DIO'S ROME
AN
HISTORICAL NARRATIVE
ORIGINALLY COMPOSED IN GREEK
DURING THE REIGNS OF
SEPTIMIUS SEVERUS, GETA
AND CARACALLA, MACRINUS,
ELAGABALUS AND ALEXANDER SEVERUS:
AND
NOW PRESENTED IN ENGLISH FORM
BY
HERBERT BALDWIN FOSTER,
A.B. (Harvard), Ph.D. (Johns Hopkins),
Acting Professor of Greek in Lehigh University
FIFTH VOLUME: Extant Books 61-76 (A.D. 54-211).
1906
DURATION OF TIME
M. Asinius Marcellus, Manius Acilius Aviola.
(A.D. 54 =
a.u. 807 = First of Nero, from Oct. 13th).
Nero Caesar Aug., L. Antistius Vetus.
(A.D. 55 = a.u.
808 = Second of Nero).
Q. Volusius Saturninus, P. Cornelius Scipio.
(A.D. 56 =
a.u. 809 = Third of Nero).
Nero Caesar Aug. (II), L. Calpurnius Piso.
(A.D. 57 =
a.u. 810 = Fourth of Nero).
Nero Caesar Aug. (III), M. Valerius Messala.
(A.D. 58 =
a.u. 811 = Fifth of Nero).
C. Vipsanius Apronianus, L. Fonteius Capito.
(A.D. 59 =
a.u. 812 = Sixth of Nero).
Nero Caesar Aug. (IV), Cornelius Lentulus Cossus.
(A.D.
60 = a.u. 813 = Seventh of Nero).
A.D. 54 (a.u. 807)
1
At the death of Claudius the leadership on most just
principles belonged to Britannicus, who had been born
a legitimate son of Claudius and in physical development
was beyond what would have been expected of
his years. Yet by law the power passed to Nero on
account of his adoption. No claim, indeed, is stronger
than that of arms. Every one who possesses superior
force has always the appearance of both saying and
doing what is more just. So Nero, having first disposed
of Claudius's will and having succeeded him as
master of the whole empire, put Britannicus and his
sisters out of the way. Why, then, should one stop to
lament the misfortunes of other victims?
2
The following signs of dominion had been observed in
his career. At his birth just before dawn rays not
cast by any beam of sunlight yet visible surrounded his
form. And a certain astrologer from this and from
the motion of the stars at that time and their relation
to one another divined two things in regard to him,--that
he would rule and that he would murder his
mother. Agrippina on hearing this became for the
moment so beside herself as actually to cry out: "Let
him kill me, if only he shall rule." Later she was
destined to repent bitterly of her prayer. Some people
become so steeped in folly that if they expect to obtain
some blessing mingled with evil, they at once through
their anxiety for the advantage pay no heed to the
detriment. When the time for the latter also comes,
they are cast down and would choose not to have secured
even the greatest good thing. Yet Domitius, the
father of Nero, had a sufficient previous intimation of
his son's coming baseness and licentiousness, not by
any oracle but through the nature of his own and
Agrippina's characters. And he declared: "It is impossible
for any good man to be born from me and
from her." As time went on, the finding of a serpent
skin around Nero's neck when he was but a boy caused
the seers to say: "He shall acquire great power
from the aged man." Serpents are thought to slough
off their old age with their old skin, and so get power.
3
Nero was seventeen years of age when he began to
rule. He first entered the camp, and, after reading to
the soldiers all that Seneca had written, he promised
them as much as Claudius had been accustomed to
give. Before the senate he read such a considerable
document,--this, too, written by Seneca,--that it was
voted the statements should be inscribed on a silver
tablet and should be read every time the new consuls
took up the duties of their office. Consequently those
who heard him made themselves ready to enjoy a good
reign according to the letter of the compilation. At
first Agrippina
[in company with Pallas, a vulgar and
tiresome man,]
managed all affairs pertaining to the
empire, and she and her son went about together, often
reclining in the same litter; usually, however, she
would be carried and he would follow alongside. It
was she who transacted business with embassies and
sent letters to peoples and governors and kings. When
this had gone on for a considerable time, it aroused the
displeasure of Seneca and Burrus, who were both the
most sensible and the most influential of the advisers
of Nero. The one was his teacher and the other was
prefect of the Pretorians. They took the following occasion
to stop this method of procedure. An embassy
of Armenians had arrived and Agrippina wished to
ascend the platform from which Nero was talking with
them. The two men, seeing her approach, persuaded
the young man to go down before she could reach there
and meet his mother, pretending some form of greeting.
After that was done they did not return again,
making some excuse to prevent the foreigners from
seeing the flaw in the empire. Subsequently they labored
to keep any public business from being again
committed to her hands.
4
When they had accomplished this, they themselves
took charge of the entire empire and gave it the very
best and fairest management that they could. Nero
was not in general fond of affairs and was glad to
live at leisure.
[The reason, indeed, that he had previously
distrusted his mother and now was fond of her
lay in the fact that now he was free to enjoy himself,
and the government was being carried on no less well.
And his advisers after consultation made many
changes in existing customs, abolishing some things
altogether and passing a number of new laws.]
They
let Nero sow his wild oats with the intention of bringing
about in him through the satisfaction of all his desires
a changed attitude of mind, while in the meantime
no great damage should be done to public interests.
Surely they must have known that a young and
self-willed spirit, when reared in unreproved license
and in absolute authority, so far from becoming satiated
by the indulgence of its passions is ruined more
and more by these very agencies. Indeed, Nero at first
gave but simple dinners; his revels, his drunkenness,
his amours were moderate. Afterward, as no one reproved
him for them and public business was carried
forward none the worse for all of it, he began to believe
that what he did was right and that he could carry
his practices to even greater lengths.
[Consequently
he began to indulge in each of these pursuits in a more
open and precipitate fashion. And in case his guardians
gave him any warning or his mother any rebuke,
he would appear abashed while they were present and
promise to reform; but as soon as they were gone, he
would again become the slave of his desire and yield
to those who were dragging him in the other direction,--a
straight course down hill.]
Next he came to despise
instruction, inasmuch as he was always hearing
from his associates, "Do you submit to this?" or "Do
you fear these people?", "Don't you know that you
are Caesar?", "Have not you the authority over them
rather than they over you?" He was also animated
by obstinacy, not wishing to acknowledge his mother
as superior and himself as inferior, nor to admit the
greater good sense of Seneca and Burrus.
5
Finally he passed the possibility of being shamed,
dashed to the ground and trampled under foot all their
suggestions, and began to follow in the steps of Gaius.
When he had once felt a desire to emulate him, he quite
outdid him, for he believed that the imperial power
must manifest itself among other ways by allowing
no one to surpass it even in the vilest deeds.
[As he
was praised for this by the crowds, and received many
pleasant compliments from them, he gave himself no
rest. His doings were at first confined to his home and
associates, but were later on carried abroad. Thus he
attached a mighty disgrace to the whole Roman race
and committed many outrages upon the individuals
composing it. Innumerable acts of violence and insult,
of rape and murder, were committed both by the emperor
himself and by those who at one time or another
had influence with him. And, as certainly and inevitably
follows in all such practices]
, great sums of
money naturally were spent, great sums unjustly procured,
and great sums seized by force. For under no
circumstances was Nero niggardly. Here is an illustration.
He had ordered no less than two hundred and
fifty myriads at one time to be given to Doryphorus,
who attended to the state documents of his empire.
Agrippina had it all piled in a heap, hoping by showing
him the money all together to make him change his
mind. Instead, he asked how much the mass before
him amounted to, and when he was informed he
doubled it, saying: "I was not aware that I had allowed
him so little." It can clearly be seen, then, that
as a result of the magnitude of his expenditures he
would quickly exhaust the treasures in the royal vaults
and quickly need new revenues. Hence unusual taxes
were imposed and the property of the well-to-do was
not left intact. Some lost their possessions to spite
him and others destroyed themselves with their livelihoods.
Similarly he hated and made away with some
others who had no considerable wealth; for, if they possessed
any excellent trait or were of a good family, he
became suspicious that they disliked him.
6
Such were the general characteristics of Nero. I
shall now proceed to details.
In the matter of horse-races Nero grew so enthusiastic
that he adorned famous race-horses that had
passed their prime with the regular street costume for
men and honored them with money for their fodder.
The horsebreeders and charioteers, elated at this enthusiasm
of his, proceeded to abuse unjustifiably even
the praetors and consuls. But Aulus Fabricius, when
praetor, finding that they refused to hold contests on
fair terms, dispensed with them entirely. He trained
dogs to draw chariots and introduced them in place of
horses. When this was done, the wearers of the white
and of the red immediately entered their chariots: but,
as the Greens and the Blues would not even then participate,
Nero at his own cost gave the prizes to the
horses, and the regular program of the circus was
carried out.
Agrippina showed readiness to attack the greatest
undertakings, as is evidenced by her causing the death
of Marcus Julius Silanus, to whom she sent some of
the poison with which she had treacherously murdered
her husband.
Silanus was governor of Asia, and was in no respect
inferior to the general character of his family. It was
for this, more than for anything else, she said, that she
killed him, not wishing to have him preferred before
Nero, by reason of the latter's manner of life. Moreover,
she turned everything into trade and gathered
money from the most insignificant and basest sources.
Laelianus, who was despatched to Armenia in place
of Pollio, had been assigned to the command of the
night watch. And he was no better than Pollio, for,
while surpassing him in reputation, he was all the
more insatiable in respect to gain.
A.D. 55 (a.u. 808)
7
Agrippina found a grievance in the fact that she
was no longer supreme in affairs of the palace. It was
chiefly because of Acte. Acte had been brought as a
slave from Asia. She caught the fancy of Nero, was
adopted into the family of Attalus, and was cherished
much more carefully than was Nero's wife Octavia.
Agrippina, indignant at this and at other matters, first
attempted to rebuke him, and set herself to humiliating
his associates, some by beatings and by getting rid
of others. But when she accomplished nothing, she
took it greatly to heart and remarked to him: "It
was I who made you emperor," just as if she had the
power to take away the authority from him again. She
did not comprehend that every form of independent
power given to any one by a private citizen immediately
ceases to be the property of the giver and belongs
to the one who receives it to use against his benefactor.
Britannicus Nero murdered treacherously by poison,
and then, as the skin was turned livid by the action of
the drug, he smeared the body with gypsum. But as it
was being carried through the Forum a heavy rain
falling while the gypsum was still damp washed it all
away, so that the horror was exposed not only to comment
but to view.
[After Britannicus was dead Seneca
and Burrus ceased to give careful attention to public
interests and were satisfied if they might manage them
conservatively and still preserve their lives. Consequently
Nero now made himself conspicuous by giving
free rein to all his desires without fear of retribution.
His behavior began to be absolutely insensate, as is
shown, for instance, by his punishing a certain knight,
Antonius, as a seller of poisons and by further burning
the poisons publicly. He took great credit for this
action as well as for prosecuting some persons who
had tampered with wills; but other people only laughed
to see him punishing his own acts in the persons of
others.]
8
His secret acts of licentiousness were many, both at
home and throughout the City, by night and by day.
He used to frequent the taverns and wandered about
everywhere like a private person. Any number of
beatings and insults took place in this connection and
the evil spread to the theatres, so that those who
worked as dancers and who had charge of the horses
paid no attention either to praetors or to consuls.
