 Claudius I of the Lives of the Twelve Caesars by Gaius Suetonius Tranquilus. This is a LibriVox recording. All LibriVox recordings are in the public domain. For more information or to volunteer please visit LibriVox.org. Recording by Alan Steely. The Lives of the Twelve Caesars by Gaius Suetonius Tranquilus translated by Alexander Thompson and edited by T. Forrester. Claudius Part 1, Paragrass 1-15. Livia, having married Augustus when she was pregnant, was within three months afterwards delivered of Drusus, the father of Claudius Caesar, who had at first the premonun of Decimus, but afterwards that of Nero, and it was suspected that he was begotten in adultery by his father-in-law. The following verse, however, was immediately in every one's mouth. Tos Uticus Cae Primina Padia. Poetically translated as, nine months for the common birth, the fates degree, but for the great reduced the term to three. This stressed us during the time of his quiesta and praetor commanded in Ratan and German wars, and was the first of all Roman generals who navigated the northern ocean. He made likewise some prodigious trenches beyond the Rhine, which to this day are called by his name. He overthrew the enemy in several battles and drove them far back into the depths of the desert, nor did he desist from pursuing them until an apparition in the form of a barbarian woman of more than human size appeared to him, and in the Latin tongue forbade him to proceed any further. For these achievements he had the honour of the novation and the triumphal ornaments. After his praetorship he immediately entered into the office of consul, and returning again to Germany died of disease in the summer encampment, which thence obtained the name of the unlucky camp. His corpse was carried to Rome by the principal persons of the several municipalities and colonies upon the road, being met and received by the recorders of each place and buried in the campus Martius. In honour of his memory the army erected a monument around which the soldiers used annually upon a certain day to march in solemn procession, and persons deputed from the several cities of Gaul performed religious rites. The senate likewise, among various other honours, decreed for him a triumphal arch of marble with trophies in the Appian way, and gave the cognon of Germanicus to him and his prosperity. In him the civil and military virtues were equally displayed, for, besides his victories, he gained from the enemy the Spolia Opema, and frequently marked out the German chiefs in the midst of their army and encountered them in single combat at the utmost hazard of his life. He likewise often declared that he would sometime or other, if possible, restore the ancient government. In this account I suppose some have ventured to affirm that Augustus was jealous of him and recalled him, and because he made no haste to comply with the order took him off by poison. This I mention that I may not be guilty of any admission, more than because I think it's either true or probable, since Augustus loved him so much when living that he always in his wills made him joint heir with his sons as he once declared in the Senate. And upon his cease, extolling him in a speech to the people, to the degree that he prayed the gods to make his caesars like him and to grant himself as honourable and exit out of this world as they had given him. And not satisfied with inscribing upon his tomb an epitaph in the verse composed by himself, he wrote likewise the history of his life in prose. He had by the younger Atonia several children, but left behind him only three, namely Germanicus, Livilia and Claudius. Claudius was born at Lyons in the consulship of Julius Antonius and Fabius africanus. Upon the first of August, at the very day upon which an altar was first dedicated there to Augustus. He was named Tiberius Claudius Strussus, but soon afterwards upon the adoption of his elder brother into the Julian family he assumed the cognamen to Manicus. He was left an infant by his father, and during almost the whole of his minority, and for some time after. He attained the age of manhood, was afflicted with a variety of obstinates disorders in so much that his mind and body being greatly impaired he was, even after his arrival at the years of maturity, never thought sufficiently qualified for any public or private employment. He was therefore during a long time and even after the expiration of his minority, under the direction of a pedagogue, who he complains in a certain memoir, was a barbarous wretch and formerly superintendent of the mule drivers who was selected for his governor on the purpose to correct him severely on every trifling occasion. On account of this crazy constitution of body and mind, at the spectacle of gladiators which he gave the people jointly with his brother in honour of his father's memory, he presided, muffled up, in a palium, a new fashion. When he assumed the manly habit he was carried in a litter at midnight to the capital without the usual ceremony. He applied himself, however, from an early age with great assiduity to the study of the liberal sciences and frequently published specimens of his skill in each of them, but never with all his endeavours could he attain to any public post in the government or afford any hope of arriving at distinction thereafter. His mother, Antonia, frequently called him an abortion of a man that has only been begun but never finished by nature. And when she would upgrade any one with dullness she said he was a greater fool than her son Claudius. His grandmother Augusta always treated him with the utmost contempt. Very rarely spoke to him when she did admonish him upon any occasion. It was in writing, very briefly and severely, or by messengers. His sister Lavilia, upon hearing that he was about to be created emperor, openly and loudly expressed to indignation that the Roman people should experience a fate so severe and so much below their grandeur. To exhibit the opinion both fable and otherwise entertained concerning him by Augustus his great uncle, I have here subjoined some extracts from the letters of that emperor. They begin. I have had some conversation with Iberius according to your desire my dear Livia, as to what must be done with your grandson Iberius at the games of Mars. We are both agreed in this that once for all we ought to determine what course to take with him. For if he be really sound and, so to speak, quite right in his intellects, why should we hesitate to promote him by the same steps and degrees we did his brother? But if we find him below par and efficient both in body and mind we must be aware of giving occasion for him and ourselves to be laughed at by the world which is ready enough to make such things the subject of mirth and erision. For we shall never be easy if we are always to be debating upon every occasion of this kind without settling in the first instance whether he be really capable of public offices or not. With regard to what you consult me about at present moment I am not against his superintending the feasts of the priests in the games of Mars if he will suffer himself to be governed by his kinsman, Cilius's son, that he may do nothing to make the people stare and laugh at him. But I do not approve of his witnessing the Cercian games from the Paul Vinard. He will there be exposed to view in the very front of the theatre. Nor do I like that he should go to the Albion Mount or be at Rome during the Latin festivals, for if he be capable of attending his brother to the Mount why has he not made prefect of the city. Thus, my dear Livia, you have my thoughts upon the matter. In my opinion we ought to settle this affair for once and for all, that we may not always be in suspense between hope and fear. You may, if you think proper, give your kinsman, Antonia, this part of my letter to read. In another letter he writes as follows, I shall invite the youth, Tiberius, every day during your absence, to supper, that he may not supper alone with his friends, Sopacius, and Athendonorus. I wish the poor creature was more cautious and attentive in the choice of someone whose manners ere and gait might be proper for his imitation. Atuci, Panu, Tuus, Poradicus, Lyon. In things of consequence he sadly fails. Where his mind is not run astray he discovers a noble disposition. In a third letter he says, let me die, my dear Livia, if I am not astonished that the declamation of your grandson Tiberius should please me, for how he who talks so ill should be able to declaim so clearly and properly I cannot imagine. There is no doubt, but Augustus after this came to the resolution upon the subject, and accordingly left him invested with no other honour than that of inaugural priesthood, naming him among the heirs of the third degree who were but distantly allied to his family, for a sixth part of his estate only with a legacy of no more than 800,000 sistercies. Upon his requesting some office in the state, Tiberius granted him the honoree appendages of the consortium, and when he pressed for a legitimate appointment the emperor wrote word back that he sent him forty gold pieces for his expenses during the festivals of Saturnalia and Siglaria. Upon this, laying aside all hope of advancement, he resigned himself entirely to an indolent life, living in great privacy, one with his gardens or a villa which he had near the city, another while in Campania, where he passed his time in the lowliest society, by which means, beside his former character of a dull heavy fellow, he acquired that of drunkard and gamester. Notwithstanding this sort of life, much respect was shown him both in public and in private. The equestrian order twice made a choice of him to intercede on their behalf, once to obtain from the consuls the favour of bearing on their shoulders the corpse of Augustus to Rome, and a second time to congratulate him upon the death of Sir Giannis. When he entered the theatre they used to rise and pull off their cloaks, the senate likewise decreed that