His first known magistracy was the
quaestorship, in 105 or 104 BC, with most scholars now settling on 104 based on historical context (contemporaneous reports of a grain shortage) and numismatic evidence. The argument that he held the quaestorship in 105 BC is largely based on the constitutional argument that he could not have announced his candidacy as a serving quaestor. However, if elections for the tribunate occurred between 5–9 December 104 BC, his quaestorship would have by that point expired and he would have then assumed the tribunate within days of his election. During his quaestorship he was assigned the task of arranging the transport of grain from
Ostia up the River
Tiber to Rome. But amid a rise in grain prices caused by a
slave revolt in Sicily, the senate reassigned the task from him to the aged and influential
Marcus Aemilius Scaurus. While some sources such as
Diodorus Siculus report that he was removed for incompetence or negligence, the gravity of the grain shortage itself could have caused his duties to be transferred to a more senior man. He may also have been dismissed for insubordination, as he is recorded as having minted coins to defray expenses without senatorial authorisation. The exact cause aside, Saturninus felt that he had been rebuked and repositioned himself in an anti-senatorial political position.
First tribunate Elected to the plebeian tribunate of 103 BC, he likely sought to build support among the urban poor (the ) by bringing a grain bill early in his term. The bill sought an unprecedentedly large subsidy for grain purchases at Rome, cutting the Gracchan-era subsidised price into an eighth. The costs of the proposal immediately raised attention and one of the serving
urban quaestors reported, whether falsely or otherwise is not known, that the treasury would not be able to bear such expenses; the senate then voted that bringing the proposal before the people would be against the interests of the republic. Although Saturninus moved for a vote on his proposal anyway, his legislative assembly was disrupted by violence. The senate instead, based on numismatic evidence, ordered coining of money to pay for the purchase of grain from abroad, which likely won the senatorial leaders around Scaurus support among the urban poor. Seeking instead to find support among the rural plebs, he then proposed two laws: one to distribute lands to
Gaius Marius' veterans from the Jugurthine war (though this law may instead date to 100 BC) and another to establish a permanent tribunal for treason charges. He also likely brought successful legislation to exile the ex-consul
Gnaeus Mallius Maximus. The Jugurthine land bill, if passed this year, won him considerable popularity among Marius' veterans, who were likely still encamped around Italy pending possible remobilisation to fight the
Cimbri. Archaeological evidence of colonies in
Africa for Marian veterans have been dated with some dispute to shortly after 103 BC. He also found a man called Equitius to pose as the biological son of
Tiberius Gracchus in an effort to associate himself with the Gracchi. Definitely of low status and possibly a freedman, when this Equitius was presented before the
censor Quintus Caecilius Metellus Numidicus for registration, Numidicus refused to enrol him and pronounced him a fraud, triggering violent protests. After his tribunate, he was prosecuted for having mistreated ambassadors from the
Pontic kingdom of
Mithridates. His popularity at this point was likely at an ebb, leaving him open to prosecution. Painting himself as a victim of a powerful corrupt clique in the senate, was able to build up enough support to secure an acquittal. Numidicus, as censor, also attempted to expel him and his buddying political ally
Gaius Servilius Glaucia from the senate but was stopped by his censorial colleague. Glaucia was elected in 101 BC to the plebeian tribunate and arranged the assassination of one of the tribunes-designate so that Saturninus could be elected in the now vacated place. Appian's report that Saturninus would have lost but for the assassination of the tribune-designate, one Aulus Nonius, may suggest that Saturninus' popularity among the electorate was weak.
Second tribunate Upon his entrance to the tribunate of 100 BC, he formed a political alliance with Gaius Marius, then returning from victory in the
Cimbrian War. In support of Marius, Saturninus proposed legislation to establish new colonies to reward Marius' veterans in
Cisalpine Gaul and also outside of Italy. It also gave Marius the power to extend the citizenship to recipients so to allow them to settle on the Roman lands they received. The provisions allowing for the extension of the citizenship further inflamed the , always jealous of their citizen privileges, against Saturninus; to secure the passage of the law, Saturninus had to send messengers into the countryside to organise Marian veterans to come to the city. Ignoring contrary omens and rallying a mob to defeat the urban crowd's attempt to disrupt his voting assembly, his rural plebs and veterans forced the urban plebs out and passed the law, probably in January or March. One of the clauses of the law required all senators to swear an oath to uphold the law. Numidicus, who refused to swear the oath, possibly on grounds that it was passed by violence or procedurally deficient, left for exile. Numidicus, a friend of the urban plebs, may have withdrawn from the city to spare it further fighting between rural and urban factions. Regardless, Saturninus moved legislation to send Numidicus into exile by denying him fire and water (). He did not engage in any other legislative activities for the year, possibly due to his mass of supporters among the rural plebs having returning to their farms, but was able to secure a third term as tribune at the tribunician elections.