They were disorderly themselves and led others to be
the same, while Nero not only did not restrain them
even by words, but stirred them up all the more. He
delighted in their actions and used to be secretly conveyed
in a litter into the theatres, where unseen by the
rest he watched the proceedings. Indeed, he forbade
the soldiers who had usually been in attendance at all
public gatherings to appear there any longer. The
reason he assigned was that they ought not to superintend
anything but strictly military affairs, but his
true purpose was to afford those who wished to raise
a disturbance the amplest scope. He made use of the
same excuse in reference to his not allowing any
soldier to attend his mother, saying that no one except
the emperor ought to be guarded by them. In this
way he displayed his enmity toward the masses, and
as for his mother he was already openly at variance
with her. Everything that they said to each other,
or that the imperial pair did each day, was reported
outside the palace, yet it did not all reach the public
and hence conjectures were made to supply missing
details and different versions arose. What was conceivable
as happening, in view of the baseness and
lewdness of the pair, was noised abroad as having
already taken place, and reports possessing some credibility
were believed as true. The populace, seeing
Agrippina now for the first time without Pretorians,
took care not to fall in with her even by accident; and
if any one did chance to meet her he would hastily get
out of the way without saying a word.
9
At one spectacle men on horseback overcame bulls
while riding along beside them, and the knights who
served as Nero's personal guard brought down with
their javelins four hundred bears and three hundred
lions. On the same occasion thirty knights belonging
to the military fought in the arena. The emperor
sanctioned such proceedings openly. Secretly, however,
he carried on nocturnal revels throughout the
length and breadth of the city, insulting the women,
practicing lewdness on boys, stripping those whom he
encountered, striking, wounding, murdering. He had
an idea that his incognito was impenetrable, for he
used all sorts of different costumes and false hair at
different times: but he would be recognized by his
retinue and by his deeds. No one else would have
dared to commit so many and such gross outrages so
recklessly. A.D. 56 (a.u. 809)
It was becoming unsafe even for a person
to stay at home, since he would break into shops and
houses. It came about that a certain Julius Montanus,
[1]
a senator, enraged on his wife's account, fell upon this
reveler and inflicted many blows upon him, so that he
had to remain several days in concealment by reason
of the black eyes he had received. Montanus did not
suffer for it, since Nero thought the violence had been
all an accident and was for showing no anger at the
occurrence, had not the other sent him a letter begging
his pardon. Nero on reading the epistle remarked:
"So he knew that he was striking Nero." The suicide
of Montanus followed hard after.
A.D. 57 (a.u. 810)
In the course of producing a spectacle at one of the
theatres, he suddenly filled the place with sea-water so
that the fishes and sea-monsters
[2]
swam in it, and had a
naval battle between "Persians" and "Athenians."
At the close of it he suddenly withdrew the water,
dried the subsoil, and continued land contests, not only
between two men at a time but with crowds pitted
against other crowds.
A.D. 58 (a.u. 811)
10
Subsequent to this, oratorical contests took place,
and as a result even of these numbers were exiled and
put to death.--Seneca also was held to account, one of
the charges against him being that he was intimate
with Agrippina.
[It had not been enough for him to
debauch Julia, nor had he become better as a result
of exile, but he went on to make advances to such a
woman as Agrippina, with such a son.]
Not only in
this instance but in others he was convicted of doing
precisely the opposite of what he taught in his philosophical
doctrines. He brought accusations against
tyranny, yet he made himself a teacher of tyrants: he
denounced such of his associates as were powerful,
yet he did not hold aloof from the palace himself: he
had nothing good to say of flatterers, yet he had so
fawned upon Messalina and Claudius's freedmen
[that
he had sent them from the island a book containing
eulogies upon them; this latter caused him such mortification
that he erased the passage.]
While finding
fault with the rich, he himself possessed a property
of seven thousand five hundred myriads; and though
he censured the extravagances of others, he kept five
hundred three-legged tables of cedar wood, every one
of them with identical ivory feet, and he gave banquets
on them. In mentioning these details I have at least
given a hint of their inevitable adjuncts,--the licentiousness
in which he indulged at the very time that
he made a most brilliant marriage, and the delight
that he took in boys past their prime (a practice which
he also taught Nero to follow). Nevertheless, his austerity
of life had earlier been so severe that he had
asked his pupil neither to kiss him nor to eat at the
same table with him.
[For the latter request he had a
good reason, namely, that Nero's absence would enable
him to conduct his philosophical studies at leisure without
being hindered by the young man's dinners. But as
for the kiss, I can not conceive how that tradition came
about. The only explanation which one could imagine,
namely, his unwillingness to kiss that sort of mouth,
is proved to be false by the facts concerning his favorites.
For this and for his adultery some complaints
were lodged against him, but at this time he was himself
released without formal accusations and succeeded
in begging off Pallas and Burrus. Later on he did
not come out so well.]
A.D. 59 (a.u. 811)
11
There was a certain Marcus Salvius Otho, who
through similarity of character and sharing in wrongdoing
had become so intimate with Nero that he was
not even punished for saying one day to the latter:
"Then I hope you may see me Caesar." All that came
of it was the response: "I sha'n't see you even consul."
It was to him that the emperor gave Sabina, of
patrician family, after separating her from her husband,
and they both enjoyed her together. Agrippina,
therefore, fearing that Nero would marry the woman
(for he was now beginning to entertain a mad passion
for her), ventured upon a most unholy course. As if
it were not enough for her story that she had attracted
her uncle Claudius into love for her by her blandishments
and uncontrolled looks and kisses, she undertook
to enslave Nero also in similar fashion. However,
I am not sure whether this actually occurred, or
whether it was invented to fit their characters: but I
state here what is admitted by all, that Nero had a
mistress resembling Agrippina of whom he was especially
fond because of this very resemblance. And
when he toyed with the girl herself or threw out hints
about it to others, he would say that he was having intercourse
with his mother.
A.D. 59 (a.u. 812)
12
Sabina on hearing about this began to persuade
Nero to get rid of his mother in order to forestall her
alleged plots against him. He was likewise incited,--
so many trustworthy men have stated,--by Seneca,
whether it was to obscure the complaint against his
own name that the latter was anxious or to lead Nero
on to a career of unholy bloodguiltiness that should
bring about most speedily his destruction by gods and
men. But they shrank from doing the deed openly and
were not able to put her out of the way secretly by
means of poison, for she took extreme precautions
against all such things. One day they saw in the
theatre a ship that automatically separated in two,
let out some beasts, and came together again so as to
be once more seaworthy; and they at once had another
one built like it. By the time the ship was finished
Agrippina had been quite won over by Nero's attentions,
for he exhibited devotion to her in every way
to make sure that she should suspect nothing and be
off her guard. He dared, however, do nothing in Rome
for fear the crime should become widely known. Hence
he went some distance into Campania accompanied by
his mother, and took a sail on the fatal ship itself,
which was adorned in the most brilliant fashion to the
end that she might feel a desire to use the vessel continually.
13
When they reached Bauli, he gave for several
days most costly dinners at which he showed great
solicitude in entertaining his mother. If she were absent
he feigned to miss her sorely, and if she were
present he was lavish of caresses. He bade her ask
whatever she desired and bestowed many gifts without
her asking. When he had shaped the situation to this
extent
[3]
,
then rising from dinner about midnight he
embraced her, and straining her to his breast kissed
her eyes and hands, exclaiming: "Mother, farewell,
and happiness attend you! For you I live and because
of you I rule." He then gave her in charge of Anicetus,
a freedman, supposedly to convey her home on
the ship that he had prepared.
But the sea would not endure the tragedy about to
be enacted on it nor would it submit to assume responsibility
for the deception wrought by the monstrous
contrivance: therefore, though the ship parted
asunder and Agrippina fell into the water, she did not
perish. In spite of the fact that it was dark and she
was full of strong drink and that the sailors used their
oar blades on her, so much so that they killed Acerronia
Polla, her fellow voyager, she nevertheless saved
her life and reached home. Thereupon she affected
not to realize that it was a plot and let not a word of
it be known, but sent speedily to her son an account of
the occurrence with the implication that it had happened
by accident, and conveyed to him the good news
(as she assumed it to be) that she was safe. Nero
hearing this could not endure the unexpected outcome
but punished the messenger as savagely as if he had
come to assassinate him, and at once despatched
Anicetus with the sailors to make an end of his mother.
He would not entrust the killing of her to the Pretorians.
When she saw them, she knew for what they
had come, and leaping from her bed tore open her
clothing; exposing her abdomen, and cried out:
"Strike here, Anicetus, strike here, for this bore
Nero!"
14
Thus was Agrippina, daughter of Germanicus,
grandchild of Agrippa, descendant of Augustus, slain
by the very son to whom she had given the sovereignty
and for whose sake she had killed her uncle and others.
Nero when informed that she was dead would not believe
it, for the monstrousness of his bold deed plunged
him in doubts; therefore he desired to behold the victim
with his own eyes. So he laid bare her body,
looked her all over and inspected her wounds, finally
uttering a remark far more abominable even than the
crime. What he said was: "I did not know I had so
beautiful a mother."
To the Pretorians he gave money evidently to secure
their prayers for many such occurrences, and
he sent to the senate a message in which he enumerated
the offences of which he knew she was guilty,
stating also that she had plotted against him and on
being detected had committed suicide. Yet for all this
calm explanation to the governing body he was frequently
subject to agitation at night, so that he would
even leap suddenly from his bed. And by day terror
seized him at the sound of trumpets that seemed to
blare forth some horrid din of war from the spot
where lay Agrippina's bones. Therefore he went elsewhere.
And when in his new abode he had again the
same experience, he distractedly transferred his residence
to some other place.
Nero, not having a word of truth from any one and
seeing that all approved what he had been doing,
thought that either his actions had escaped notice or
that he had conducted himself correctly. Hence he became
much worse also in other respects. He came to
think that all that it was in his power to do was right
and gave heed to those whose speech was prompted by
fear or flattery as if they told absolute truth. For a
time he was subject to fears and questionings, but,
after the ambassadors had made him a number of
pleasing speeches, he regained courage.
15
The population of Rome, on hearing the report,
though horrified were nevertheless joyful, because they
thought that now he would surely come to ruin. Nearly
all of the senators pretended to rejoice at what had
taken place, participated in Nero's pleasure, and voted
many measures of which they thought he would be
glad. Publius Thrasea Paetus had also come to the
senate-house and listened to the letter. When, however,
the reading was done, he at once rose without
making any comment and went out. Thus what he
would have said he could not, and what he could have
said he would not. He behaved in the same way under
all other conditions. For he used to say: "If it were
a matter of Nero's putting only me to death, I could
easily pardon the rest who load him with flatteries.
But since among those even who praise him so excessively
he has gotten rid of some and will yet destroy
others, why should one stoop to indecent behavior and
perish like a slave, when like a freeman one may pay
the debt to nature? There shall be talk of me hereafter,
but of these men not a word save for the single
fact that they were killed." Such was the kind of man
Thrasea showed himself, and he would always encourage
himself by saying: "Nero can kill me, but
he can not harm me."
16
When Nero after his mother's murder reentered
Rome, people paid him reverence in public, but in
private so long as any one could speak frankly with
safety they tore his character to very tatters. And
first they hung by night a piece of hide on one of his
statues to signify that he himself ought to have a hiding.
Second, they threw down in the Forum a baby
to which was fastened a board, saying: "I will not
take you up for fear you may slay your mother."
At Nero's entrance into Rome they took down the statues of Agrippina.
But there was one which they did not cut loose soon enough, and
so they threw over it a cloth which gave it the appearance of being
veiled. Thereupon somebody at once affixed to the statue the following
inscription: "I am abashed and thou art unashamed."
In many quarters at once, also, might be read the
inscription:
"Nero, Orestes, Alemeon, matricides."
Persons could actually be heard saying in so many
words: "Nero put his mother out of the way." Not
a few lodged information that certain persons had
spoken in this way, their object being not so much to
destroy those whom they accused as to bring reproach,
on Nero. Hence he would admit no suit of that kind,
either not wishing that the rumor should become more
widespread by such means, or out of utter contempt
for what was said. However, in the midst of the sacrifices
offered in memory of Agrippina according to decree,
the sun suffered a total eclipse and the stars could
be seen. Also, the elephants drawing the chariot of
Augustus entered the hippodrome and went as far as
the senators' seats, but at that point they stopped and
refused to proceed farther. And the event which one
might most readily conjecture to have taken place
through divine means was that a thunderbolt descended
upon his dinner and consumed it all as it was
being brought to him, like some tremendous harpy
snatching away his food.
