In 17/16 BC Lollius was appointed by Augustus as governor of Gaul. During his governorship, he was responsible for several legions who guarded the Rhine river. His legions were defeated by the Germanic tribes--the Sicambri, Tencteri and Usipetes--that had crossed the Rhine. The military defeat that Lollius suffered, known as the "clades Lolliana", is coupled by Suetonius with the disaster of Publius Quinctilius Varus, but it was disgraceful rather than dangerous. Augustus dispatched his step-son Tiberius to rectify the situation and to regain the captured standard of the Legio V Macedonica. On the arrival of Tiberius, the Germanic tribes retired beyond the Rhine. Although the political and military career of Lollius suffered, and he was never again given command of an army, he remained on friendly terms with Augustus.