he should be added to the number of Augustal college of priests who were chosen by lot, and soon afterwards when his house was burned down that it should be rebuilt at the public charge, and that he should have the privilege of giving his vote among the men of the consular rank. This decree was however repealed, Tiberius insisting to have him excused on account of his imbecility and promising to make good his loss at his own expense, but at his death he named him in his will among his third heirs for a third part of his estate, leaving him beside a legacy of two millions of Cisterces and expressly recommending him to the armies, the senate and the people of Rome amongst his other relations. At last Caius, his brother's son, upon his advancement to the empire, endeavouring to gain the affections of the public by all arts of popularity, Claudius also was admitted to the public offices and held the consul ship jointly with his nephew for two months. As he was entering the forum for the first time in the fascias, an eagle which was flying that way alighted upon his right shoulder. A second consul ship was allotted to him to commence at the expiration of the fourth year. He sometimes resided at the public spectacles as the representative of Caius, being always on those occasions complimented with the acclamations of the people wishing him all happiness, sometimes under the title of the emperor's uncle and sometimes under that of Germanicus's brother. Still he was subject to many slights. If at any time he came in late to supper, he was obliged to walk around the room sometime before he could get a place at the table. When he indulged himself with sleep after eating, which was common practice with him, the company used to throw olive stones and dates at him, and the buffoons who attended would wake him as if only in jest with a cane or a whip. Sometimes they would put slippers upon his hands as he lay snoring that he might upon awakening rub his face with them. He was not only exposed to contempt, but sometimes likewise to considerable danger. First in his consul ship, for having been too remiss in providing and erecting the statues of Cassius's brothers, Nero and Rossus, he was very near being deprived of his office, and afterwards he was continually harassed with informations against him by one or other, sometimes even of his own domestics. When the conspiracy of Lepius and Gluticulus was discovered being sent with some other deputies into Germany to congratulate the emperor upon the occasion, he was in danger of his life, Caius being greatly enraged and loudly complaining that his uncle was sent to him as if he was a boy who wanted a governor. Some even say that he was thrown into a river in his travelling dress. From this period he voted in the senate always the last of the members of the consular rank being called upon after the rest on purpose to disgrace him. A charge of the forgery of the will was also allowed to be prosecuted, though he only signed it as a witness, at last being obliged to pay eight million of cisterces on entering upon a new office of the priesthood. He was reduced to such straits in his private affairs that in order to discharge his bond to the treasury he was under the necessity of exposing to sale his whole estate by the order of the prefix. Having spent the greater part of his life under these and like circumstances he came at last to the empire in the fiftieth year of his age by a very surprising turn of fortune. Being as well as the rest prevented from approaching Caius by the conspirators who dispersed the crowd under the pretext of his desiring to be private he retired to an apartment called the Hermium, and soon afterwards terrified by the report of Caius being slain he crept into the adjoining balcony where he hid himself behind the hangings of the door. A common soldier who happened to pass by that way spying his feet and desirous to discover who he was pulled him out. When immediately recognising him he threw himself in great fright at his feet and saluted him by the title of Emperor. He then conducted him to his fellow soldiers who were all in a great rage and irresolute what they should do. They put him into a litter and as the slaves of the palace had all fled took their turns in carrying him on their shoulders and brought him into the camp sad and trembling. The people who met him lamented his situation as if the poor innocent was being carried to execution. Being received within the ramparts he continued all night with the sentries on guard recovering somewhat from his fright but in no great hopes of the succession. For the consuls with the senate and civil troops had possessed themselves of the forum and capital with the determination to assert the public liberty and he being sent for likewise by a tribune of the people to the senate house to give his advice upon the present juncture of affairs return the answer. I am under constraint and cannot possibly come. The day afterwards the senate being deletory to their proceedings and worn out by divisions amongst themselves while the people who surrounded the senate house shouted that they should have one master naming Claudius. He suffered the soldiers assembled under the arms to swear allegiance to him promising them fifteen thousand Cisterces man. He being the first of the Caesars who purchased the submission of the soldiers with money. Having thus established himself in power his first object was to abolish all remembrance of the two preceding days in which a revolution in the state had been canvassed. Accordingly he passed an act of perpetual oblivion and pardon for everything said or done during that time and this he faithfully observed with the exception only of putting to death a few tribunes and centurions concerned in the conspiracy against Caesars both as an example and because he understood that they had also planned his own death. He now turned his thoughts towards paying respect to the memory of his relations. His most solemn and usual oath was by Augustus. He prevailed upon the senate to decree divine honors to his grandmother Livia with the chariot in this Caesarsian procession drawn by elephants as had been appointed for Augustus and public offerings to the shades of his parents besides which he instituted Caesarsian games for his father to be celebrated every year upon his birthday and for his mother a chariot to be drawn through the circus with the title of Augusta which had been refused by his grandmother. To the memory of his brother to which upon all occasions he showed a great regard he gave a Greek comedy to be exhibited in the public diversions at Naples and awarded the crown for it according to the sentence of the judges in that solemnity nor did he admit to make honor and grateful mention to Mark Antony declaring by proclamation that he the more earnestly insisted upon the observation of his father Drusius's birthday because it was likewise that of his grandfather Antony. He completed the marble arch near Pompey's theater which had formally been decreed by the senate in honor of Tiberius but which had been neglected and though he cancelled all the acts of Caesars yet he forbade the day of his assassination notwithstanding it was that of his own accession to the empire to be reckoned among the festivals but with regard to his own a grandestment he was sparing and modest declining the title of emperor and refusing all excessive honors he celebrated the marriage of his daughter and the birthday of a grandson with great privacy at home. He recalled none of those who had been banished without a decree of the senate and requested of them permission for the prefect of the military tribunes and praetorian guards to attend him in the senate house and also that they would be pleased to bestow upon his procurators judicial authority in the provinces. He asked of the consuls likewise the privilege of holding fares upon his private estate he frequently assisted the magistrates in the trial of Causes as one of their assessors and when they gave public spectacles he would rise up with the rest of the spectators and salute them both by words and gestures. When the tribunes of people came to him while he was on the tribunal he excused himself because on account of the crowd he could not hear them unless they stood. In a short time by his conduct he wrought himself so much into the favour and affection of the public that when upon his going to Ostia a report was spread in the city that he had been waylaid and slain the people never ceased cursing the soldiers for traitors and the senate as parasites until one or two persons and presently after several others were brought by the magistrate upon the rostra who assured them that he was alive and not far from the city on his way home. Conspiracies however were formed against him not only by individuals separately but by a faction and at last his government was disturbed with civil war. A lowfellow was found with a pognon about him near his chamber at midnight two men of the equestrian order were discovered waiting for him in the streets armed with a tuck and a huntsman's dagger one of them intended to attack him as he came out of the theatre and the other as he was sacrificing in the temple of mars. Gullus Asinius and Statilius Corvinus grandsons of the two orators polio and messala formed a conspiracy against him in which they engage many of his free men and slaves. Ferius Camilius Scribonianus his lieutenant in the Dalmatia broke into the rebellion but was reduced in the space of five days the legions which he had seduced from their oath of fidelity relinquishing their purpose upon an alarm occasioned by ill omens for when orders were given them to march to meet their new emperor the eagles could not be decorated nor the standards pulled out of the ground whether it was by accident or a divine into position. Besides his former consulship he held the office afterwards four times the first two successively but the following after an interval of four years each the last