17
[In spite of this he killed by poison also his aunt
Domitia, whom likewise he used to say he revered like
a mother. He would not even wait a few days for her
to die a natural death of old age, but was eager to destroy
her also. His haste to do this was inspired by
her possessions at Baiae and Ravenna, which included
magnificent amusement pavilions that she had erected
and]
are in fine condition even now. In honor of his
mother he celebrated a very great and costly festival,
events taking place for several days in five or six
theatres at once. It was then that an elephant was led
to the very top of the vault of the theatre and walked
down from that point on ropes, carrying a rider.
There was another exhibition at once most disgraceful
and shocking. Men and women not only of equestrian
but even of senatorial rank appeared in the orchestra,
the hippodrome, and even the hunting-theatre, like the
veriest outcasts. Some of them played the flute and
danced or acted tragedies and comedies or sang to the
lyre. They drove horses, killed beasts, fought as gladiators,
some willingly, others with a very bad grace.
Men of that day beheld the great families,--the Furii,
the Horatii, the Fabii, Poreii, Valerii, and all the rest
whose trophies, whose temples were to be seen,--standing
down below the level of the spectators and
doing some things to which no common citizen even
would stoop. So they would point them out to one another
and make remarks, Macedonians saying: "That
is the descendant of Paulus"; Greeks, "Yonder
the offspring of Mummius"; Sicilians, "Look at
Claudius"; the Epirots, "Look at Appius"; Asiatics,
"There's Lucius"; Iberians, "There's Publius";
Carthaginians, "There's Africanus"; Romans,
"There they all are". Such was the expiation that
the emperor chose to offer for his own indecency.
18
All who had sense, likewise, bewailed the multitude
of expenditures. Every costliest viand that men eat,
everything else, indeed, of the highest value,--horses,
slaves, teams, gold, silver, raiment of varied hues,--was
given away by tickets. Nero would throw tiny
balls, each one appropriately inscribed, among the
populace and that article represented by the token
received would be presented to the person who had
seized it. The sensible, I say, reflected that, when he
spent so much to prevent molestation in his disgraceful
course, he would not be restrained from any most
outrageous proceedings through mere hope of profit.
Some portents had taken place about this time,
which the seers declared imported destruction to him,
and they advised him to divert the danger upon others.
So he would have immediately put numbers of men
out of the way, had not Seneca said to him: "No
matter how many you may slay, you can not kill your
successor."
It was now that he celebrated a corresponding number
of "Preservation Sacrifices," as he called them,
and dedicated the forum for the sale of dainties,
called Macellum. 19
Somewhat later he instituted a different
kind of feast (called Juvenalia, a word that
showed it belonged in some way to "youth"). The
occasion was the shaving of his beard for the first
time. The hairs he cast into a small golden globe and
offered to Jupiter Capitolinus. To furnish amusement
members of the noblest families as well as others
did not fail to give exhibitions. For instance, Aelia
Catella danced: he was first of all a man prominent
for family and wealth and also advanced in years,--he
was eighty years of age. Others who on account of
old age or disease could not do anything on their own
account sang as chorus. All devoted themselves to
practicing as much as and by whatever way they were
able. Regularly appointed "schools" were frequented
by the most distinguished men, women, girls,
lads, old women, old men. In case any one was unable
to appear in any other fashion, he would enter the
choruses. And whereas some of them out of shame
had put on masks to avoid being recognized, Nero at
the request of the populace had them taken off and
showed these people to those by whom they had once
been ruled. Now most of all it was that these amateur
performers and others deemed the dead happy; for
many of the foremost men this year had been slain.
Some of them, charged with conspiracy against Nero,
were surrounded by the soldiers and stoned to death.
20
And, as there needed to be a fitting climax to these
deeds, Nero himself appeared as an actor and Gallio
[4]
proclaimed him by name. There stood Caesar on
the stage wearing the garb of a singing zither-player.
Spoke the emperor: "My lords, of your kindness
give me ear." Then did the Augustus sing to the
zither a thing called "Attis or the Bacchantes,"
[5]
whilst many soldiers stood by and all the people that
the seats would hold sat watching. Yet had he (according
to the tradition) but a slight voice and an indistinct,
so that he moved all present to laughter and
tears at once. Beside him stood Burrus and Seneca
like teachers prompting a pupil: they would wave their
hands and togas at every utterance and draw others
on to do the same. Indeed, Nero had ready a peculiar
corps of about five thousand soldiers, called Augustans;
these would begin the applause, and all the rest,
however loath, were obliged to shout aloud with them,--except
Thrasea. He would never stoop to such conduct.
But the rest, and especially the prominent men,
gathered with alacrity even when in grief and joined
as if glad in all the shouts of the Augustans. One
could hear them saying: "Excellent Caesar! Apollo!
Augustus! One like unto the Pythian! By thine own
self, O Caesar, no one can surpass thee!" After this
performance he entertained the people at a feast on
boats on the site of the naval battle given by Augustus:
thence at midnight he sailed through a canal into
the Tiber.
A.D. 60 (a.u. 813)
21
This, then, he did to celebrate the shaving of his
chin. In behalf of his preservation and the continuance
of his authority,--thus he gave notice,--he instituted
quinquennial games, naming them Neronia.
In honor of the event he also constructed the gymnasium
at the dedication of which he made a free distribution
of olive oil to the senators and knights. The
crown for singing to the zither, moreover, he took
without a contest, for all others were debarred on the
assumption that they were unworthy of victory.
[And
immediately in their garb he was enrolled on the very
lists of the gymnasium.]
Thenceforward all other
crowns for zither playing at all the contests were sent
to him as the only person competent to win victories
of that sort.
DURATION OF TIME
Nero Aug. (IV), Cornelius Cossus Cossi F. Lentulus.
(A.D. 60 = a.u. 813 = Seventh of Nero, from Oct. 13th).
Caesonius Paetus, P. Petronius Turpilianus.
(A.D. 61 = a.u 814 = Eighth of Nero).
P. Marius Celsus, L. Asinius Gallus.
(A.D. 62 = a.u. 815
= Ninth of Nero).
C. Memmius Regulus, L. Verginius Rufus.
(A.D. 63 = a.u.
816 = Tenth of Nero).
C. Lecanius Bassus, M. Licinius Crassus Frugi.
(A.D. 64 =
a.u. 817 = Eleventh of Nero).
A. Licinius Nerva Silanus, M. Vestinus Atticus.
(A.D. 65 =
a.u. 818 = Twelfth of Nero).
A.D. 61 (a.u. 814)
1
While this sport was going on at Rome, a terrible
disaster had taken place in Britain. Two cities had
been sacked, eight myriads of Romans and of their
allies had perished, and the island had been lost.
Moreover, all this ruin was brought upon them by a
woman, a fact which in itself caused them the greatest
shame. Heaven evidently gave them in advance an
indication of the catastrophe. At night there was
heard to issue from the senate-house foreign jargon
mingled with laughter and from the theatre outcries
with wailing: yet no mortal man had uttered the
speeches or the groans. Houses under water came to
view in the river Thames,
[6]
and the ocean between the
island and Gaul sometimes grew bloody at flood-tide.
2
The casus belli lay in the confiscation of the money
which Claudius had given to the foremost Britons,--Decianus
Catus, governor of the island, announcing
that this must now be sent back. This was one reason [Lacuna]
[7]
and another was that Seneca had lent
them on excellent terms as regards interest a thousand
myriads that they did not want,
[8]
and had afterward
called in this loan all at once and levied on them for
it with severity. But the person who most stirred their
spirits and persuaded them to fight the Romans, who
was deemed worthy to stand at their head and to have
the conduct of the entire war, was a British woman,
Buduica,
[9]
of the royal family and possessed of greater
judgment than often belongs to women. It was she
who gathered the army to the number of nearly twelve
myriads and ascended a tribunal of marshy soil made
after the Roman fashion. In person she was very
tall, with a most sturdy figure and a piercing glance;
her voice was harsh; a great mass of yellow hair fell
below her waist and a large golden necklace clasped
her throat; wound about her was a tunic of every conceivable
color and over it a thick chlamys had been
fastened with a brooch. This was her constant attire.
She now grasped a spear to aid her in terrifying all
beholders and spoke as follows:--
3
"You have had actual experience of the difference
between freedom and slavery. Hence, though some of
you previously through ignorance of which was better
may have been deceived by the alluring announcements
of the Romans, yet now that you have tried both
you have learned how great a mistake you made by
preferring a self-imposed despotism to your ancestral
mode of life. You have come to recognize how far
superior is the poverty of independence to wealth in
servitude. What treatment have we met with that is
not most outrageous, that is not most grievous, ever
since these men insinuated themselves into Britain?
Have we not been deprived of our most numerous and
our greatest possessions entire, while for what remains
we must pay taxes? Besides pasturing and
tilling all the various regions for them do we not contribute
a yearly sum for our very bodies? How much
better it would have been to be sold to masters once
and for all than to ransom ourselves annually and possess
empty names of freedom! How much better to
have been slain and perish rather than go about with
subservient heads! Yet what have I said? Even
dying is not free from expense among them, and you
know what fees we deposit on behalf of the dead.
Throughout the rest of mankind death frees even those
who are in slavery; only in the case of the Romans do
the very dead live for their profit. Why is it that
though none of us has any money,--and how or whence
should we get it?,--we are stripped and despoiled like
a murderer's victims? How should the Romans grow
milder in process of time, when they have conducted
themselves so toward us at the very start,--a period
when all men show consideration for even newly captured
beasts?
4
"But, to tell the truth, it is we who have made ourselves
responsible for all these evils in allowing them
so much as to set foot on the island in the first place
instead of expelling them at once as we did their famous
Julius Caesar,--yes, in not making the idea of attempting
the voyage formidable to them, while they
were as yet far off, as it was to Augustus and to Gaius
Caligula. So great an island, or rather in one sense
a continent encircled by water, do we inhabit, a veritable
world of our own, and so far are we separated by
the ocean from all the rest of mankind that we have
been believed to dwell on a different earth and under
a different sky and some of their wisest men were not
previously sure of even our exact name. Yet for all
this we have been scorned and trampled under foot by
men who know naught else than how to secure gain.
Still, let us even at this late day, if not before,
fellow-citizens, friends and relatives,--for I deem you all
relatives, in that you inhabit a single island and are
called by
[10]
one common name,--let us do our duty while
the memory of freedom still abides within us, that we
may leave both the name and the fact of it to our children.
For if we utterly lose sight of the happy conditions
amid which we were born and bred, what pray
will they do, reared in bondage?
5
"This I say not to inspire you with a hatred of
present circumstances,--that hatred is already apparent,--nor
with a fear of the future,--that fear
you already have,--but to commend you because of
your own accord you choose to do just what you ought,
and to thank you for cooperating so readily with me
and your own selves at once. Be nowise afraid of the
Romans. They are not more numerous than are we
nor yet braver. And the proof is that they have
protected themselves with helmets and breastplates and
greaves and furthermore have equipped their camps
with palisades and walls and ditches to make sure that
they shall suffer no harm by any hostile assault.
[11]
Their fears impel them to choose this method rather
than engage in any active work like us. We enjoy such
a superabundance of bravery that we regard tents as
safer than walls and our shields as affording greater
protection than their whole suits of mail. As a
consequence, we when victorious can capture them and
when overcome by force can elude them. And should
we ever choose to retreat, we can conceal ourselves in
swamps and mountains so inaccessible that we can be
neither found nor taken. The enemy, however, can
neither pursue any one by reason of their heavy armor
nor yet flee. And if they ever should slip away from
us, taking refuge in certain designated spots, there, too,
they are sure to be enclosed as in a trap. These are
some of the respects in which they are vastly inferior to
us, and others are their inability to bear up under
hunger, thirst, cold, or heat, as we can; for they
require shade and protection, they require kneaded bread
and wine and oil, and if the supply of any of these
things fails them they simply perish. For us, on the
other hand, any root or grass serves as bread, any
plant juice as olive oil, any water as wine, any tree
as a house. Indeed, this very region is to us an
acquaintance and ally, but to them unknown and hostile.
