Lollia Paulina
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Lollia Paulina (PIR2 L 308) (? - AD 49) was an Empress, and third wife to Emperor Caligula. Her father, Marcus Lollius was a formal consul, and her mother was a distant cousin to Emperor Tiberius. She became quite rich as the heir of their estates. Her sister Lollia Saturnina married Decimus Valerius Asiaticus, consul in 35 and 46, to whom she bore a son.
Her first husband was a consul and a Roman Governor, Publius Memmius Regulus. Caligula ordered her from him, after Caligula heard a remark on how beautiful her grandmother was. Caligula married her in 38 AD. After 6 months he divorced because she was infertile. Caligula forbade her to sleep with or go near a man.
In later years, she a became a rival to Agrippina the Younger and was considered a choice for wife for Emperor Claudius. In 49 AD, Agrippina the Younger charged her with black magic. She didn't get a hearing. Her property was confiscated and she left Italy. On orders she committed suicide.
She is mentioned in Pliny the Elder's Natural history as an example of ostentation, reportedly wearing a large share of her inheritance to a dinner party in the form of jewelry, worth some 40 million sesterces.
[edit] Reference
- E. Groag, A. Stein, L. Petersen - e.a. (edd.), Prosopographia Imperii Romani saeculi I, II et III, Berlin, 1933 - . (PIR2)