for six months the others for two and the third upon his being chosen in the room of a consul who died which had never been done by any of the emperors before him whether he was a consul or out of office he constantly attended the courts for the administration of justice even upon such days as were solemnly observed as days of rejoicing in his family or by his friends and sometimes upon the public festivals of ancient institution nor did he always adhere strictly to the letter of the laws but overruled the rigor or lenity of many of their enactments according to his sentiments of justice inequality for where persons lost their suits by insisting upon more than appeared to be their due before the judges of private causes he granted them the indulgence of a second trial and with regard to such as were convicted of any great delinquency he even exceeded the punishment appointed by law and condemned them to be exposed to wild beasts but in hearing and determining causes he exhibited a strange inconsistency of temper being at one time circumspect and say jesus at another inconsiderate and rash and sometimes frivolous and like one out of his mind in correcting the role of judges he struck off the name of one who concealing the privilege his children gave him to be excused from serving had answered to his name as to eager for the office another who was summoned before him in a cause of his own but alleged that the affair did not properly come under the empress cognance but that of ordinary judges he ordered to plead the cause himself immediately before him and show him in a case of his own how equitable a judge he would prove in that of other persons a woman refusing to acknowledge her own son and there being no clear proof on either side he obliged her to confess the truth by ordering her to marry the young man he was much inclined to determine causes in favor of parties who appeared against those who did not without inquiring whether their absence was occasioned by their own fault or by real necessity on proclamation of a man's being convicted of forgery and that he ought to have his hands cut off he insisted that an executioner should be immediately sent for with a Spanish sword and a block a person being prosecuted for falsely assuming the freedom of Rome and a frivolous dispute arising between the advocates in the cause whether he ought to make his appearance in the Rome or the Grecian dress to show his impartiality he commanded him to change his clothes several times according to the character he assumed in the accusation or defense an anecdote is related of him and believed to be true that in a particular cause he delivered his sentence in writing thus I am in favor of those who have spoken the truth by this he's so much forfeited the good opinion of the world that he was everywhere and openly despised a person making an excuse for the non-appearance of a witness whom he had sent for from the provenances declared it was impossible for him to appear concealing the reason for some time at last after several interrogatories were put to him on the subject he answered the man is dead to which Claudius replied I think that this is a sufficient excuse another thanking him for suffering a person who was prosecuted to make his defense by council added and yet it is no more than what is usual I have likewise heard old men say that the advocates used to abuse his patients so grossly that they would not only call him back as he was quitting the tribunal but would seize him by the lap of his coat and sometimes catch him by his heels to make him stay some obscure Greek who was litigant had an altercation with him in which he called out you are an old fool that such behavior however strange is not incredible will appear from this anecdote it is certain that a Roman knight who was prosecuted by the impotent device of his enemies on the false charge of abominable obscenity with women observing that the common strumpets were summoned against him and allowed to give evidence abraded Claudius in very harsh and severe terms with his folly and cruelty and through his style and some books which he had in his hands in his face with such violence as to wound him severely in the cheek end of Claudius part one recording by Alan Steeley Bristol UK Claudius part two of the lives of the 12 Caesars by Gaius Sutonius Tranquillus this is a LibriVox recording all LibriVox recordings are in the public domain for more information or to volunteer please visit LibriVox.org recording by Alan Steeley he likewise assumed the censorship which had been discontinued since the time that Paulus and Plancus had jointly held it but this he also administered very unequally and with a strange variety of humour and conduct in his review of the knights he passed over without any mark of disgrace a profligate young man only because his father spoke of him in the highest terms four said he his father is his proper censor another who was infamous for debauching use and for adultery he only admonished to indulge his youthful inclinations more sparingly or at least more cautiously adding why must I know what mistress you keep when at the request of his friends he had taken off a mark of infamy which he had set upon one night's name he said let the blot however remain he not only struck out of the list of judges but likewise deprived of the freedom of Rome an illustrious man of the highest provincial rank in Greece only because he was ignorant of Latin language nor in this review did he suffer anyone to give an account of his conduct by an advocate but obliged each man to speak for himself in the best way he could he disgraced many and some that little expected it and for a reason entirely new namely for going out of Italy without his license and one likewise for having in his provenance been the familiar companion of a king observing that in former times Raberius posthumous had been prosecuted for treason although he only went after Ptolemy to Alexandria for the purpose of securing payment of a debt having tried to brand with disgrace several others he to his own greater shame found them generally innocent through the negligence of the persons employed to inquire into their characters those whom he charged with living in celibacy with want of children or a state proving themselves to be husband's parents and in affluent circumstances one of the knights who was charged with stabbing himself laid his bosom bear to show that there was not the least mark of violence upon his body the following incidents were remarkable in his censorship he ordered a car plated with silver and of a very sumptuous workmanship which was exposed for sale in the sigillaria to be purchased and broken in pieces before his eyes he published 20 proclamations in one day in one of which he advised the people since the vintage was very plentiful to have their casks well secured at the bung with pitch and in another he told them that nothing would sooner cure the bite of a viper than the sap of a yew tree he undertook one expedition and that was of short duration the triumphal ornaments to creed him by senate he considered as beneath the imperial dignity and was therefore resolved to have the honor of a real triumph for this purpose he selected britain which had never been attempted by anyone since julia cesar and was then chafing with rage because the romans would not give up some deserters accordingly he set sail from austria but was twice very nearly wrecked by the boisterous wind called cirqueus upon the coast of the gloria and near the islands called stockades having marched by land from arseys to gasorium he then passed over to britain and part of the island submitted to him within a few days after his arrival without battle or bloodshed he returned to rome in less than six months from the time of his departure and triumphed in the most solemn manner to witness which he not only gave leave to the governors of provinces to come to rome but even to some of the exiles among the spoils taken from the enemy he fixed upon the bediment of his house in the patium a naval crown in token of his having passed and as it were conquered the ocean and had it suspended near the civic crown which was there before mercellana his wife followed his chariot in a covered litter those who had attended the honor of triumphal ornaments in the same war rode behind the rest followed on foot wearing the row with the broad stripes crassus frugui was mounted upon a horse richly comparisoned in a robe embroidered with palm leaves because this was the second time of his obtaining that honor he paid particular attention to the care of the city and to have it well supplied with provisions a dreadful fire happened in ameliana which lasted some time he passed two nights in the drabatorium and the soldiers in the gladiators not being in sufficient numbers to extinguish it he caused the magistrates to summon the people out of all the streets in the city to their assistance placing bags of money before him encouraged them to do their utmost declaring that he would reward everyone on the spot according to their exertions during a scarcity of provisions occasioned by bad crops for several successive years he was stopped in the middle of the forum by a mob who so abused him at the same time pelting him with fragments of bread that he had some difficulty in escaping into the palace by the back door he therefore used all possible means to bring provisions into the city even in the winter he proposed to the merchants a sure profit by indemnifying them against any loss that might befall them by storms at sea and granted great privileges to those who built ships for that traffic to a citizen of Rome he gave an exemption from the papier poppian law to one who had only the privilege of latium the freedom of the city and to women the rights which by law belonged to those who had four children which enactments are enforced to this day he completed some important public works which though not numerous were very useful the principal were an