As for the rivers, we swim them naked, but they even
with boats can not cross easily. Let us therefore go
against them trusting boldly to good fortune. Let us
show them that they are hares and foxes trying to rule
dogs and wolves."
6
At these words, employing a species of divination,
she let a hare escape from her bosom, and as it ran in
what they considered a lucky direction, the whole multitude
shouted with pleasure, and Buduica raising her
hand to heaven, spoke: "I thank thee, Andraste,
[12]
and call upon thee, who are a woman, being myself also
a woman that rules not burden-bearing Egyptians like
Nitocris, nor merchant Assyrians like Semiramis (of
these things we have heard from the Romans), nor
even the Romans themselves, as did Messalina first
and later Agrippina;--at present their chief is Nero,
in name a man, in fact a woman, as is shown by his
singing, his playing the cithara, his adorning himself:--but
ruling as I do men of Britain that know not how
to till the soil or ply a trade yet are thoroughly versed
in the arts of war and hold all things common, even
children and wives; wherefore the latter possess the
same valor as the males: being therefore queen of such
men and such women I supplicate and pray thee for
victory and salvation and liberty against men insolent,
unjust, insatiable, impious,--if, indeed we ought to
term those creatures men who wash in warm water, eat
artificial dainties, drink unmixed wine, anoint themselves
with myrrh, sleep on soft couches with boys for
bedfellows (and past their prime at that), are slaves
to a zither-player, yes, an inferior zither-player.
Wherefore may this Domitia-Nero woman reign no
more over you or over me: let the wench sing and play
the despot over the Romans. They surely deserve to
be in slavery to such a being whose tyranny they have
patiently borne already this long time. But may we,
mistress, ever look to thee alone as our head."
7
After an harangue of this general nature Buduica
led her army against the Romans. The latter chanced
to be without a leader for the reason that Paulinus
their commander had gone on an expedition to Mona,
an island near Britain. This enabled her to sack and
plunder two Roman cities, and, as I said, she wrought
indescribable slaughter. Persons captured by the Britons
underwent every form of most frightful treatment.
The conquerors committed the most atrocious
and bestial outrages. For instance, they hung up
naked the noblest and most distinguished women, cut
off their breasts and sewed them to their mouths, to
make the victims appear to be eating them. After
that they impaled them on sharp skewers run perpendicularly
the whole length of the body. All this they
did to the accompaniment of sacrifices, banquets, and
exhibitions of insolence in all of their sacred places,
but chiefly in the grove of Andate,--that being the
name of their personification of Victory, to whom they
paid the most excessive reverence.
8
It happened that Paulinus had already brought
Mona to terms; hence on learning of the disaster in
Britain he at once set sail thither from Mona. He was
unwilling to risk a conflict with the barbarians immediately,
for he feared their numbers and their frenzy;
therefore he was for postponing the battle to a more
convenient season. But as he grew short of food and
the barbarians did not desist from pressing him hard,
he was compelled, though contrary to his plan, to enter
into an engagement with them. Buduica herself,
heading an army of about twenty-three myriads of
men, rode on a chariot and assigned the rest to their
several stations. Now Paulinus could not extend his
phalanx the width of her whole line, for, even if the
men had been drawn up only one deep, they would not
have stretched far enough, so inferior were they in
numbers: nor did he dare to join battle with one compact
force, for fear he should be surrounded and cut
down. Accordingly, he separated his army into three
divisions in order to fight at several points at once,
and he made each of the divisions so strong that it
could not easily be broken through. While ordering
and arranging his men he likewise exhorted them, saying:
9
"Up, fellow-soldiers! Up, men of Rome! Show
these pests how much even in misfortune we surpass
them. It is a shame for you now to lose ingloriously
what but a short while ago you gained by your valor.
Often have we ourselves and also our fathers with far
fewer numbers than we have at the present conquered
far more numerous antagonists. Fear not the host of
them or their rebellion: their boldness rests on nothing
better than headlong rashness unaided by arms
and exercise. Fear not because they have set on fire a
few cities: they took these not by force nor after a battle,
but one was betrayed and the other abandoned.
Do you now exact from them the proper penalty for
these deeds, that so they may learn by actual experience
what they undertook when they wronged such
men as us."
10
After speaking these words to some he came to a
second group and said: "Now is the occasion, now,
fellow-soldiers, for zeal, for daring. If to-day you
prove yourselves brave men, you will recover what
has slipped from your grasp. If you overcome this
enemy, no one else will any longer withstand us. By
one such battle you will both make sure of your present
possessions and subdue whatever is left. All
soldiers stationed anywhere else will emulate you and
foes will be terror-stricken. Therefore, since it is in
your own hands either to rule fearlessly all mankind,
both the nations that your fathers left under your control
and those which you yourselves have gained in addition,
or else to be bereft of them utterly, choose rather
to be free, to rule, to live in wealth, to enjoy prosperity,
than through indolence to suffer the reverse
of these conditions."
11
After making an address of this sort to the group
in question, he came up to the third division and said
also to them: "You have heard what sort of acts
these wretches have committed against us, nay more,
you have even seen some of them. Therefore choose
either yourselves to suffer the same treatment as previous
victims and furthermore to be driven entirely
out of Britain, or else through victory to avenge those
that perished and also to give to the rest of mankind
an example of mild clemency toward the obedient, of
necessary severity toward the rebellious. I entertain
the highest hopes of victory for our side, counting on
the following factors: first, the assistance of the gods;
they usually cooperate with the party that has been
wronged: second, our inherited bravery; we are Romans
and have shown ourselves superior to all mankind
in various instances of valor: next, our experience;
we have defeated and subdued these very men
that are now arrayed against us: last, our good name;
it is not worthy opponents but our slaves with whom
we are coming in conflict, persons who enjoyed freedom
and self-government only so far as we allowed it.
Yet even should the outcome prove contrary to our
hope,--and I will not shrink from mentioning even
this contingency,--it is better for us to fall fighting
bravely than to be captured and impaled, to see our
own entrails cut out, to be spitted on red hot skewers,
to perish dissolved in boiling water, when we have fallen
into the power of creatures that are very beasts,
savage, lawless, godless. Let us therefore either beat
them or die on the spot. Britain shall be a noble memorial
to us, even though all subsequent Romans
should be driven from it; for in any case our bodies
shall forever possess the land."
12
At the conclusion of exhortations of this sort and
others like them he raised the signal for battle. Thereupon
they approached each other, the barbarians making
a great outcry intermingled with menacing incantations,
but the Romans silently and in order until
they came within a javelin's throw of the enemy.
Then, while the foe were advancing against them at
a walk, the Romans started at a given word and
charged them at full speed, and when the clash came
easily broke through the opposing ranks; but, as they
were surrounded by the great numbers, they had to be
fighting everywhere at once. Their struggle took many
forms. In the first place, light-armed troops might be
in conflict with light-armed, heavy-armed be arrayed
against heavy-armed, cavalry join issue with cavalry;
and against the chariots of the barbarians the Roman
archers would be contending. Again, the barbarians
would assail the Romans with a rush of their chariots,
knocking them helter-skelter, but, since they fought
without breastplates, would be themselves repulsed by
the arrows. Horseman would upset foot-soldier, and
foot-soldier strike down horseman; some, forming in
close order, would go to meet the chariots, and others
would be scattered by them; some would come to close
quarters with the archers and rout them, whereas others
were content to dodge their shafts at a distance:
and all these things went on not at one spot, but in
the three divisions at once. They contended for a long
time, both parties being animated by the same zeal and
daring. Finally, though late in the day, the Romans
prevailed, having slain numbers in the battle, beside
the wagons, or in the wood: they also captured many
alive. Still, not a few made their escape and went on
to prepare to fight a second time. Meanwhile, however,
Buduica fell sick and died. The Britons mourned
her deeply and gave her a costly burial; but, as they
themselves were this time really defeated, they scattered
to their homes.--So far the history of affairs in
Britain.
A.D. 62 (a.u. 815)
13
In Rome Nero had before this sent away Octavia
Augusta, on account of his concubine Sabina, and subsequently
he put her to death. This he did in spite
of the opposition of Burrus, who tried to prevent his
sending her away, and once said to him: "Well, then,
give her back her dowry" (by which he meant the
sovereignty). Indeed, Burrus used such unmitigated
frankness that on one occasion, when he was asked by
the emperor a second time for an opinion on matters
regarding which he had already made clear his attitude,
he answered bluntly: "When I have once had
my say about anything, don't ask me again." So
Nero disposed of him by poison. He also appointed
to command the Pretorians a certain Ofonius Tigillinus,
who outstripped all his contemporaries in licentiousness
and bloodiness.
[It was he who won Nero
away from them and made light of his colleague
Rufus.
[13]
]
To him
the famous sentence of Pythias is
said to have been directed. She had proved the only
exception when all the other attendants of Octavia
had joined Sabina in attacking their mistress, despising
the one because she was in misfortune and toadying
to the other because her influence was strong.
Pythias alone had refused though cruelly tortured to
utter lies against Octavia, and finally, as Tigillinus
continued to urge her, she spat in his face, saying:
"My mistress's privy parts are cleaner, Tigillinus,
than your mouth."
14
The troubles of his relatives Nero turned into
laughter and jest. For instance, after killing Plautus
[14]
he took a look at his head when it was brought to him
and remarked: "I didn't know he had such a big
nose," as much as to say that he would have spared
him, had he been aware of this fact beforehand. And
though he spent practically his whole existence in
tavern life, he forbade others to sell in taverns anything
boiled save vegetables and pea-soup. He put
Pallas out of the way because the latter had accumulated
great wealth that could be counted by the ten
thousand myriads. Likewise he was very liable to
peevishness that showed in his behavior, and at such
times he would not speak a word to his servants or
freedmen but write on tablets whatever he wanted as
well as any orders that he had to give them.
A.D. 63 (a.u. 816)
15
Indeed, when many of those who had gathered at Antium perished,
Nero made that, too, an occasion for a festival.
A certain Thrasea gave his opinion to the effect that for a senator the
extreme penalty should be exile.
A.D. 64 (a.u. 817)
To such lengths did Nero's self-indulgence go that
he actually drove chariots in public. Again, one time
after the slaughter of beasts he straightway brought
water into the theatre by means of pipes and produced
a sea-fight: then he let the water out again
and arranged a gladiatorial combat. Last of all he
flooded the place once more and gave a costly public
banquet. The person who had been appointed director
of the banquet was Tigillinus, and a large and complete
equipment had been furnished. The arrangements
made were as follows. In the center and resting
on the water were placed the great wooden wine
vessels, over which boards had been fastened. Round
about it had been built taverns and booths. Thus
Nero and Tigillinus and their fellow-banqueters,
being in the center, held their feast on purple carpets
and soft mattresses, while all the other people
caroused in the taverns. These also entered the
brothels, where unrestrictedly they might enjoy absolutely
any woman to be found there. Now the latter
were some of the most beautiful and distinguished in
the city, both slaves and free, some hetaerae, some virgins,
some wives,--not merely, that is to say, public
wenches, but both girls and women of the very noblest
families. Every man was given authority to have
whichever one he wished, for the women were not
allowed to refuse any one. Consequently, the multitude
being a regular rabble, they drank greedily and
reveled in wanton conduct. So a slave debauched
his mistress in the presence of his master and a
gladiator ravished a girl of noble family while her
father looked on. The shoving and striking and
uproar that went on, first on the part of those who
were going in and second on the part of those who
stood around outside, was disgraceful. Many men
met their death in these encounters, and of the women
some were strangled and some were seized and
carried off.
