{{Short description|Early 2nd century Roman senator and suffect consul}} '''Acilius Rufus''' is the name of a Roman senator, who was suffect consul in the ''nundinium'' of March to April 107; it unclear which consul ''ordinarius'' of the year Rufus replaced, Lucius Licinius Sura or Quintus Sosius Senecio.<ref>Alison E. Cooley, ''The Cambridge Manual of Latin Epigraphy'' (Cambridge: University Press, 2012), p. 468</ref> The expert consensus agrees that Rufus should be identified with the Acilius Rufus whom Pliny the Younger mentions in his letters on the trial of Varenus Rufus who was prosecuted for malfeasance while governor of Bithynia and Pontus.<ref>''Epistulae'', V.20; VI.13</ref>
There is disagreement over identifying Acilius Rufus the consul with one Lucius Acilius Rufus, a senator known from an inscription from Thermae Himeraeae.<ref>{{CIL|10|7334}}</ref> This inscription attests that this Acilius Rufus held the traditional republican magistracies of quaestor of Sicilia, plebeian tribune, praetor, and prefect of the ''frumenti dandi ex senatus consultum''. Although there appears to be no reason not to identify this person with the consul, Ronald Syme objects arguing that the first suffect consul of a year was a very prestigious post, and that having been quaestor of Sicilia and prefect of the ''frumenti dandi'', Acilius Rufus lacked sufficient esteem for him to achieve that prestigious rank of suffect consuls.<ref>Syme, [https://www.jstor.org/stable/20184192 "Superior Suffect Consuls"], ''Zeitschrift für Papyrologie und Epigraphik'', 58 (1985), pp. 239f</ref> As a result, he notes the existence of one Marcus Acilius Rufus of Saguntum who was an imperial procurator, and proposes that a hypothetical descendant of this procurator was suffect consul for this ''nundinium'' of 107.<ref>Syme, "Superior Suffect Consuls", p. 241</ref>
Despite his proven discernment for the evidence, Syme appears to depend too heavily on an argument from silence{{mdash}}especially as we know so little about many consuls of this time{{mdash}}to not allow for the vagaries of life. In this case, Licinius Sura vanishes from the record after his consulate, so it is possible he died unexpectedly in March 107 and the consular Acilius Rufus, who is attested as replacing a single consul, may have been selected at the last moment to complete the ''nundinium''. In any case, lack of evidence prevents more than guesses.
== References == {{Reflist}}
{{s-start}} {{s-off}} {{s-bef|before=Lucius Licinius Sura III,<br/>and Quintus Sosius Senecio II|as=ordinary consuls}} {{s-ttl|title=Suffect consul of the Roman Empire |years=107}} {{s-aft|after=Gaius Minicius Fundanus, and<br/> Titus Vettennius Severus|as=suffect consuls}} {{s-end}}
{{DEFAULTSORT:Acilius Rufus, Lucius}} Category:1st-century Romans Category:2nd-century Romans Category:Suffect consuls of Imperial Rome Rufus, Lucius Acilius