aqueduct which had been begun by chaos an emissary for the discharge of waters of the thethusian lake and the harbour of austnia although he knew that augustus had refused to comply with a repeated application from the marcians for one of these and that the other had been several times intended by julia cesar but has often abandoned on account of difficulty of its execution he brought to the city the cool and plentiful springs of the claudian water one of which is called carulius and the other curtius and albundius as likewise the river of the new anio in a stone canal and distributed them into many magnificent reservoirs the canal from the fusian lake was undertaken as much for the sake of profit as for the honor of the enterprise for there were parties who offered to drain it at their own expense on condition of their having a grant of the land laid dry with great difficulty he completed a canal three miles in length partly by cutting through and partly by tunneling a mountain 30 000 men being constantly employed in the work for 11 years he formed the harbour at austia by carrying out circular piers on the right and on the left with a mole protecting in deep water the entrance to the port to secure the foundation of this mole he sunk the vessel in which the great obelisk had been brought from egypt and built upon piles a very lofty tower in imitation of the pharaohs at alexandria on which lights were burnt to direct mariners in the night he often distributed largesse of corn and money amongst the people and entertain them with a great variety of public magnificent spectacles not only such as were usual and in the accustomed places but some of new invention and others revived from ancient models and exhibited in places where nothing of the kind had ever before been attempted in the games which he presented at the dedication of pompeh's theatre which had been burnt down and was rebuilt by him he presided upon a tribunal erected for him in the orchestra having first paid his devotions in the temple above and then coming down through the centre of the circle while all the people kept their seats in profound silence he likewise exhibited the secular games giving out that augustus had anticipated the regular period though he himself says in his history that they had been omitted before the age of augustus who had calculated the years with great exactness and again brought them to their regular period the crier was therefore ridiculed when he invited people in the usual form to games which no person had ever before seen nor ever would again when many were still living who'd already seen them and some of the performers who had formally acted in them were now again brought upon the stage he likewise frequently celebrated the cercian games in the Vatican sometimes exhibiting a hunt of wild beasts after every five courses he embellished the circus maximus with marble barriers and gilded goals which before were of common stone and wood and assigned proper places for the senators who were used to sitting promiscuously with the other spectators besides the chariot races he exhibited there the trojan game and wild beasts from africa which were encountered by a troupe of praetorian knights with their tribunes and even the prefect at the head of them besides thethalian horse who drive fierce bulls around the circus leaping upon their backs when they have exhausted their fury and dragged them by their horns to the ground he gave exhibitions of gladiators in several places and of various kinds one yearly on the anniversary of his accession in the praetorian camp but without any hunting or the usual apparatus another in the scepter as usual and in the same place another out of the common way and of a few days continuance only which he called sportula because when he was going to present it he informed the people by proclamation that he had invented them to a late supper that he had invited them to a late supper got up in haste and without ceremony nor did he lend himself to any kind of public diversion with more freedom and hilarity in so much that he would hold out his left hand and joined by the common people count upon his fingers aloud the gold pieces presented to those who came off conquerors he would earnestly invite the company to be merry sometimes calling them his masters with a mixture of insipid far-fetched jests thus when the people called for palambas he said he would give them one when he could catch it the following was well intended and well timed having amidst greater applause spared a gladiator on the intercession of his four sons he sent a billet immediately around to the theater to remind the people how much it behoved them to get children since they had before them an example of how useful they had been in procuring favor and security for a gladiator he likewise represented in the campus martyus the assault and sacking of a town and the surrender of the british kings presiding in his generals cloak immediately before he drew off the waters from the fucian lake he exhibited upon it a naval fight but the combatants on board the fleets cried out health attend you noble emperor we who are about to peril our lives salute you and he replying health attend you too and they all refused to fight as if by that response he had meant to excuse them upon this he hesitated for a time whether he should not destroy them all with fire and sword at last leaping from his seat and running along the shore of the lake with tottering steps the result of his foul excesses he partly by fair words and partly by threats persuaded them to engage this spectacle represented an engagement between the fleets of sicilian roads consisting each of 12 ships of war of three banks of oars the signal for the encounter was given by the silver triton raised by machinery from the middle of the lake with regard to religious ceremonies the administration of affairs both civil and military and the condition of all orders of the people at home and abroad some practices he corrected others which had been laid aside he revived and some regulations he introduced which were entirely new in appointing new priests for the several colleges he made no appointments without being sworn when an earthquake happened in the city he never failed to summon the people together by the praetor and appoint holidays for sacred rites and upon the sight of any ominous bird in the city or capital he issued an order for the supplication the words of which by virtue of his office of high priest after an exhortation from the rostra he recited in the presence of the people who repeated them after him all workmen and slaves being first ordered to withdraw the courts of judicata whose sittings had been formally divided between the summer and winter months he ordered for dispatch of business to sit the whole year round the jurisdiction in matters of trust which used to be granted annually by a special commission to certain magistrates and in the city only he made permanent and extended the provincial judges likewise he altered the clause added by tiberius to the papiapopian law which inferred that men of 60 years of age were incapable of begetting children he ordered that out of the ordinary course of proceeding orphans might have guardians appointed to them by the consuls and that those who have banished from any province by the chief magistrate should be debarred from coming into the city or any part of italy he inflicted upon certain persons a new sort of banishment by forbidding them to depart further than three miles from rome when any affair of importance came before the senate he used to sit between the two consuls upon the seats of the tribunes he reserved for himself the power of granting license to travel out of italy which before had belonged to the senate he likewise granted the consular ornaments to his deucinarian procurators from those who declined the senatorian dignity he took away the equestrian although he had in the beginning of his reign declared that he would admit no man into the senate who was not the great grandson of a roman citizen yet he gave the broad hem to the son of a freed man on condition that he should be adopted by a roman knight being afraid however of incurring censure by such an act he informed the public that his ancestor apius kyus the censor had elected the sons of the free men into the senate for he was ignorant it seems that in the times of apius and a long time afterwards persons manumitted were not called free men but only their sons who were freeborn instead of the expense which the college of questors was obliged to incur in paving the highways he ordered them to give the people an exhibition of gladiators and relieving them of the provinces of ostia and gall he reinstated them in charge of the treasury which since it had been taken from them had been managed by praetors or those who had formally filled that office he gave the triumphal ornaments to silanus who was betrothed to his daughter though he was underage and in other cases he bestowed them on so many and with so little reserve that there is extant a letter unanimously addressed to him by all the legions begging him to grant his consular lieutenants the triumphal ornaments at the time of their appointment to commands in order to prevent their seeking occasion to engage in unnecessary wars he decreed to alana splortius the honor of the ovation going to meet him at his entering the city and walking with him in the procession to the capital and back in which he took the left side giving him the post of honor he allowed gabinius circundus upon his conquest of torcy a german tribe to assume the cognamen of torsius his military organization of the equestrian order was this after having the command of the cohort they were promoted to a wing of auxiliary horse and subsequently received the commission of tribune of a legion he raised a body of militia who were called supernumeraries who though they were a sort of soldier and kept in reserve yet received pay he procured an act of the