Death The date of Saturninus' death is disputed. If Appian is to be believed, it occurred on 10 December, the day on which he was to enter a third plebeian tribunate and a day after the consular for that year. The dating of the death to December is unlikely: Appian is ignorant of the delay between election and inauguration; consular elections in December are too late; the afternoon when the riot was suppressed was hot, unlikely in December; Equitius, who had also won election as tribune for 99 BC, according to other sources had not yet come into office; and one Saufeius was still quaestor, meaning that 5 December had not yet passed. A date in September or October 100 BC is more likely.
Reconstructions The inciting incident of the riot was Saturninus' occupation of the
Capitoline hill after the killing of one of the candidates in the consulship of that year, the former rabble-rousing tribune of 111 BC,
Gaius Memmius Regulus. There are two major reconstructions of the events. The first is based on the narrative from Appian and the
Livian tradition (represented by Florus, the
Periochae, and Orosius). The second is a deduced reconstruction of events the classicist
Ernst Badian. In Appian and the Livian tradition, after Marcus Antonius is elected as consul-designate, Saturninus and Glaucia summon their supporters to disrupt the electoral assembly. In Appian, this is because it appears that Memmius is to win and therefore preclude Glaucia from becoming consul. They therefore murder him to prevent him from securing that slot. Afterwards, with the urban plebs gathering to kill Saturninus in retribution, they flee to and fortify themselves upon the Capitoline. It is claimed that he was then there proclaimed and by his followers, both of which are almost certainly inventions from a hostile tradition. The narrative from Appian and Livy is problematic and has been challenged as contradictory with Cicero's descriptions, generally of higher quality, of the same events. In Badian's reconstruction, Saturinius' ally Glaucia, one of the sitting praetors, had sought to offer himself as a candidate for the consulship. Gaius Marius, who was to be president of the consular , refused on the grounds of illegality; moreover, a constellation of Glaucia as consul with Saturninus and Equitius as tribunes would be politically unacceptable for Marius and the aristocracy whose approval he was courting. The occupation of the hill was meant to secure the voting location so to induce an assembly to pass a directing Marius to accept Glaucia's candidature. However, since the day for the elections had already been set, no legislation could be moved. Saturninus and Glaucia therefore conspired to incite a riot: it would disrupt the elections, allowing them to pass their bill; and also it would create an opportunity to kill Memmius, who was a political rival. Believing that Marius would do nothing due to their status as sitting magistrates and his unwillingness to intervene after they killed Aulus Nonius at the tribunician elections the previous year, they did not believe there would be a serious response to their tactics.
Surrender and death Whatever motives Saturninus and Glaucia had, after a battle in the forum and their occupation of the Capitoline, their actions had clearly gone too far. Appian describes the urban plebs, enemies of Saturninus and friends of Memmius, as already gathering to storm the hill and lynch Saturninus and Glaucia. The senate also resolved decisively in favour of police action against the murderers. Marcus Aemilius Scaurus, still , played a central role in corralling opinion at a senate meeting towards a . Marius, hesitating likely due to the unprecedented actions he was to perform, conducted a short levy of the urban citizenry, likely including his own veterans, and gave a speech which was successful in dispersing many of Saturninus' rural supporters. They then surrounded the Capitoline and cut the water supply to the hill. With shortage of water and surrounded by armed troops, Saturninus and his supporters surrendered. Faced with demands to execute the , Marius instead promised safety pending trial and moved them to the senate house in the forum, the . However, an urban mob – while some senators participated it is not clear that the ruling oligarchy organised the mob – stormed the senate house and with tiles killed Saturninus and his allies. == Family ==