16
After this Nero had the wish (or rather it had
always been a fixed purpose of his) to make an end
of the whole city and sovereignty during his lifetime.
Priam he deemed wonderfully happy in that he had
seen his country perish at the same moment as his
authority. Accordingly he sent in different directions
men feigning to be drunk or engaged in some indifferent
species of rascality and at first had one or two
or more blazes quietly kindled in different quarters:
people, of course, fell into the utmost confusion, not
being able to find any beginning of the trouble nor to
put any end to it, and meanwhile they became aware
of many strange sights and sounds. For soon there
was nothing to be observed but many fires as in a
camp, and no other phrases fell from men's lips but
"This or that is burning "; "Where?"; "How?";
"Who set it?"; "To the rescue!" An extraordinary
perturbation laid hold on all wherever they
might be, and they ran about as if distracted, some
in one direction and some in another. Some men in
the midst of assisting their neighbors would learn
that their own premises were on fire. Others received
the first intimation of their own possessions being
aflame when informed that they were destroyed. Persons
would run from their houses into the lanes with
some idea of being of assistance from the outside, or
again they would dash into the dwellings from the
streets, appearing to think they could accomplish
something inside. The shouting and screaming of
children, women, men, and graybeards all together
were incessant, so that one could have no consciousness
nor comprehension of anything by reason of the
smoke and shouting combined. On this account some
might be seen standing speechless, as if dumb. All
this time many who were carrying out their goods
and many more who were stealing what belonged to
others kept encountering one another and falling over
the merchandise. It was not possible to get anywhere,
nor yet to stand still; but people pushed and were
pushed back, they upset others and were themselves
upset, many were suffocated, many were crushed: in
fine, no evil that can possibly happen to men at such
a crisis failed to befall them. They could not with
ease find even any avenue of escape, and, if any one
did save himself from some immediate danger, he
usually fell into another one and was lost.
17
This did
not all take place on one day, but lasted for several
days and nights together. Many houses were destroyed
through lack of some one to defend them and
many were set on fire in still more places by persons
who presumably came to the rescue. For the soldiers
(including the night watch), having an eye upon plunder,
instead of extinguishing any blaze kindled greater
conflagrations. While similar scenes were being enacted
at various points a sudden wind caught the fire
and swept it over whatever remained. Consequently
no one concerned himself any longer about goods or
houses, but all the survivors, standing in a place of
safety, gazed upon what seemed to be many islands
and cities burning. There was no longer any grief
over individual losses, for it was swallowed up in the
public lamentation, as men reminded one another how
once before most of their city had been similarly laid
waste by the Gauls.
18
While the whole population was
in this state of mind and many crazed by the disaster
were leaping into the blaze itself, Nero mounted to
the roof of the palace, where nearly the whole conflagration
could be taken in by a sweeping glance, and
having assumed the lyrist's garb he sang the Taking
(as he said) of Ilium, which, to the ordinary vision,
however, appeared to be the Taking of Rome.
The calamity which the city at this time experienced
has no parallel before or since, except in the Gallic
invasion. The whole Palatine hill, the theatre of
Taurus, and nearly two-thirds of the remainder of the
city were burned and countless human beings perished.
The populace invoked curses upon Nero without
intermission, not uttering his name but simply cursing
those who had set the city on fire: and this was
especially the case because they were disturbed by
the memory of the oracle chanted in Tiberius's day.
These were the words:--
"Thrice three hundred cycles of tireless years being ended,
Civil strife shall the Romans destroy."
[
15]
And when Nero by way of encouraging them reported
that these verses were nowhere to be found,
they changed and went to repeating another oracle,
which they averred to be a genuine Sibylline production,
namely:--
"Last of the sons of Aeneas a matricide shall govern."
And so it proved, whether this was actually revealed
beforehand by some divination or whether the
populace now for the first time gave it the form of a
divine saying adapted to existing circumstances. For
Nero was indeed the last emperor of the Julian line
descended from Aeneas.
He now began to collect vast sums from both individuals
and nations, sometimes using compulsion, with
the conflagration for his excuse, and sometimes obtaining
it by "voluntary" offers; and the mass of the
Romans had the food supply fund withdrawn.
19
While he was so engaged, he received news from
Armenia and soon after a laurel wreath in honor of
victory. The scattered bodies of soldiery in that
region had been united by Corbulo, who trained them
sedulously after a period of neglect, and then by the
very report of his coming had terrified both Vologaesus,
king of Parthia, and Tiridates, chief of Armenia.
He resembled the primitive Romans in that
besides coming of a brilliant family and besides possessing
much strength of body he was still further
gifted with a shrewd intelligence: and he behaved
with great bravery, with great fairness, and with
great good faith toward all, both friends and enemies.
For these reasons Nero had despatched him
to the scene of war in his own stead and had entrusted
to him a larger force than to anybody else,
being equally assured that the man would subdue the
barbarians and would not revolt against him. And
Corbulo proved neither of these assumptions false.
All other men, however, had it as a particular grievance
against him that he kept faith with Nero. They
were very anxious to get him as emperor in place of
the actual despot, and this conduct of his seemed to
them his only defect.
20
Corbulo, accordingly, had taken Artaxata without a
struggle and had razed the city to the ground. This
exploit finished, he marched in the direction of Tigranocerta,
sparing all the districts that yielded themselves
but devastating the lands of all such as resisted
him. Tigranocerta submitted to him voluntarily,
and he performed other brilliant and glorious
deeds, as a result of which he induced the formidable
Vologaesus to accept terms that accorded with the Roman
reputation.
[For Vologaesus, on hearing that
Nero had assigned Armenia to others and that Adiabene
was being ravaged by Tigranes, made preparations
himself to go on a campaign into Syria against
Corbulo, but sent into Armenia Monobazus, king of
Adiabene, and Monaeses, a Parthian. These two had
shut up Tigranes in Tigranocerta. But since they did
not succeed in harming him at all by their siege and as
often as they tried conclusions with him were repulsed
by both the native troops and the Romans that were
in his army, and since Corbulo guarded Syria with
extreme care, Vologaesus recognized the hopelessness
of his attempt and disbanded his forces. Then he sent
to Corbulo and obtained peace on condition that he
send a new embassy to Nero, raise the siege,
and withdraw his soldiers from Armenia. Nero made
him no immediate nor speedy nor definite reply, but
despatched Lucius Caesennius Paetus to Cappadocia to
see to it that there should be no Armenian uprising.]
21
[So Vologaesus attacked Tigranocerta and drove
back Paetus, who had come to its aid. When the latter
fled he pursued him, beat back the garrison left by
Paetus at the Taurus, and shut him up in Rhandea, near
the river Arsanias. Then he was on the point of retiring
without accomplishing anything; for destitute
as he was of heavy-armed soldiers he could not approach
close to the wall, and he had no large stock of
provender, particularly as he had come at the head of
a vast host without making arrangements for food
supplies. Paetus, however, stood in terror of his archery,
which took effect in the very camp itself, as well
as of the cavalry, which kept appearing at all points.
Hence he made peace proposals to his antagonist, accepted
his terms, and took an oath that he would himself
abandon all of Armenia and that Nero should give
it to Tiridates. The Parthian was satisfied enough
with this agreement, seeing that he was to obtain control
of the country without a contest and would be making
the Romans his debtors for a very considerable
kindness. And, as he learned that Corbulo (whom
Paetus several times sent for before he was surrounded)
was drawing near, he dismissed the beleaguered soldiers,
having first made them agree to build a
bridge over the river Arsanias for him. He was not
really in need of a bridge, for he had crossed on foot,
but he wished to give them a practical example of the
fact that he was stronger than they. Indeed, he did not
retire by way of the bridge even on this occasion, but
rode across on an elephant, while the rest got over as
before.
22
The capitulation had scarcely been made when Corbulo
with inconceivable swiftness reached the Euphrates
and there waited for the retreating force. When
the two armies approached each other you would have
been struck with the difference between them and between
their generals: one set were fairly aglow with
delight at their rapidity; the others were grieved and
ashamed of their compact. Vologaesus sent Monaeses to
Corbulo with the demand that the newcomer should
give up the fort in Mesopotamia. So they held a prolonged
conference together right at the bridge crossing
the Euphrates, after first destroying the center of
the structure. Corbulo having promised to leave the
country if the Parthian would also abandon Armenia,
both of these things were done temporarily until Nero
could learn the outcome of the engagements and begin
negotiations with the envoys of Vologaesus, whom
the latter had sent a second time. The answer given
them by the emperor was that he would bestow Armenia
upon Tiridates if this aspirant would come to
Rome. Paetus was deposed from his command and the
soldiers that had been with him were sent somewhere
else. Corbulo was again assigned to the war against
the same foes. Nero had intended to accompany the
expedition in person, but after falling down during
the ceremony of sacrificing he would not venture to go
abroad but remained where he was.]
23
[Corbulo therefore officially prepared for war upon
Vologaesus and sent a centurion bidding him depart
from the country. Privately, however, he suggested
to the king that he send his brother to Rome, and this
advice met with acceptance, since Corbulo seemed to
have the stronger force. Thus it came about that they
both, Corbulo and Tiridates, met at no other place than
Rhandea, which suited them both. It appealed to the
Parthian because there his people had cut off the Romans
and had sent them away under a capitulation, a
visible proof of the favor that had been done them. To
the Roman it appealed because his men were going to
wipe out the ill repute that had attached to them there
before. For the meeting of the two was not limited
merely to conversation; a lofty platform had been
erected on which were set images of Nero, and in the
presence of crowds of Armenians, Parthians, and Romans
Tiridates approached and did them reverence;
after sacrificing to them and calling them by laudatory
names he took off the diadem from his head and set it
upon them. Monobazus and Vologaesus also came to
Corbulo and gave him hostages. In honor of this event
Nero was a number of times saluted as imperator and
held a triumph, contrary to precedent.]
But Corbulo
in spite of the large force that he had and the very considerable
reputation that he enjoyed did not rebel and
was never accused of rebellion. He might easily have
been made emperor, since men thoroughly detested
Nero but all admired him in every way.
[In addition
to the more striking features of his submissive behavior
he voluntarily sent to Rome his son-in-law
Annius, who served as his lieutenant; this was done
professedly that Annius might escort Tiridates back,
but in fact this relative stood in the position of a
hostage to Nero. The latter was so firmly persuaded
that his general would not revolt that Corbulo obtained
his son-in-law as lieutenant
[16]
before he had been
praetor.]
[And Junius Torquatus, a descendant of Augustus,
made himself liable to a most strange indictment. He
had squandered his property in a rather lavish way,
whether following his native bent or with the intention
of not being very rich. Nero therefore declared that,
as he lacked many things, he must be covetous of the
goods of others, and consequently caused a fictitious
charge to be brought against him of aspiring to imperial
power.]
A.D. 65 (a.u. 818)
24
Seneca, however, and Rufus the prefect and some
other prominent men formed a plot against Nero.
They could no longer endure his ignoble behavior, his
licentiousness, and his cruelty. They desired at one
and the same time to be rid of these evils and to give
Nero his release from them. Indeed, Sulpicius Asper,
a centurion, and Subrius Flavius, a military tribune,
both belonging to the body-guards, admitted this to
him point blank. Asper, when interrogated by the emperor
as to the reason for his attempt, replied: "I
could help you in no other way." And the response of
Flavins was: "I both loved you and hated you above
all men. I loved you, hoping that you would prove a
good emperor: I have hated you because you do so-and-so.
I can not be slave to charioteer or lyre-player."--Information
was lodged and these men were punished,
besides many others indirectly associated with them.
