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Historical person
c. 2nd century–238
Pupienus was an experienced Roman senator and former urban prefect who became joint emperor with Balbinus during the crisis of AD 238. The senate selected them to resist Maximinus Thrax, and Pupienus travelled north to organise defence while Balbinus remained in Rome. After Maximinus’s murder, the two emperors returned in triumph but continued to distrust each other. The Praetorian Guard seized and killed them, placing the young Gordian III on the throne.
Pupienus appears in Harry Sidebottom’s Throne of the Caesars series. Fiction commonly presents him as the more military and severe of the two senatorial emperors, capable of confronting Maximinus but unable to control Rome. His fate illustrates how success against an external claimant did not resolve the conflict between senate, crowd and guard.
In Harry Sidebottom’s Fire and Sword, after the defeat of the Gordians, the Senate appoints Pupienus and Balbinus, while Maximinus Thrax advances into Italy and the young Gordian III becomes the focus of popular and dynastic hopes. Harry Sidebottom’s Blood and Steel is set in AD 238 opposition to Maximinus Thrax turns into open revolt.
Series
The Throne of the Caesars trilogy follows the collapse of the Severan settlement and the political violence that carried Rome from the murder of Severus Alexander in AD 235 to the Year of the Six Emperors in 238. Its viewpoint moves among emperors, soldiers, senators, provincial officials and…
All books in this series
