The son was born in the year 479: his various epistles as quaestor, master of the offices, and Praetorian praefect, extend from 509 to 539, and he lived as a monk about thirty years, (Tiraboschi Storia della Letteratura Italiana, tom.iii.

p.
7--24.

Fabricius, Bibliot.Lat.Med.Aevi, tom.i.p.357, 358, edit.
Mansi.)] [Footnote 5711: Cassiodorus was of an ancient and honorable family; his grandfather had distinguished himself in the defence of Sicily against the ravages of Genseric; his father held a high rank at the court of Valentinian III., enjoyed the friendship of Aetius, and was one of the ambassadors sent to arrest the progress of Attila.

Cassiodorus himself was first the treasurer of the private expenditure to Odoacer, afterwards "count of the sacred largesses." Yielding with the rest of the Romans to the dominion of Theodoric, he was instrumental in the peaceable submission of Sicily; was successively governor of his native provinces of Bruttium and Lucania, quaestor, magister, palatii, Praetorian praefect, patrician, consul, and private secretary, and, in fact, first minister of the king.

He was five times Praetorian praefect under different sovereigns, the last time in the reign of Vitiges.