Everything in the nature of a complaint that could be
entertained against any one for excessive joy or grief,
for words or gestures, was brought forward and was
believed. Not one of these complaints, even if fictitious,
could be refused credence in view of Nero's actual
deeds. Hence conscienceless friends and house
servants of some men flourished greatly. Persons
guarded against strangers and foes,--for of these
they were suspicious,--but were bound to expose
themselves whether they would or no to their associates.
25
It would be no small task to record details about
most of those that perished, but the fate of Seneca
needs a few words by itself. It was his wish to end
the life of his wife Paulina at the same time with his
own, for he declared that he had taught her to despise
death and that she desired to leave the world in company
with him. So he opened her veins as well as
his own. As he failed, however, to yield readily to
death, his end was hastened by the soldiers; and his
dying so speedily enabled Paulina to survive. He did
not lay hands upon himself, however, until he had revised
the book which he had composed and had deposited
with various persons certain other valued possessions
which he feared might come into Nero's hands
and be destroyed. Thus was Seneca forced to part
with life in spite of the fact that he had on the pretext
of illness abandoned the society of the emperor
and had bestowed upon him his entire property, supposedly
to help defray the expense of necessary building
operations. His brothers, too, perished after him.
26
Likewise Thrasea and Soranus, who had no superiors
in family, wealth, and every excellence, met their
death not because they were accused of conspiracy but
because they were what they were. Against Soranus
Publius Egnatius Celer, a philosopher, gave false evidence.
The victim had had two associates,--Cassius
Asclepiodotus of Nicaea and this Publius of Berytus.
Now Asclepiodotus so far from speaking against Soranus
bore witness to his noble qualities; he was at
the time exiled for his pains, but later, under Galba,
was restored. Publius in return for his services as
blackmailer received money and honors (as did others
of the same profession), but subsequently he was banished.
Soranus was slain on the charge of having
caused his daughter to employ a species of magic, the
foundation for this story being that when he was sick
his family had offered some sacrifices. Thrasea was
executed for not appearing regularly at the senate-house,
thus showing that he did not like the measures
passed, for not listening to the emperor's singing and
zither-playing, for not sacrificing to Nero's Divine
Voice as did the rest, and for not giving any public
exhibitions: for it was remarked that at Patavium, his
native place, he had acted in a tragedy given in pursuance
of some old custom at a festival held every
thirty years. As he made the incision in his artery, he
raised his hand, exclaiming: "To thee, Jupiter, patron
of freedom, I pour this libation of blood."
27
And why should one be surprised that such complaints
were fastened upon them,
[17]
seeing that one man
[18]
was
brought to trial and slain for living near the Forum,
for letting out some shops, or for receiving a few
friends in them; and another
[19]
because he possessed a
likeness of Cassius, the murderer of Caesar?
The conduct of a woman named Epicharis also deserves
mention. She had been included in the conspiracy
and all its details had been trusted to her without
reserve; yet she revealed none of these though
often tortured in all the ways that the skill of Tigillinus
could devise. And why should one enumerate
the sums given to the Pretorians on the occasion of
this conspiracy or the excessive honors voted to Nero
and his friends? Let me say only that it led to the
banishment of Rufus Musonius, the philosopher. Sabina
also perished at this time through an act of
Nero's. Either accidentally or intentionally he had
given her a violent kick while she was pregnant.
28
The extremes of luxury indulged in by this Sabina I
will indicate in the briefest possible terms. She had
gilded girths put upon the mules that carried her and
caused five hundred asses that had recently foaled to
be milked each day that she might bathe in their milk.
She devoted great thought to making her person appear
youthful and lustrously beautiful,--and with
brilliant results; and this is why, not fancying her appearance
in a mirror one day, she prayed that she
might die before she passed her prime. Nero missed
her so that
[after her death, at first, on learning that
there was a woman resembling her he sent for and
kept this female: later]
because a boy of the liberti
class, named Sporus, resembled Sabina, he had him
castrated and used him in every way like a woman;
and in due time he formally married him though he
[Nero]
was already married to a freedman Pythagoras.
He assigned the boy a regular dowry according
to contract, and Romans as well as others held a public
celebration of their wedding.
While Nero had Sporus the eunuch as a wife, one of his associates
in Rome, who had made a specialty of philosophy, on being asked whether
the marriage and cohabitation in question met with his approval replied:
"You do well, Caesar, to seek the company of such wives. If
only your father had had the same ambition and had dwelt with a
similar consort!"--indicating that if this had been the case, Nero
would not have been born, and the government would have been relieved
of great evils.
This was, however, later. At the time with which
we are immediately concerned many, as I stated, were
put to death and many who purchased their preservation
with Tigillinus with a great price were released.
29
Nero continued to commit many ridiculous acts,
among which may be cited his descending at a kind of
popular festival to the orchestra of the theatre, where
he read some Trojan lays of his own: and in honor of
these there were offered numerous sacrifices, as there
were over everything else that he did. He was now
making preparations to compile in verse a narration of
all the achievements of the Romans: before composing
any of it, however, he began to consider the proper
number of books, and took as his adviser Annaeus
Cornutus, who at this time was famed for his learning.
This man he came very near putting to death and did
deport to an island, because, while some were urging
him to write four hundred books, Cornutus said that
was too many and nobody would read them. And
when some one objected: "Yet Chrysippus, whom
you praise and imitate, has composed many more," the
savant retorted: "But they are a help to the conduct
of men's lives." So Cornutus was punished with
exile for this. And Lucanus was enjoined from writing
poetry because he was securing great praise for his
work.
DURATION OF TIME
C. Lucius Telesinus, C. Suetonius Paulinus.
(A.D. 66 = a.u.
819 = Thirteenth of Nero, from Oct. 13th).
Fonteius Capito, Iunius Rufus.
(A.D. 67 = a.u. 820 =
Fourteenth of Nero).
C. Silius Italicus, Galerius Trachalus Turpilianus.
(A.D.
68 = a.u. 821, to June 9th).
A.D. 66 (a.u. 819)
1
In the consulship of Gaius Telesinus and Suetonius
Paulinus one event of great glory and another of deep
disgrace took place. For one thing Nero contended
among the zither-players, and after Menecrates,
[20]
the
teacher of this art, had celebrated a triumph for him
in the hippodrome, he appeared as a charioteer. For
the other, Tiridates presented himself in Rome, bringing
with him not only his own children but those of
Vologaesus, of Pacorus, and of Monobazus. They were
the objects of interest in a quasi-triumphal procession
through the whole country west from the Euphrates.
2
Tiridates himself was in the prime of life, a notable
figure by reason of his youth, beauty, family, and intelligence:
and his whole train of servants together
with the entourage of a royal court accompanied the
advance. Three thousand Parthian horsemen and besides
them numerous Romans followed his train. They
were received by gaily decorated cities and by peoples
who shouted their compliments aloud. Provisions were
furnished them free of cost, an expenditure of twenty
myriads for their daily support being thus charged to
the public treasury. This went on without change for
the nine months occupied in their journey. The prince
covered the whole distance to the confines of Italy on
horseback and beside him rode his wife, wearing a
golden helmet in place of a veil, so as not to defy the
traditions of her country by letting her face be seen.
In Italy he was conveyed in a two-horse carriage sent
by Nero and met the emperor at Naples, which he
reached by way of the Picentes. He refused, however,
to obey the order to put down his dagger when
he approached the Roman monarch, and he nailed it
firmly to the scabbard. Yet he knelt upon the ground,
and with arms crossed called him master and did obeisance.
3
Nero manifested his approbation of this act
and entertained him in many ways, one of which was
a gladiatorial show at Puteoli. The person who directed
the contests was Patrobius, one of his freedmen.
He managed to make it a brilliant and costly affair, as
is shown by the fact that on one of the days not a person
but Ethiopians, men, women, and children, appeared
in the theatre. By way of showing Patrobius
some proper honor Tiridates shot at beasts from his
elevated seat. And, if we may trust the report, he
transfixed and killed two bulls together with one
arrow.
4
After this affair Nero took him up to Rome and set
the diadem upon his head. The entire city had been
decorated with lights and garlands, and great crowds
of people were to be seen everywhere, the Forum,
however, being especially full. The center was occupied
by the populace, arranged according to rank, clad in
white and carrying laurel branches: everywhere else
were the soldiers, arrayed in shining armor, their
weapons and standards reflecting back the sunbeams.
The very roof tiles of the buildings in this vicinity
were completely hidden from view by the spectators
who had ascended to these points of vantage. Everything
was in readiness by the time night drew to a
close and at daybreak Nero, wearing the triumphal
garb and accompanied by the senate and the Pretorians,
entered the Forum. He ascended the rostra and
seated himself upon the chair of state. Next Tiridates
and his suite passed through rows of heavy-armed
men drawn up on each side, took their stand
close to the rostra, and did obeisance to the emperor
as they had done before. 5
At this a great roar went
up which so alarmed Tiridates that for some moments
he stood speechless, in terror of his life. Then, silence
having been proclaimed, he recovered courage and
quelling his pride made himself subservient to the
occasion and to his need, caring little how humbly he
spoke, in view of the prize he hoped to obtain. These
were his words: "Master, I am the descendant of
Arsaces, brother of the princes Vologaesus and Pacorus,
and thy slave. And I have come to thee, my
deity, to worship thee as I do Mithra. The destiny
thou spinnest for me shall be mine: for thou art my
Fortune and my Fate."
Nero replied to him as follows: "Well hast thou
done to come hither in person, that present in my
presence thou mayest enjoy my benefits. For what
neither thy father left thee nor thy brothers gave and
preserved for thee, this do I grant thee. King of
Armenia I now declare thee, that both thou and they
may understand that I have power to take away kingdoms
and to bestow them." At the end of these words
he bade him come up the inclined plane built for this
very purpose in front of the rostra, and Tiridates
having been made to sit beneath his feet he placed the
diadem upon his head. At this there was no end of
shouts of all sorts. 6
According to decree there also
took place a celebration in the theatre. Not merely
the stage but the whole interior of the theatre round
about had been gilded, and all properties brought in
had been adorned with gold, so that people came to
refer to the very day as "golden." The curtains
stretched across the sky-opening to keep off the sun
were of purple and in the centre of them was an embroidered
figure of Nero driving a chariot, with golden
stars gleaming all about him. So much for the setting:
and of course they had a costly banquet.
Afterward Nero sang publicly with zither accompaniment
and drove a chariot, clad in the costume of the
Greens and wearing a charioteer's helmet. This
made Tiridates disgusted with him; but for Corbulo
the visitor had only praise and deemed the one thing
against him to be that he would put up with such a
master. Indeed, he made no concealment of his views
to Nero's face, but one day said to him: "Master, you
have in Corbulo a good slave." The person addressed,
however, did not comprehend his speech.--In all other
matters he flattered the emperor and ingratiated himself
most skillfully, with the result that he received
all kinds of gifts, said to have possessed in the aggregate
a value of five thousand myriads, and obtained
permission to rebuild Artaxata. Moreover, he took
with him from Rome many artisans, some of whom he
got from Nero, and some whom he persuaded by offers
of high wages. Corbulo, however, would not let
them all cross into Armenia, but only the ones whom
Nero had given him. That caused Tiridates to admire
him all the more and to despise his chief.
7
The return was made not by the same route as he
followed in coming,--through Illyricum and north of
the Ionian Gulf,--but instead he sailed from Brundusium
to Dyrrachium. He viewed also the cities of
Asia, which helped to increase his amazement at the
strength and beauty of the Roman empire.
Tiridates one day viewed an exhibition of pancratium. One of the
contestants fell to the ground and was being pummeled by his opponent.
When the prince saw it, he exclaimed: "That's an unfair contest.
It isn't fair that a man who has fallen should be beaten."
On rebuilding Artaxata Tiridates named it Neronia.
