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).
[Sidenote: A.D. 66 (a.u. 819)] [Sidenote:--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, [Footnote: This proper name is
the result of an emendation by Reimar.]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.
[Sidenote:--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.
[Sidenote:--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.
[Sidenote:--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.
[Sidenote:--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.
[Sidenote:--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.
[Sidenote:--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.]
[Sidenote:--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. [Footnote: Literally "victor of the periodos." This was a name
applied to an athlete who had conquered in the Pythian, Isthmian, Nemean
and Olympian games.] 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.
[Sidenote: A.D. 67 (?)] [Sidenote:--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 [Footnote: [Greek: oi]
supplied by Reiske.] 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.
[Sidenote:--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.
[Sidenote:--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. [Sidenote:--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.
[Sidenote:--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.
[Sidenote:--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.
[Sidenote:--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.
[Sidenote:--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.
[Sidenote:--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.
[Sidenote:--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.
[Sidenote:--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.
[Sidenote: A.D. 68 (a.u. 821)] [Sidenote:--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.
[Sidenote: 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.
[Sidenote:--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.