Gaius Calpetanus Rantius Quirinalis Valerius Festus

He proved his value to the Flavians when, as legatus legionis, or commander, of Legio III Augusta stationed in Africa, he assassinated the proconsul, who favored a rival of Vespasian during the Year of Four Emperors.

Olli Salomies has argued that the name given to him at birth was Valerius Festus, and he was adopted by Gaius Calpetanus Rantius Sedatus, suffect consul for the nundinium of March to April 47.

Festus, who had been waiting at Adrumetum to learn the outcome of events in Carthage, then proceeded to the camp of Legio III Augusta and took control of the unit.

[5] Valerius Festus began to "punish and reward", as Tacitus puts it, and drove out the Garamantes, who had been called to help by the numerically weaker Oeae in the dispute between the inhabitants of Oea and Leptis Magna .

In the year 70 AD, when fighting the Garamantes, he did a famous expedition to sub-Saharan Africa probably reaching what is now Nigeria, according to historians Susan Ravel and Fage.

Indeed Pliny wrote that in 70 AD a legatus legionis, or commander, of the Legio III Augusta named Festus repeated the Balbus expedition toward the Niger River.

Gadoufaoua (Touareg for “the place where camels fear to go”) is a site in the Tenere desert of Niger known for its extensive fossil graveyard, where remains of Sarcosuchus imperator, popularly known as SuperCroc, have been found).