But Vologaesus though often summoned refused to
come to Nero, and finally, when the latter's invitations
became burdensome to him, sent back a despatch to
this effect: "It is far easier for you than for me to
traverse so great a body of water. Therefore, if you
will come to Asia, we can then arrange
[where we
shall be able]
to meet each other."
[Such was the
message which the Parthian wrote at last.]
8
Nero though angry at him did not sail against him,
nor yet against the Ethiopians or the Caspian Pylae,
as he had intended.
[He saw that the subjugation of
these regions demanded time and labor and hoped
that they would submit to him of their own accord:]
and he sent spies to both places. But he did cross
over into Greece, not at all as Flamininus or Mummius
or as Agrippa and Augustus his ancestors had
done, but for the purpose of chariot racing, of playing
and singing, of making proclamations, and of acting in
tragedies. Rome was not enough for him, nor Pompey's
theatre, nor the great hippodrome, but he desired
also a foreign tour, in order to become, as he
said, victor in all the four contests.
[21]
And a multitude
not only of Augustans but of other persons were taken
with him, large enough, if it had been a hostile host,
to have subdued both Parthians and all other nations.
But they were the kind you would have expected Nero's
soldiers to be, and the arms they carried were zithers
and plectra, masks and buskins. The victories Nero
won were such as befitted that sort of army, and
he overcame Terpnus and Diodorus and Pammenes,
instead of Philip or Perseus or Antiochus. It is
probable that his purpose in forcing the Pammenes
referred to, who had been in his prime in the reign of
Gaius, to compete in spite of his age, was that he
might overcome him and vent his dislike in abuse of
his statues.
A.D. 67 (?)
9
Had he done only this, he would have been the subject
of ridicule. So how could one endure to hear
about, let alone seeing, an emperor, an Augustus, listed
on the program among the contestants, training his
voice, practicing certain songs, wearing long hair on
his head but with his chin shaven, throwing his toga
over his shoulder in the races, walking about with one
or two attendants, eyeing his adversaries suspiciously
and ever and anon throwing out a word to them in the
midst of a boxing match; how he dreaded the directors
of the games and the wielders of the whip and spent
money on all of them secretly to avoid being shown up
in his true colors and whipped; and how all that he
did to make himself victor in the citharoedic contest
only contributed to his defeat in the Contest of the
Caesars? How find words to denounce the wickedness
of this proscription in which it was not
[22]
Sulla that
bulletined the names of others, but Nero bulletined his
own name? What victory less deserves the name than
that by which one receives the olive, the laurel, the
parsley, or the fir-tree garland, and loses the political
crown? And why should one bewail these acts of his
alone, seeing that he also by treading on the high-soled
buskins lowered himself from his eminence of power,
and by hiding behind the mask lost the dignity of his
sovereignty to beg in the guise of a runaway slave,
to be led like a blind man, to conceive, to bear children,
to go mad
[to drive a chariot]
, as he acted out
time after time the story of Oedipus, and of Thyestes,
of Heracles and Alemeon, and of Orestes? The masks
he wore were sometimes made to resemble the characters
and sometimes had his own likeness. The women's
masks were all fashioned to conform to the
features of Sabina
[in order that though dead she
might still move in stately procession. All the situations
that common actors simulate in their acting he,
too, would undertake to present, by speech, by action,
by being acted upon,--save only that]
golden chains
were used to bind him: apparently it was not thought
proper for a Roman emperor to be bound in iron
shackles.
10
All this behavior, nevertheless, the soldiers and all
the rest saw, endured, and approved. They entitled
him Pythian Victor, Olympian Victor, National Victor,
Absolute Victor, besides all the usual expressions, and
of course added to these names the honorific designations
belonging to his imperial office, so that every
one of them had "Caesar" and "Augustus" as a tag.
He conceived a dislike for a certain man because while he was
speaking the man frowned and was not overlavish of his praises; and
so he drove him away and would not let him come into his presence.
He persisted in his refusal to grant him audience, and when the person
asked: "Where shall I go, then?" Phoebus, Nero's freedman, replied:
"To the deuce!"
No one of the people ventured either to pity or to
hate the wretched creature. One of the soldiers, to be
sure, on seeing him bound, grew indignant, ran up,
and set him free. Another in reply to a question:
"What is the emperor doing?" had to answer: "He
is in labor pains," for Nero was then acting the part of
Canace. Not one of them conducted himself in a way
at all worthy of a Roman. Instead, because so much
money fell to their share, they offered prayers that he
might give many such performances and they in this
way get still more.
11
And if things had merely gone on like this, the affair,
while being a source of shame and of ridicule alike,
would still have been deemed free from danger. But
as a fact he devastated the whole of Greece precisely
as if he had been despatched to some war and without
regard to the fact that he had declared the country
free, also slaying great numbers
[of men, women and
children. At first he commanded the children and
freedmen of those who were executed to leave him
half their property at their death, and allowed the original
victims to make wills in order to make it seem less
likely that he had killed them for their money; and he
invariably took all that was bequeathed to him, if not
more. In case any one left to him or to Tigillinus less
than they were expecting, the wills were of no avail.--Later
he deprived persons of their entire property and
banished all their children at once by one decree. Not
even this satisfied him, but he destroyed not a few of
the exiles.]
For no one could begin to enumerate all
the confiscated possessions of men allowed to live and
all the votive offerings that he stole from the very
temples in Rome.
[The despatch-bearers hurried
hither and thither with no piece of news other than
"kill this man!" or that that man was dead. No
private messages, only state documents, were delivered;
for Nero had taken many of the foremost men to
Greece under pretence of needing some assistance
from them merely in order that they might perish
there. 12
The whole population of Rome and Italy he
surrendered like captives to a certain Helius, a Caesarian.
The latter had been given absolutely complete
authority, so that he might confiscate, banish, and put
to death (even before notifying Nero) ordinary persons,
knights, and senators alike.]
Thus the Roman domain was at that time a slave to
two emperors at once,--Nero and Helius; and I do
not feel able to say which was the worse. In most respects
they behaved entirely alike, and the one point
of difference was that the descendant of Augustus was
emulating zither-players, whereas the freedman of
Claudius was emulating Caesars. I consider the acts
of Tigillinus as a part of Nero's career because he was
constantly with him: but Polyclitus and Calvia Crispinilla
by themselves plundered, sacked, despoiled all
the places they could get at. The former was associated
with Helius at Rome, and the latter with Sabina,
born Sporus. Calvia had been entrusted with the care
of the boy and with the oversight of the wardrobe,
though a woman and of high rank; and she saw to it
that all were stripped of their possessions.
13
Now Nero called Sporus Sabina not merely on account
of the fact that by reason of resemblance to her
he had been made a eunuch, but because the boy like
the mistress had been solemnly contracted to him in
Greece, with Tigillinus to give the bride away, as the
law ordained. All the Greeks held a festal celebration
of their marriage, uttering all the customary good
wishes (as they could not well help) even to the extent
of praying that legitimate children might be born to
them. After that Nero took to himself two bedfellows,
Pythagoras to treat as a man and Sporus as a woman.
The latter, in addition to other forms of address, was
termed lady, queen, and mistress.
Yet why should one wonder at this, seeing that this
monarch would fasten naked boys and girls to poles,
and then putting on the hide of a wild beast would approach
them and satisfy his brutal lust under the appearance
of devouring parts of their bodies? Such
were the indecencies of Nero.
When he received the senators he wore a short
flowered tunic with muslin collar, for he had already
begun to transgress precedent in wearing ungirt tunics
in public. It is stated also that knights belonging to
the army used in his reign for the first time saddle-cloths
during their public review.
14
At the Olympic games he fell from the chariot he
was driving and came very near being crushed to
death: yet he was crowned victor. In acknowledgment
of this favor he gave to the Hellanodikai the twenty-five
myriads which Galba later demanded back from
them.
[And to the Pythia he gave ten myriads for
giving some responses to suit him: this money Galba
recovered.]
Again, whether from vexation at Apollo
for making some unpleasant predictions to him or because
he was merely crazy, he took away from the god
the territory of Cirrha and gave it to the soldiers. In
fact, he abolished the oracle, slaying men and throwing
them into the rock fissure from which the divine afflatus
arose. He contended in every single city that
boasted any contest, and in all cases requiring the services
of a herald he employed for that purpose Cluvius
Rufus, an ex-consul. Athens and the Lacedaemonians
were exceptions to this rule, being the only places that
he did not visit at all. He avoided the second because
of the laws of Lycurgus, which stood in the way of his
designs, and the former because of the story about the
Furies.--The proclamation ran: "Nero Caesar wins
this contest and crowns the Roman people and his
world." Possessing according to his own statement
a world, he went on singing and playing, making proclamations,
and acting tragedies.
15
His hatred for the senate was so fierce that he took
particular pleasure in Vatinius, who kept always saying
to him: "I hate you, Caesar, for being of senatorial
rank."--I have used the exact expression that
he uttered.--Both the senators and all others were
constantly subjected to the closest scrutiny in their
entrances, their exits, their attitudes, their gestures,
their outcries. The men that stuck constantly by Nero,
listened attentively, made their applause distinct, were
commended and honored: the rest were both degraded
and punished, so that some, when they could endure it
no longer (for they were frequently expected to be on
the qui vive from early morning until evening), would
feign to swoon and would be carried out of the theatres
as if dead.
16
As an incidental labor connected with his sojourn in
Greece he conceived a desire to dig a canal across the
isthmus of the Peloponnesus, and he did begin the
task. Men shrank from it, however, because, when the
first workers touched the earth, blood spouted from it,
groans and bellowings were heard, and many phantoms
appeared. Nero himself thereupon grasped a
mattock and by throwing up some of the soil fairly
compelled the rest to imitate him. For this work he
sent for a large number of men from other nations as
well.
17
For this and other purposes he needed great sums of
money; and as he was a promoter of great enterprises
and a liberal giver and at the same time feared an attack
from the persons of most influence while he was
thus engaged, he destroyed many excellent men. Of
most of these I shall omit any mention, merely saying
that the stock complaint under which all of them were
brought before him was uprightness, wealth, and
family: all of them either killed themselves or were
slaughtered by others. I shall pause to consider only
Corbulo and (of the Sulpicii Scribonii) Rufus and
Proculus. These two deserve attention because they
were in a way brothers and contemporaries, never doing
anything separately but united in purpose and in
property as they were in family: they had for a long
time administered the affairs of the Germanies and
had come to Greece at the summons of Nero, who affected
to want something from them. A complaint of
the kind which that period so prodigally afforded was
lodged against them. They could obtain no hearing on
the matter nor even get within sight of Nero; and as
this caused them to be slighted by all persons without
exception, they began to long for death and so met
their end by slitting open their veins.--And I notice
Corbulo, because the emperor, after giving him also a
most courteous summons and invariably calling him
(among other names) "father" and "benefactor,"
then, as this general approached Cenchrea, commanded
that he be slain before he had even entered his presence.
Some explain this by saying that Nero was about to
sing with zither accompaniment and could not endure
the idea of being seen by Corbulo while he wore the
long ungirded tunic. The condemned man, as soon as
he understood the import of the order, seized a sword,
and dealing himself a lusty blow exclaimed: "Your
due!" Now for the first time in his career was he
ready to believe that he had done ill both in sparing the
zither-player and in going to him unarmed.
18
This is the substance of what took place in Greece.
Does it add much to mention that Nero ordered Paris
the dancer killed because he wished to learn dancing
from him and was disappointed? Or that he banished
Caecina Tuscus, governor of Egypt, for bathing in the
tub that had been specially constructed for his coming
visit to Alexandria?
In Rome about this same time Helius committed
many acts of outrage. One of these was his killing of
a distinguished man, Sulpicius Camerinus, together
with his son; the complaint against them was that
whereas they were called Pythici after some of their
ancestors they would not abandon possession of this
name, thus blaspheming Nero's Pythian victories by
the use of a similar title.--And when the Augustans
offered to build a shrine to the emperor worth a thousand
librae, the whole equestrian order was compelled
to help defray the expense they had undertaken.--As
for the doings of the senate, it would be a task to describe
them all in detail. For so many sacrifices and
days of thanksgiving were announced that the whole
year would not hold them all.
