Lucius Vipstanus Messalla (orator)

Lucius Vipstanus Messalla (c. 45 – c. 80) was a military officer, politician and a noted orator.

Biography

Vipstanus Messalla is presumed to be the son of Gaius Vipstanus Messalla Gallus. In AD 69, he was a tribunus militum stationed with the legion VII Claudia in Moesia which entered the civil war against the emperor Vitellius. He was temporarily in command of the legion in September and October 69, after the legion's Legate was forced to flee; later, Messalla wrote an account of the campaign.

Vipstanus Messalla was a friend of the historian Tacitus, who used Messalla's account of the campaign in his own work on the Histories. Tacitius described Messalla as an outstanding orator; in AD 70, Vipstanus Messalla, who was not yet of senatorial age, defended his older step-brother, the notorious informer Lucius Aquilius Regulus in the Curia Julia. Massalla's family's prestiege was sufficient to sway enough of the Senate to reject the charges laid against Regulus.

Vipstanus Messalla probably died during the reign of Titus, possibly during the plague that swept through the city in AD 80. He had at least one son, also named Lucius Vipstanus Messalla.