senate to prohibit all soldiers from attending senators at their houses in the way of respect and compliment he confiscated the estates of all freed men who presumed to take upon themselves the equestrian rank such of them as were ungrateful to their patrons and were complained of by them he reduced to their former condition of slavery and declared to their advocates that he would always give judgment against the freed men in a suit at law which the masses might happen to have with them some persons having exposed their six slaves in a languishing condition on the island of asculapius because of the tedious nature of their cure he declared all who were so exposed perfectly free never more to return if they should recover to their former servitude and that if anyone chose to kill at once rather than expose a slave he should be liable for murder he purchased a proclamation forbidding all travelers to pass through towns of italy any otherwise they're on foot or in a litter or chair he courted a cohort of soldiers at putioli and another at ostia to be in readiness against any accidents from fire he prohibited foreigners from adopting roman names especially those which belong to families those who falsely pretended to the freedom of rome he beheaded on the escueline he gave up to the senate the provinces of akea and massedonia which tiberius had transferred to his own administration he deprived the lightians from their liberties as a punishment for their fatal dissensions but restored to the rodians their freedom upon their repenting of their former misdemeanors he exonerated forever the people of illium from the payment of taxes as being the founders of the roman race reciting upon the occasion a letter in greek from the senate and people of rome to king solucius on which they promised him their friendship and alliance provided that he would grant their kinsmen ellensians immunity from all burdens he banished from rome all jews who were continually making disturbances at the instigation of one crestus he allowed the ambassadors of the germans to sit at the public spectacles in seats assigned to the senators being induced to grant them favors by their frank and honorable conduct for having been seated in rows of benches which were common to people on observing the pathian and armenian ambassadors sitting among the senators they took upon themselves to cross over into the same seats as being they said no way inferior to the others in point either of merit or rank the religious rites of the druids solemnized with such horrid cruelties which had only been forbidden the citizens of rome during the reign of augustus he utterly abolished among the Gauls on the other hand he attempted to transfer the illusian mysteries from attica to rome he likewise ordered the temple of venus ericina in sicily which was old and in ruinous condition to be repaired at the expense of the roman people he concluded treaties with foreign princes in the forum with the sacrifice of a sow and the form of words used by the heralds in former times but in these and other things and indeed the greater part of his administration he was directed not so much by his own judgment as by the influence of his wives and freed men from the most part acting in conformity to what their interests or fancies dictated he was twice married at the very early age first to amelia lepida the granddaughter of augustus and afterwards to livia medulina who had the cognamen of camilla and was descended from the old dictator camillus the former he divorced while still a virgin because her parents had incurred the displeasure of augustus and he lost the latter by sickness on the day fixed for their nuptials he next married lotia urgula nila whose father had enjoyed the honor of a triumph and soon afterwards alia patina the daughter of a man of consular rank but he divorced them both patina upon some trifling cause of disgust and urgula nina for scandalous lewdness and the suspicion of murder after them he took in marriage valeria mesalina the daughter of barbatus mesalana his cousin but finding that besides her other shameful deportries she had even gone so far as to marrying in his own absence chaias silas the settlement of her dower being formally signed in the presence of augustus he put her to death then summoning his pretorians to his presence he made them this declaration as i have been so unhappy in my unions i am resolved to continue in future unmarried and if i should not i give you leave to stab me he was however unable to persist in this resolution for he began immediately to think of another wife and even of taking back patina whom he had formally divorced he thought also of lolia paulia who had been married to chaias Caesar but being ensnared by the arts of agrippina the daughter of his brother germanicus who took advantage of the kisses and endearments which their near relationship admitted to inflame his desires he got someone to propose at the next meeting of the senate that they should oblige the emperor to marry agrippina as a measure highly conducive to the public interest and that in future liberty should be given for such marriages which until that time had been considered incestuous in less than 24 hours after this he married her no person was found however to follow the example accepting one freedman and a centurion of the first rank at the solemnization of whose nuptials both he and agrippina attended he had children by three of his wives by urgula nila drossus and claudia by patina antonia and by mesolinia octavia and also a son whom at first he called germanicus but afterwards britannicus he lost drossus at pompe when he was very young he being choked with a pair which in his play he tossed into the air and caught in his mouth and a few days before he had protruded him to want to say janus's daughters and i am therefore surprised that some authors should say he lost his life by treachery of st. janus claudia who was in truth the daughter of bota his freedman though she was born five months before his divorce he ordered to be thrown naked at her mother's door he married antonia to snaeus pompe the great and afterwards to fastus sila both use a very noble parentage octavia to his stepson nero and after she had been contracted to slannus britannicus was born upon the twelfth day of his reign and in his second consulship he often earnestly commended him to the soldiers holding him in his arms before their ranks and would likewise show him to the people in the theater setting him upon his lap or holding him out whilst he was still very young and was sure to receive their acclimations and good wishes on his behalf of his sons-in-law he adopted nero he not only dismissed from his favor both pompe and slannus but put them to death end of claudius part two recording by alan steely bristol uk claudias part three of the lives of the twelve seizes by gaia satonius tranquillus this is a libra vox recording all libra vox recordings are in the public domain for more information or to volunteer please visit libra vox.org recording by alan steely the lives of the twelve seizes by gaia satonius tranquillus translated by alexander tomson and edited by t forester claudias part three paragraphs 28 to 46 amongst his freed men the greatest favorite was the eunuch persides whom in his british triumph he presented with the pointless spear classing him among the military men next to him if not equal in favor was phoenix whom he not only preferred to commands both the cohorts and troops but the government of the provenance of judia and he became in consequence of his elevation the husband of three queens another favorite was harpreaucras to whom he granted the privilege of being carried in a litter within the city and of holding public spectacles for the entertainment of people in this class he was likewise poly bias who assisted him in his studies and had often the honor of walking between the two consuls but above all others narcissus his secretary and palius the controller of his accounts were in high favor with him he not only allowed them to receive by decree of the senate immense presence but also to be decorated with a questorian and praetorian and signs of honor so much did he indulge them in the massing wealth and plundering the public that upon his complaining once at the lowness of his exchequer someone said with great reason it would be full enough if those two freed men of his would take him into partnership with them being entirely governed by these freed men and as i have already said by his wives he was a tool of others rather than the prince he distributed offices or the command of armies pardoned or punished according as it suited their interests their passions or their caprice and for the most part without knowing or being sensible of what he did not to enter into the minute details relative to the revocation of grants the reversal of judicial decisions obtaining his signature to fictitious appointments or the bare faced alteration of them after his signing he put to death apia selanus the father of his son-in-law and the two julias the daughters of drossus and germanicus without any positive proof of their crimes with which they were charged or so much as permitting them to make any defense he also cut off snes pompe the husband of his eldest daughter and lucia selanus who was betrothed to the younger pompe was stabbed in the act of unnatural lewdness with a favorite paramour selanus was obliged to quit the office of preto upon the fourth of the callons of january and kill himself on news day following the very same on which claudius and agrippina were married he condemned to death five and thirty senators and above 300 roman knights with so little attention to what he did that when a centurion bought him word of the execution of a man of consular rank who was one of a number and told him that he had executed his order he declared he had ordered no such thing but he had approved of it because his freed men it seems had said that the soldiers did nothing