19
Helius having for some time sent Nero repeated
messages urging him to return as quickly as possible,
when he found that no attention was paid to them,
went himself to Greece on the seventh day and frightened
him by saying that a great conspiracy against him
was on foot in Rome. This news made him embark at
double quick rate. There was some hope of his perishing
in a storm and many rejoiced, but to no purpose:
he came safely to land. And cause for destroying some
few persons was found in the very fact that they had
prayed and hoped that he might perish.
A.D. 68 (a.u. 821)
20
So, when he marched into Rome, a portion of the wall was torn
down and a section of the gates broken in, because
some asserted that each of these ceremonies was customary
upon the return of garlanded victors from the
games. First entered men wearing the garlands which,
had been won, and after them others with boards
borne aloft on spears, upon which were inscribed the
name of the set of games, the kind of contest, and a
statement that "Nero Caesar first of all the Romans
from the beginning of the world has conquered in it."
Next came the victor himself on a triumphal car in
which Augustus once had celebrated his many victories:
he wore a vesture of purple sprinkled with gold
and a garland of wild olive; he held in his hand the
Pythian laurel. By his side in the vehicle sat Diodorus
the Citharoedist. After passing in this manner through
the hippodrome and through the Forum in company
with the soldiers and the knights and the senate he ascended
the Capitol and proceeded thence to the palace.
A.D. 68 (a.u. 821)
The city was all decked with garlands, was ablaze with
lights and smoky with incense, and the whole population,--the
senators themselves most of all,--kept
shouting aloud: "Vah, Olympian Victor! Vah
Pythian Victor! Augustus! Augustus! Hail to Nero
the Hercules, hail to Nero the Apollo!! The one National
Victor, the only one from the beginning of time!
Augustus! Augustus! O, Divine Voice! Blessed are
they that hear thee!"--Why should I employ circumlocutions instead of
letting you see their very words? The actual expressions
used do not disgrace my history: no, the concealment
of none of them rather lends it distinction.
21
When he had finished these ceremonies, he announced
a series of horse-races, and transferring to the
hippodrome these crowns and all the rest that he had
secured by victories in chariot racing, he put them
about the Egyptian obelisk. The number of them was
one thousand eight hundred and eight. After doing
this he appeared as charioteer.--A certain Larcius, a
Lydian, approached him with an offer of twenty-five
myriads if he would play and sing for them. Nero
would not take the money, disdaining to do anything
for pay; and so Tigillinus collected it, as the price of
not putting Larcius to death. However, the emperor
did appear on the stage with an accompanied song and
he also gave a tragedy. In the equestrian contests he
was seldom absent, and sometimes he would voluntarily
let himself be defeated in order to make it more
credible that he really won at other times.
Dio 62nd Book: "And he inflicted uncounted woes on many cities."
22
This was the kind of life Nero led, this was the way
he ruled. I shall narrate also how he was put down
and driven from his throne.
While Nero was still in Greece, the Jews revolted openly and he sent
Vespasian against them. The inhabitants of Britain and of Gaul,
likewise, oppressed by the taxes, experienced an even keener distress, which
added fuel to the already kindled fire of their indignation.
--There was a Gaul named Gaius Julius Vindex
[an Aquitanian]
, descended from the native royal race
and on his father's side entitled to rank as a Roman
senator. He was strong of body, had an intelligent
mind, was skilled in warfare and was full of daring
for every enterprise.
[He was to the greatest degree
a lover of freedom and was ambitious; and he stood at
the head of the Gauls.]
Now this Vindex made an assembly
of the Gauls, who had suffered much during the
numerous forced levies of money, and were still suffering
at Nero's hands. And ascending a tribunal
he delivered a long and detailed speech against Nero,
saying that they ought to revolt from the emperor and
join him in an attack
[upon him]
,--"because," said
he, "he has despoiled the whole Roman world, because
he has destroyed all the flower of their senate, because
he debauched and likewise killed his mother, and does
not preserve even the semblance of sovereignty. Murders,
seizures and outrages have often been committed
and by many other persons: but how may one find
words to describe the remainder of his conduct as it
deserves? I have seen, my friends and allies,--believe
me,--I have seen that man (if he is a man, who
married Sporus and was given in marriage to Pythagoras)
in the arena of the theatre and in the orchestra,
sometimes with the zither, the loose tunic, the
cothurnus,
[23]
sometimes with wooden shoes
[24]
and mask. I have
often heard him sing, I have heard him make proclamations,
I have heard him perform tragedy. I have seen
him in chains, I have seen him dragged about, pregnant,
bearing children, going through all the situations
of mythology, by speech, by being addressed, by being
acted upon, by acting. Who, then, will call such a person
Caesar and emperor and Augustus? Let no one for
any consideration so abuse those sacred titles. They
were held by Augustus and by Claudius. This fellow
might most properly be termed Thyestes and Oedipus,
Alcmeon and Orestes. These are the persons he represents
on the stage and it is these titles that he has
assumed rather than the others. Therefore now at
length rise against him: come to the succor of yourselves
and of the Romans; liberate the entire world!"
23
Such words falling from the lips of Vindex met with
entire approval from all. Vindex was not working to
get the imperial office for himself but chose Servius
Sulpicius Galba for that position: this man was distinguished
for his upright behavior and knowledge of
war, was governor of Spain, and had a not inconsiderable
force. He was also nominated by the soldiers as
emperor.
24
Rufus, governor of Germany, set out to make war on
Vindex; but when he reached Vesontio he sat down to
besiege the city, for the alleged reason that it had not
received him. Vindex came against him to the aid of
the city and encamped not far off. They then sent
messages back and forth to each other and finally held
a conference together at which no one else was present
and made a mutual agreement,--against Nero, as it
was thought. After this Vindex set his army in motion
for the apparent purpose of occupying the town: and
the soldiers of Rufus, becoming aware of their approach,
and thinking the force was marching straight
against them, set out without being ordered to oppose
their progress. They fell upon the advancing troop
while the men were off their guard and in disarray,
and so cut down great numbers of them. Vindex seeing
this was afflicted with so great grief that he slew
himself. For he felt, besides, at odds with Heaven itself, in that
he had not been able to attain his goal in an undertaking of so great
magnitude, involving the overthrow of Nero and the liberation of the
Romans.
This is the truth of the matter. Many afterwards
inflicted wounds on his body, and so gave currency to
the erroneous supposition that they had themselves
killed him.
25
Rufus mourned deeply his demise, but refused to
accept the office of emperor, although his soldiers frequently
obtained it. He was an energetic man and had a large,
wide-awake body of troops. His soldiers tore down
and shattered the image of Nero and called their general
Caesar and Augustus. When he would not heed
them, one of the soldiers thereupon quickly inscribed
these words on one of his standards. He erased the
terms, however, and after a great deal of trouble
brought the men to order and persuaded them to submit
the question
[25]
to the senate and the people. It is
hard to say whether this was merely because he did not
deem it right for the soldiers to bestow the supreme
authority upon any one (for he declared this to be the
prerogative of the senate and the people), or because
he was entirely highminded and felt no personal desire
for the imperial power, to secure which others were
willing to do everything.
26
[Nero was informed of the Vindex episode as he was
in Naples viewing the gymnastic contest just after
luncheon. He was naturally far from sorry, and leaping
from his seat vied in prowess with some athlete.
He did not hurry back to Rome but merely sent a letter
to the senate, in which he asked them to regard
leniently his non-arrival, because he had a sore throat,
implying that when he did come he wanted to sing to
them. And he continued to devote the same care and
attention to his voice, to his songs, and to the zither
tunes, not only just then but also subsequently: so he
would not try a tone of his intended program. If he
was at any time compelled by circumstances to make
some exclamation, yet somebody, reminding him that
he was to appear as citharoedist, would straightway
check and control him.
It is stated that Nero having offered by proclamation
two hundred and fifty myriads to the person who
should kill Vindex, the latter when he heard of it
remarked: "The person who kills Nero and brings his
head to me may take mine in return." That was the
sort of man Vindex was.
In general he still behaved in his accustomed manner
and he was pleased with the news brought him because
he had been expecting in any event to overcome Vindex
and because he thought he had now secured a justifiable
ground for money-getting and murders. He enjoyed
the same degree of luxury; and upon the completion
and adornment of the heroum of Sabina he gave it a
brilliant dedication, taking care to have inscribed upon
it: "The Women have built This to Sabina, the
Goddess Venus." And the writing told the truth:
for the building had been constructed with money of
which a great part had been stolen from women. Also
he had his numerous little jokes, of which I shall mention
only one, omitting the rest.]
One night he suddenly
summoned in haste the foremost senators and
knights, apparently to make some communication to
them regarding the political situation. When they
were assembled, he said: "I have discovered a way by
which the water organ"--I must write exactly what
he said--"will produce a greater and more harmonious
volume of sound." Such were his jokes about
this period. And little did he reck that both sets of
doors, those of the monument and those of the bedchamber
of Augustus, opened of their own accord in
one and the same night, or that at Albanum it rained
so much blood that rivers of it flowed over the land,
or that the sea retreated a good distance from Egypt
and covered a large portion of Lycia. 27
But when he
heard about Galba's being proclaimed emperor by the
soldiers and about the desertion of Rufus, he fell into
great fear: he made preparations in person at Rome
and he sent against the rebels Rubrius Gallus and some
others.
On learning that Petronius,
[
26]
whom he had sent ahead against the
rebels with the larger portion of the army, also favored the cause of
Galba, Nero reposed no further hope in arms.
Being abandoned by all without exception he began
forming plans to kill the senators, burn the city to the
ground, and sail to Alexandria. He dropped this hint
in regard to his future course: "Even though we be
driven from our empire, yet this little artistic gift of
ours shall support us there." To such a pitch of folly
had he come as to believe that he could live for a
moment as a private citizen and would be able to appear
as a musician.
He was on the point of putting those measures into effect when the
senate first withdrew the guard that surrounded Nero, then entered the
camp, and declared Nero an enemy but chose Galba in his place as
emperor.
But when he perceived that he had been deserted
also by his body-guards (he happened to be asleep in
some garden), he undertook to make his escape. Accordingly,
he assumed shabby clothing and mounted a
horse no better than his attire. Closely veiled he rode
while it was yet night towards an estate of Phao, a
Caesarian, in company with the owner of the place, and
Epaphroditus and Sporus. 28
While he was on the
way an extraordinary earthquake occurred, so that
one might have thought the whole world was breaking
apart and all the spirits of those murdered by
him were leaping up to assail him. Being recognized,
they say, in spite of his disguise by some one
who met him he was saluted as emperor; consequently
he turned aside from the road and hid himself
in a kind of reedy place. There he waited till
daylight, lying flat on the ground so as to run the least
risk of being seen. Every one who passed he suspected
had come for him; he started at every voice,
thinking it to be that of some one searching for him:
if a dog barked anywhere or a bird chirped, or a bush
or twig was shaken by the breeze, he was thrown into a
violent tremor. These sounds would not let him have
rest, yet he dared not speak a word to any one of those
that were with him for fear some one else might hear:
but he wept and bewailed his fortune, considering
among other things how he had once stood resplendent
in the midst of so vast a retinue and was now dodging
from sight in company with three freedmen. Such
was the drama that Fate had now prepared for him, to
the end that he should no longer represent all other
matricides and beggars, but only himself at last. Now
he repented of his haughty insolence, as if he could
make one of his acts undone. Such was the tragedy
in which Nero found himself involved, and this verse
constantly ran through his mind:
"Both spouse and father bid me pitiably die."
After a long time, as no one was seen to be searching
for him, he went