Marcus Vipsanius Agrippa was a Roman consul, architect and military leader whose feats in war assured the ascendancy of Octavian, later the Emperor Augustus, and whose influence with the Emperor was rivaled only by that of Maecenas.
Background
Marcus Vipsanius Agrippa was born about 63 B.C. in an uncertain location, possibly in Arpino, Istria or Asisium. His father was perhaps called Lucius Vipsanius Agrippa. He had an elder brother whose name was also Lucius Vipsanius Agrippa, and a sister named Vipsania Polla.
Education
Agrippa was educated with Octavian (the future emperor Augustus) at Apollonia, and the two became close friends.
Career
In the struggle for power after Julius Caesar’s death, Agrippa served as one of Octavian’s key military commanders. In 41–40 he fought against Mark Antony’s brother Lucius.
In 40 he held the post of praetor urbanus (magistrate mainly in charge of administration of justice at Rome) and was a major figure in negotiating a settlement between Octavian and Antony at Brundisium.
In 39 - 38 b.c. Agrippa put down a rising of the Aquitanians in Gaul, and crossed the Rhine to punish the aggressions of the Germans.
On his return in 37 b.c. he refused a triumph but accepted the consulship.
At this time Sextus Pompeius, second son of Pompeius the Great, with whom war was imminent, had command of the sea on the coasts of Italy. Sextus Pompeius had built up a strong naval force and was threatening Rome's grain supply and other sea communications. Agrippa constructed a great naval base near Baiae, on the bay of Naples, and finally crushed Sextus off Sicily.
In 35-33 b.c. Agrippa led an army against the Illyrians, a people in what is now the Balkans.
He was again called away to take command of the fleet when the war with Antony broke out in 31 b.c. The victory at Actium, which gave the mastery of Rome and the empire of the world to Octavian, was mainly due to Agrippa. Probably in commemoration of the battle of Actium, Agrippa built and dedicated the Pantheum still in existence as La Rotonda.
In 29–28 Agrippa and Octavian jointly conducted a census and carried out a purge of the Senate; in 28 and 27 Agrippa held the consulate again, both times with Octavian (from 27, Augustus) as his colleague. In 23, a year of constitutional crisis, Augustus fell ill and presented his signet ring to Agrippa, who seemed thus to be designated the emperor’s successor.
Agrippa's friendship with Augustus seems to have been clouded by the jealousy of Augustus' nephew Marcus Claudius Marcellus. The result was that Agrippa left Rome, ostensibly to take over the governorship of Syria - a sort of honourable exile; but as a matter of fact he only sent his legate to the East, while he himself remained at Lesbos.
On the death of Marcellus, which took place within a year, in 22, he was recalled to Rome by Augustus, who found he could not dispense with his services. The emperor himself left for the East in 22. Before Augustus’ return, in 19, Agrippa had left for Gaul and Spain. In Spain Agrippa was employed in putting down a rising of the Cantabrians. Returning to Rome in 18, Agrippa received the power of a tribune (tribunicia potestas), which Augustus also possessed.
He participated in Augustus’ celebration of the Secular Games at Rome in 17, after which he returned to the East as vicegerent of the emperor. In 15 he accepted an invitation from Herod I the Great to visit Judaea; while in the East, he established colonies of veterans at Berytus and Heliopolis, in Lebanon. He next settled an uprising in the Bosporan kingdom on the Black Sea and set up the cultivated dynast Polemo as king.
In 13 Agrippa’s tribunicia potestas was renewed, and at this time without doubt he received (or had renewed) a grant of imperium majus. Troubles in Pannonia required his presence, but the rigours of the winter of 13–12 caused a fatal illness; he died in March of 12 b.c. Augustus honoured his memory by a magnificent funeral.
Agrippa was also known as a writer, especially on geography. Under his supervision, Julius Caesar's design of having a complete survey of the empire made was carried out. Amongst his writings an autobiography, now lost.
Achievements
Politics
In Roman politics Agrippa had been the right-hand man of Rome's first emperor for almost 30 years. He held the office of consul, or chief magistrate, three times (37, 28, 27 b.c.) and the aedileship, in charge of grain supplies, public works, and public games, in 33 b.c.
Agrippa's campaign of public repairs and improvements included renovation and building aqueducts, one of which was the Aqua Marcia. He was concerned with enlarging and cleaning the Cloaca Maxima, constructing baths and porticos, and laying out gardens, and became the first water commissioner of Rome in 33 b.c. Through his actions, the streets were repaired and the sewers were cleaned out.
Agrippa was a staunch supporter of the public exhibition of works of art.
Connections
Agrippa had several children through his three marriages. By his first wife, Caecilia Attica, he had a daughter, Vipsania Agrippina, who was to be the first wife of the Emperor Tiberius, and who gave birth to a son, Drusus the Younger.
By his second wife, Claudia Marcella Major, he may have had a daughter, whose existence remains unclear, but this hypothetical figure is referred to as "Vipsania Marcella".
It is possible that this daughter may have been a second daughter by Caecilia Attica, but there is no information to say one way or the other.
By his third wife, Julia the Elder (daughter of Augustus), he had five children: Gaius Caesar, Julia the Younger, Lucius Caesar, Agrippina the Elder (wife of Germanicus, mother of the Emperor Caligula and Empress Agrippina the Younger), and Agrippa Postumus (a posthumous son).