more than their duty in dispatching the emperor's enemies without waiting for a warrant but it is beyond all belief that he himself at the marriage of meselina with the adulterous selanus would actually sign the writings relative to her diary induced as it is pretended by the design of diverting from himself and transferring upon another the danger which some omens seemed to threaten him either standing or sitting but especially where he lay asleep he had a majestic and graceful appearance for he was tall but not slender his gray looks became him well and he had a full neck but his knees were feeble and failed him in walking so that his gate was ungainly both when he assumed state and when he was taking diversion he was outrageous with his laughter and still more so in his wrath for then he phoned at the mouth and discharged from his nostrils he also stammered in his speech and had tremulous motion of the head at all times but particularly when he was engaged in any business however trifling although his health was very infirm during the former part of his life yet after he became emperor he enjoyed a good state of health except only that he was subject to a pain in the stomach in a fit of this complaint he said that he had thoughts of killing himself he gave entertainments as frequently as they were splendid and generally when there was such ample room that very often 600 guests snapped down together at a feast he gave on the banks of the canal for draining the fucian lake he narrowly escaped being drowned the water at its discharge rushing out with such violence that it overflowed the conduit at supper he had always his own children with those of several of the nobility who according to an ancient custom sat at the feet of the couches one of his guests having been suspected of poloining a golden cup he invited him again the next day but served him with a porcelain jug it is said too that he intended to publish an edit allowing all people the liberty of giving vent at the table to any distention occasioned by flatulence upon hearing of a person whose modesty when under restraint had nearly cost him his life he was always ready to eat and drink at any time or in any place one day as he was hearing causes in the form of augustus he smelt the dinner which was preparing for the salae in the temple of mars adjoining where upon he quitted the tribunal and went to partake of the feast with the priests he scarcely ever left the table until he had thoroughly crammed himself and drank to intoxication and then he would immediately fall asleep lying upon his back with his mouth open while in this condition a feather was put down his throat to make him throw up the contents of his stomach upon composing himself to rest his sleep was short and he usually woke around midnight but he would sometimes sleep in the daytime and that even when he was upon the tribunal so that advocates often found it difficult to wake him though they raised their voices for that purpose he set no bounds on his libidious intercourse with women he never betrayed any unnatural desires for the other sex he was fond of gaming and published a book upon the subject he even used to play as he rode in his chariot having the table so fitted that the game was not disturbed by the motion of the carriage his cruel and sanguine disposition was exhibited upon great as well as trifling occasions when any person was to be put to torture or criminal punished for parasite he was impatient for the execution and would have it performed in his own presence when he was at Tiber being desirous of seeing an example of the old way of putting male factors to death some were immediately bound to a stake for the purpose but there being no executioner to be had at the place he sent for one from Rome and waited for his coming until night in any exhibition of gladiators presented either by himself or others if any of the combatants chance to fall he ordered them to be butchered especially the retiari that he might see their faces in the agonies of death two gladiators happening to kill each other he immediately ordered some little knives to be made of their swords for his own use he took great pleasure in seeing men engage with wild beasts and the combatants who appeared on stage at noon he would therefore come to the theater by break of day and at noon dismissing the people to dinner continued sitting himself and besides those who were devoted to the sanguinary fate he would match others with beasts upon sight or such occasions as for instance the carpenters and their assistants and the people of that sort if a machine or any piece of work in which they had been employed about the theater did not answer the purpose for which it was intended to this desperate kind of encounter he forced one of his nomenclatures even encumbered as he was by wearing the toga but the characteristics most prominent in him were fear and distrust in the beginning of his reign although he much affected a modest and humble appearance as has been already observed yet he durst not venture himself at an entertainment without being attended by a guard or spearsman and made soldiers wait upon him at the table instead of servants he never visited a sick person until the chamber had been first searched and the bed and bedding thoroughly examined at other times all persons who came to pay their court to him was strictly searched by officers appointed for that purpose nor was it until a long time and with much difficulty was he prevailed upon to excuse women boys and girls from such rude handling or suffer their attendance or writing masters to retain their cases for pens and styles when camillus formed his plot against him not doubting but his timidity might be worked upon without a war he wrote to him a scurrilous petulant and threatening letter desiring him to resign the government and but take himself to a life of privacy upon receiving this requisition he had some thoughts of complying with it and summoned together the principal men of the city to consult them on the subject having heard some loose reports of conspiracies formed against him he was so much alarmed that he thought of immediately abdicating the government and when as I have before related a man armed with a dagger was discovered near him while he was sacrificing he instantly ordered the heralds to convoke the senate and with tears and dismal exclamations lamented that such was his condition that he was safe nowhere and for a long time afterwards he abstained from appearing in public he smothered his ardent love for messa liner not so much on the account of her infamous conduct as from the apprehension of danger believing that she was aspired to share with salinas her partner in adultery the imperial dignity upon this occasion he ran in a great fright and a very shameful manner to the camp asking all the way he went if the empire were indeed safely his no suspicion was too trifling no person on whom it rested too contemptible to throw him into a panic and induce him to take precautions for his safety and meditate revenge a man engaged in litigation before his tribunal having saluted him drew him aside and told him he had dreamt that he saw him murdered and shortly afterwards when his adversary came to deliver his plea to the emperor the plaintiff pretended to have discovered the murderer pointed to him as the man he had seen his dream whereupon as if he had been taken in the act he was hurried away to execution we are informed that apius salinas was got rid of in the same manner by the contrivance betwixt messa liner and narcissus in which they had their several parts assigned to them narcissus therefore burst into his law's chamber before the daylight apparently in great fright and told him that he had dreamt that apius salinas had murdered him the empress upon this affecting great surprise declared that she had the like dream for several nights excessively presently afterwards word was brought as it had been agreed on that apius was come he having indeed received orders the preceding day to be there at that time and as if the truth of the dream was sufficiently confirmed by his appearance at that juncture he was immediately ordered to be prosecuted and put to death the day following claudius related the whole affair to the senate and acknowledged his great obligation to his freed men for watching over him even in his sleep sensible of his being subject to passions and resentment he excused himself in both instances by the proclamation assuring the public that the former should be short and harmless the latter never without good cause after severely reprimanding the people of ostia for not sending some boats to meet him upon his entering the mouth of the tiber in terms which might expose them to public resentment he wrote to roam that he had been treated as a private person yet immediately afterwards he pardoned them and that in a way which had appearance of making them satisfaction or begging pardon for some injury he had done them some people who addressed him unseasonably in public he pushed away with his own hand he likewise banished a person who had been secretary to a questor and even a senator who had filled the office of praetor without hearing and although they were innocent the former only because he had treated him with rudeness while he was in a private station the other because in his adult ship he had fined some tenants of his for selling cooked victuals contrary to the law and ordered his steward who interfered to be whipped on this account likewise he took from the ad eyes the jurisdiction they had overcooked shops he did not scruple to speak of his own absurdities and declared in some short speeches which he published that he had only feigned in facility in the reign of kiosk because otherwise it would have been impossible for him to have escaped and arrived at the station he had then attained he could not however gain credit for this assertion for a short time afterwards a book was published under the title of moron