Publius Servilius Vatia Isauricus (consul 48 BC)

Publius Servilius Vatia Isauricus was a Roman consul elected in 48 BC along with Gaius Julius Caesar. He is generally regarded as a puppet of Caesar, having a long friendship with the Dictator. He was the son of Publius Servilius Vatia Isauricus.

In 54 BC Vatia was praetor. As praetor he opposed Gaius Pomptinus in his endeavour to obtain a triumph. At the start of the civil war, Vatia defected from the optimates to Caesar. Caesar made him his colleague as consul for 48 BC. Caesar soon left Rome to fight Pompey in Greece and left Vatia in command of the city.

Vatia Isauricus became a very controversial figure after Caesar left him in Rome as the sole head of state while Caesar went to do battle with Gnaeus Pompeius Magnus. Along with Gaius Trebonius, Vatia Isauricus was seen as the perpetrator of the complete destruction of the Roman economy in the 1st century BC, and was the target of the populist leader and magistrate Marcus Caelius Rufus who led a mob against the regime in 48 BC.

In March, Caelius began talking of abolishing all debt in the city, as even the upper classes had begun to feel the pressure of money, Marcus Tullius Cicero's wife Terentia was forced to sell most of her jewelry. Caelius had no jurisdiction on the standing of debts, his only magistracy being in the administration of foreigners in Rome. Trebonius was to handle debts.

After setting up a tribunal within earshot of Trebonius's in the Forum for the second time, Vatia Isauricus himself went to the Forum to confront the rogue magistrate, followed by a retinue of fasces-wielding guards. After a heated argument on the tribunal, Vatia Isauricus famously pulled an axe out of one of the fasces and destroyed Caelius's wooden magistrate's chair. Caelius and Vatia Isauricus nearly came to blows, and the mob became so confrontational with the Consul that the guards actually needed to unsheathe their axes to ward off the mobbing crowd.

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