Lucullus has been described as "an enigma", as the only definite fact known about him is Suetonius' report that the emperor Domitian had him executed for allowing a new type of lance to be named after him.
Ronald Syme, noting the difficulty of polyonymous names, proposed identifying Lucullus with a known suffect consul of 89, Publius Sallustius Blaesus.
[5] However, P. Conole and Brian Jones point out since the records of the Arval Brethren "record his presence in Rome during every year of the first half of Domitian's reign for which complete minutes have survived, it is difficult to see how he could have managed to gain sufficient provincial experience in praetorian posts to merit appointment to Britain, an Imperial consular province.
An inscription from Chichester, recorded by Samuel Woodford in his Inscriptionum Romano-Britannicarum Conllectio (1658) but since lost, refers to Sallustius Lucullus, giving his praenomen as Gaius and describing him as a propraetorian legate of the emperor Domitian.
Jones proposes the following theory: Lucullus opposed Domitian's plans to move the frontier of Roman Britain south to a more defensible location; these views and associated acts were reported by Karus; the emperor Domitian saw this opposition as treason, and gave Karus orders to eliminate Lucullus, who was rewarded generously.
Sallustius (or his unknown predecessor, if one existed) may have attempted to consolidate Agricola's victories in Scotland by building the Glen Forts which Peter Salway dates to his rule.
Forts at Ardoch and Dalswinton in southern Scotland, which Agricola had built, were extensively rebuilt in the late 80s and evidence of improvements of other military installations in the region points to a strong presence in the Scots Lowlands.