[2] Because the last known member of the republican and Patrician family of the Fabii was Paullus Fabius Persicus who died in the reign of Claudius, it is likely that Cilo was descended from one of the clientes or freedmen of that house.
Next he received a commission as military tribune with Legio XI Claudia, which was stationed at Durostorum (modern Silistra) in Moesia Inferior, on the southern banks of the Danube.
The first appointment Cilo received after concluding his duties as praetor was as legatus legionis or commander of Legio XVI Flavia Firma, which was stationed in Roman Syria.
[9] A third time the two were in near proximity was when Cilo governed Narbonensis and Severus was legatus or governor of the adjacent province of Gallia Lugdunensis.
Birley suggests the reason Cilo received the slain emperor's body was because by this time he was a member of the sodalis Hadrianalis (a priestly order that other sources say he belonged to) and had placed it in the Mausoleum of Hadrian, where a funerary inscription for Commodus can be found.
The following year he fought against Severus' rival Pescennius Niger near Perinthus, and his troops suffered heavy casualties.
[13] An army drawn from the legions garrisoned along the Danube under Tiberius Claudius Candidus arrived to relieve Cilo, and in Autumn 194 crossed the Sea of Marmara, outflanking Niger.
Following this victory, Cilo was made governor of Bithynia and Pontus, securing the rear of the advancing Septimian forces.
[17] While in that office, he saved the life of procurator and, later, emperor Marcus Opellius Macrinus when his patron Gaius Fulvius Plautianus fell into disgrace.
This domus, showed also in the Forma Urbis Romae, is under the basilica and the monastery of Santa Balbina, and was close to the horti Ciloniae Fabiae.