anaestasis the resurrection of fools the design of which was to show that nobody ever counterfeited folly amongst other things people admired in him his indifference and unconcern ought to express it in greek his meteoria and able pepsia placing him at a table a little after meseliners death he inquired why the empress did not come many of those whom he condemned to death he ordered the day after to be invited to his table and to game with him and sent to rep remand them as sluggish fellows for not making greater haste when he was meditating his incestuous marriage with agrippina he was perpetually calling her my daughter my nursing born and brought up upon my lap and when he was going to adopt nero as if there was little cause for censure in his adopting a son-in-law when he had a son of his own arrived at the years of maturity he continually gave out in public that no one had ever been admitted by adoption into the claudian family he frequently appeared so careless in what he said and so in attentive to circumstances that it was believed he never reflected who he himself was or amongst whom or at what time or in what place he spoke in a debate in senate relative to the butchers and viteners he cried out i ask you who can live without a bit of meat i mentioned the great plenty of the old taverns from which he himself used formally to have his wine among other reasons for his supporting a certain person who was candidate for the quest to ship he gave this his father once gave me very seasonably a draft of cold water when i was sick upon his bringing a woman as a witness in some cause before the senate he said this woman was my mother's freed woman and dresser but she always considered me as her master and this i say because there are some still in my family that do not look upon me as such the people of osteo dressing him in open court with a petition he flew into a rage at them and said there is no reason why i should oblige you if anyone else is free to act as he pleases surely i am the following expression he had in his mouth every day and at all hours and seasons watch you take me for a theologious and in greek speak but do not touch me besides many other familiar sentences below the dignity of a private person much more of an emperor who is not deficient either in eloquence or learning as having applied himself very closely to the liberal sciences by the encouragement of titus livius and with the assistance of solpicus flavus he attempted at an early age the composition of a history and having called together a numerous adultery to hear and give their judgment upon it he read it over with such difficulty and frequently interrupting himself for after he had begun a great laugh was raised among the company by the breaking of several benches from the weight of very fat men and even when order was restored he could not forbear bursting out into violent fits of laughter at the remembrance of the accident after he became emperor likewise he wrote several things which he was careful to have recited to his friends by a reader he commenced his history from the death of the dictator Caesar but afterwards he took a later period and began at the conclusion of the civil wars because he found he could not speak with freedom and due regard to truth concerning the former period having been often taken to task both by his mother and grandmother of the earlier history he left only two books but of the latter one and forty he compiled likewise the history of his own life in eight books full of absurdities but in no bad style also a defense of zero against the books of sinious gallus which exhibited a considerable degree of learning he besides invented three new letters and added them to the former alphabet as highly necessary he published a book to recommend them while he was yet only a private person but on his elevation to imperial power he had little difficulty in introducing them into common use and these letters are still extent in a variety of books registers and inscriptions upon buildings he applied himself with no less attention to the study of greece literature asserting upon all occasions his love of that language and its surpassed excellency a stranger once holding a discourse both in greek and latin he addressed him thus since you are skilled in both our tongues and recommended aka to the favour of the senate he said i have a particular attachment to that province on account of our common studies in the senate he often made long replies to ambassadors in that language on the tribunal he frequently quoted the verses of homa when at any time he had taken vengeance on an enemy or a conspirator he scarcely ever gave to the tribunal on guard who according to the custom came for the word any other than this andra eponasty hot tis proctoris shelpony tis time to strike when wrong demands the blow to conclude he wrote some histories likewise in greek namely 20 books on tuscan affairs and eight on the carthenogen in consequence of which another museum was founded at alexandria in addition to the old one and called after his name and it was ordered that upon certain days in every year his tuscan history should be read over in one of these and his carthenogen in another as in a school each history being read through by persons who took it in turn towards the close of his life he gave some manifest indications that he repented of his marriage with agrippina and his adoption of nero for some of his freed men noticing with approbation his having condemned the day before a woman accused of adultery he remarked it has been my misfortune to have wives who have been unfaithful to my bed but they did not escape punishment often when he happened to meet britannicus he would embrace him tenderly and express a desire that he might grow a pace and receive from him an account of all his actions using the greek phrase hotrosus chi ias etai he who was wounded would also heal and intending to give him the manly habit while he was yet under age and tender youth because his stature would allow it he added i do so and the roman people may at last have a real Caesar soon afterwards he made his will and had it signed by all the magistrates as witnesses but he was prevented from proceeding further by agrippina accused by her own guilty conscience as well as by informers of a variety of crimes it was agreed that he was taken off by poison but where and by whom administered remains in uncertainty some authors also say that it was given him as he was feasting with the priests in the capital by the eunuch allotus his taster other said by agrippina at his own table in mushrooms a dish of which he was very fond the accounts of what followed likewise differ some relate that he instantly became speechless was wracked with pain through the night and died about daybreak others that at first he fell into a sound sleep and afterwards his food rising he threw up the hole but had another dose given him whether in water gruel under pretense of refreshment after his exhaustion or in a cluster as if designed to relieve his bowels is likewise uncertain his death was kept secret until everything was settled relative to his successor accordingly vows were made for his recovery and the comedians were called to amuse him as it was pretended by his own desire he died upon the third of the aides of october 13th october in the consul ship of isinius marcellus and achillus aviola in the 64th year of his age and the 14th of his reign his funeral was celebrated with a customary imperial pomp and he was ranked amongst the guards his honor was taken from him by nero but restored by vespasian the chief passages of his death were the appearance of a comet his father dresses his monument being struck by lightning and the death of most of the magistrates of all ranks that year it appears from several circumstances that he was sensible of his approaching dissolution and made no secret of it for when he nominated the consuls he appointed no one to fill the office beyond the month in which he had died at the last assembly of the senate in which he had made his appearance he earnestly exhorted his two sons to unity with each other and with earnest entreaties commanded to the fathers the care of their tender years and in the last calls that he heard from the tribunal he repeatedly declared in open court that he was now arrived at the last stage of mortal existence while all who heard it shrunk at the hearing these ominous words end of claudius recording by alan steely bristol uk nero part one of the lives of the 12 caesars by gaius sotonia strunquillus this is a librivox recording all librivox recordings are in the public domain for more information auto volunteer please visit librivox.org recording by phillip the lives of the 12 caesars by gaius sotonia strunquillus translated by alexander tomson and edited by tea forester nero part one paragraphs one to eighteen two celebrated families the calvini and ahenobabi sprung from the race of the domiti the ahenobabi derive both their extraction and their cognomen from one lucius domitius of whom we have this tradition as he was returning out of the country to roam he was met by two young men of a most august appearance who desired him to announce to the senate and people a victory of which no certain intelligence had yet reached the city to prove that they were more than mortals they stroked his cheeks and thus changed his hair which was black to a bright color resembling that of brass which mark of distinction descended to his posterity for they had generally red beards this family had the honor of seven consul ships one triumph and two censorships and being admitted into the patrician order they continued to use of the same cognomen with no other prinomena than those of knaeus and lucius these however they assumed with singular irregularity three persons in succession sometimes adhering to one of them and then they were changed alternately for the first second and third of the ahenobabi had the prinomen of lucius and again the three