The gens Helvia was a plebeian family at Rome. This gens is first mentioned at the time of the Second Punic War, but the only member of the family to hold any curule magistracy under the Republic was Gaius Helvius, praetor in BC 198. Soon afterward, the family slipped into obscurity, from which it was redeemed by the emperor Pertinax, nearly four centuries later.
The Helvii of the Republic are known to have used the praenomina Gnaeus, Gaius, and Marcus.
Branches and cognomina
The surnames of the Helvii under the Republic included Blasio, Cinna, and Mancia, but several of the family appear without a cognomen.
This list includes abbreviated praenomina. For an explanation of this practice, see filiation.
Gnaeus Helvius, a military tribune who was slain in battle against the Gauls and Carthaginians near Mediolanum in 203 BC.
Gaius Helvius, praetor in BC 198, with Cato the Elder, his colleague as plebeian aedile the previous year. He accompanied the consul Sextus Aelius Paetus into Cisalpine Gaul, and received command of one of the consul's armies. Nine years later, in 189, he was legate to the consul Gnaeus Manlius Vulso in Galatia.
Marcus Helvius Blasio, plebeian aedile in BC 198, and praetor in 197, assigned the province of Hispania Ulterior. On his return home in 195, he was attacked by an army of 20,000 Celtiberi near the town of Illiturgi in Hispania Citerior; his guard of 6,000 defeated the Celtiberi and took the town. He was awarded an ovation, and in 194 was one of the commissioners for founding the colony of Sipontum in Apulia.
Helvius Mancia, an orator of some cleverness, whose poor appearance was mocked by either Gaius Julius Caesar Strabo, with whom he was engaged in a lawsuit, or (according to Pliny), by Lucius Licinius Crassus, the orator, about BC 90.
Helvius Blasio, a friend of Decimus Junius Brutus, for whom he tried to set an example by taking his own life, when Brutus was captured by his enemies.
Gaius Helvius Cinna, a celebrated poet and friend of Catullus. He is frequently supposed to have been the same as the tribune of the plebs named Helvius Cinna, who being mistaken for the praetor Lucius Cornelius Cinna, who had delivered an incendiary speech against Caesar on the day before his murder, was pulled from Caesar's funeral procession and killed by the mob; but there remains some doubt as to whether the poet was the same man.
Helvius Successus, father of the emperor Pertinax, was a freedman, who worked as a wool merchant and charcoal-burner at Alba Pompeia.
Publius Helvius Pertinax, emperor from January to March, AD 193. After an illustrious military and political career, he was proclaimed emperor following the murder of Commodus, and embarked upon a series of reforms; but in his haste he quickly made enemies, and was soon dispatched by the Praetorian Guard.
