Gaius Claudius Marcellus (consul 50 BC)

He was a direct descendant of consul Marcus Claudius Marcellus. His grandfather was also named Marcus; his father was Gaius and his mother was named Junia.

From his first unnamed wife, Marcellus had a daughter who married the Roman senator Sextus Quinctilius Varus, who served as a Quaestor in 49 BC. He was a grandfather to the Roman general Publius Quinctilius Varus and his three sisters.[1] He later married Octavia the Younger, a great-niece of Julius Caesar, sister of Octavian, and a child of the Roman consul Gaius Octavius, in an arranged ceremony. Octavia bore Marcellus three known surviving children: a son, Marcus, and two daughters, both named Claudia Marcella, born in Rome. However, according to the anonymous Περὶ τοῦ καισαρείου γένους Octavia bore Marcellus four sons and four daughters.[2][3]

In 54 BC the great-uncle of Octavia, Julius Caesar, was said to be anxious for Octavia to divorce Marcellus so that she could marry Pompey, his rival and son-in-law who had just lost his wife Julia (daughter of Caesar and thus Octavia's cousin once removed). However, Pompey apparently declined the proposal and Octavia's husband continued to oppose Julius Caesar, culminating in the crucial year of his consulship in 50 BC when he tried to recall Julius Caesar from his ten-year governorship in Gaul two years early, without his army, in an attempt to save the Roman Republic. Failing this, he called unsuccessfully upon Caesar to resign.

He also obstructed Caesar from standing for a second consulship in absentia, insisting that he should return to Rome to stand, thereby forgoing the protection of his armies in Gaul. When Caesar finally invaded Italy in 49 BC, Marcellus, unlike his brother and nephew, did not take up arms against him. Caesar subsequently pardoned him.

In 46 BC, with the help of other senators including Cicero (in the latter's Pro Marcello), Gaius was able to intercede with Caesar for his cousin M. Claudius Marcellus, a former consul of 51 BC and a fervent anti-Caesarian, who was at the time living in exile in Mytilene. Gaius died in May 40 BC; five months later, his widow, Octavia, married the triumvir Mark Antony.