following successively that of knaeus while those who came after were called by turns one lucius and the other knaeus it appears to me proper to give a short account of several of the family to show that nero so far degenerated from the noble qualities of his ancestors that he retained only their vices as if those alone had been transmitted to him by his descent to begin therefore at a remote period his great grandfather's grandfather knaeus domicius when he was tribune of the people being offended with the high priests for electing another than himself in the room of his father obtained the transfer of the right of election from the colleges of the priests to the people in his consulship having conquered the alabroges and the arverni he made a progress through the province mounted upon an elephant with the body of soldiers attending him in a sort of triumphal pomp of this person the orison Licinius Crassus said it was no wonder he had a brazen beard who had a face of iron and a heart of lead his son during his pride or ship proposed that knaeus Caesar upon the expiration of his consulship should be called to account before the senate for his administration of that office which was supposed to be contrary both to the omens and the laws afterwards when he was consul himself he tried to deprive knaeus of the command of the army and having been by intrigue and cabal appointed his successor he was made prisoner at Corsinium in the beginning of the civil war being set at liberty he went to Marseille which was then besieged where having by his presence animated the people to hold out he suddenly deserted them and at last was slain in the battle of Farsalia he was a man of little constancy and of a sullen temper in despair of his fortunes he had recourse to poison but was so terrified at the thoughts of death that immediately repenting he took a vomit to throw it up again and gave freedom to his physician for having with great prudence and wisdom given him only a gentle dose of the poison when knaeus Pompey was consulting with his friends in what manner he should conduct himself towards those who were neuter and took no part in the contest he was the only one who proposed that they should be treated as enemies he left a son who was without doubt the best of the family by the pedian law he was condemned although innocent amongst others who were concerned in the death of Caesar upon this he went over to Brutus and Cassius his near relations and after their death not only kept together the fleet the command of which had been given him some time before but even increased it at last when the party had everywhere been defeated he voluntarily surrendered it to Mark Antony considering it as a piece of service for which the latter owed him no small obligations of all those who were condemned by the law above mentioned he was the only man who was restored to his country and filled the highest officers when the civil war again broke out he was appointed lieutenant under the same Antony and offered the chief command by those who were ashamed of Cleopatra but not daring on account of a sudden in disposition with which he was seized either to accept or refuse it he went over to Augustus and died a few days later not without an aspersion cast upon his memory for Antony gave out that he was induced to change sides by his impatience to be with his mistress Sevilia Naes this Knaes had a son named Demitius who was afterwards well known as the nominal purchaser of the family property left by Augustus's will and no less famous in his youth for his dexterity and chariot driving than he was afterwards for the triumphal ornaments which he obtained in the German war but he was a man of great arrogance prodigality and cruelty when he was edile he obliged Lucius Plancus the censor to give him the way and in his pritorship and consulship he made Roman knights and married women act on the stage he gave hunts of wild beasts both in the circus and in all the wards of the city as also a show of gladiators but with such barbarity that Augustus after privately reprimanding him to no purpose was obliged to restrain him by a public edict by the elder Antonia he had Nero's father a man of execrable character in every part of his life during his attendance upon Caius Caesar in the east he killed a freedman of his own for refusing to drink as much as he ordered him being dismissed for this from Caesar's society he did not mend his habits for in a village upon the Appian road he suddenly whipped his horses and drove his chariot on purpose over a poor boy crushing him to pieces at Rome he struck out the eye of a Roman knight in the forum only for some free language in a dispute between them he was likewise so fraudulent that he not only cheated some silversmiths of the price of goods he had bought of them but during his pritorship defrauded the owners of chariots in the Circassian games of the prizes due to them for their victory his sister jeering him for the complaints made by the leaders of the several parties he agreed to sanction a law that for the future the prizes should be immediately paid a little before the death of Tiberius he was prosecuted for treason adulteries and incest with his sister Lepida but escaped in the timely change of affairs and died of a dropsy at Purgy leaving behind him his son Nero whom he had by Agrippina the daughter of Germanicus Nero was born at Antium nine months after the death of Tiberius upon the 18th of the calendar of January 15th of December just as the sun rose so that its beams touched him before they could well reach the earth while many fearful conjectures in respect to his future fortune were formed by different persons from the circumstances of his nativity a saying of his father to Mishis was regarded as an ill presage who told his friends who were congratulating him upon the occasion that nothing but what was detestable and pernicious to the public could ever be produced of him and Agrippina. Another manifest prognostic of his future infelicity occurred upon his lustration day for Caus Caesar being requested by his sister to give the child what name he thought proper looking at his uncle Claudius who afterwards when emperor adopted Nero he gave his and this not seriously but only in jest Agrippina treating it with contempt because Claudius at that time was a mere laughing stock at the palace he lost his father when he was three years old being left heir to a third part of his estate of which he never got possession the whole being seized by his co-heir Caus his mother being soon after banished he lived with his aunt Lepida in a very necessitous condition under the care of two tutors a dancing master and a barber after Claudius came to the empire he not only recovered his father's estate but was enriched by the additional inheritance of that of his stepfather Crispus Pacienus upon his mother's recall from banishment he was advanced to such favor through Nero's powerful interest with the emperor that it was reported assassins were employed by Messalina Claudius's wife to strangle him as Britannicus's rival whilst he was taking his noonday repose in addition to the story it was said that they were frightened by a serpent which crept from under his cushion and ran away the tale was occasioned by finding on his couch near the pillow the skin of a snake which by his mother's order he wore for some time upon his right arm enclosed in a bracelet of gold this amulet at last he laid aside from aversion to her memory but he sought for it again in vain at the time of his extremity when he was yet a mere boy before he arrived at the age of puberty during the celebration of the Serkentian games he performed his part in the Trojan play with a degree of firmness which gained him great applause in the eleventh year of his age he was adopted by Claudius and placed under the tuition of Aeneas Seneca who had been made a senator it is said that Seneca dreamt the night after that he was giving a lesson to Caius Caesar Nero soon verified his dream betraying the cruelty of his disposition in every way he could for he attempted to persuade his father that his brother Britannicus was nothing but a changeling because the latter had saluted him notwithstanding his adoption by the name of Aenobarbis as usual when his aunt Lepida was brought to trial he appeared in court as a witness against her to gratify his mother who persecuted the accused on his introduction to the forum at the age of manhood he gave a largesse to the people and a donative to the soldiers for the Praetorian cohorts he appointed a solemn procession under arms and marched at the head of them with a shield in his hand after which he went to return thanks to his father in the senate before Claudius likewise at the time he was consul he made a speech for the Bolognese in latin and for the Rodians and people of Ilium in greek he had the jurisdiction of prefect of the city for the first time during the latin festival during which the most celebrated advocates brought before him not short and trifling causes as is usual in that case but trials of importance notwithstanding they had instructions from Claudius himself to the contrary soon afterwards he married Octavia and exhibited the Serkensian games and hunting of wild beasts in honor of Claudius he was seventeen years of age at the death of that prince and as soon as that event was made public he went out to the cohorts on guard between the hours of six and seven for the omens were so disastrous that no earlier time of the day was judged proper on the steps before the palace gate he was unanimously saluted by the soldiers as their emperor and then carried in a litter to the camp thence after making a short speech to the troops into the senate house where he continued until evening of all the immense honors which were heaped upon him refusing none but the title of father of his country on account of his youth he began his reign with an ostentation of dutiful regard to the memory of Claudius whom he buried with the utmost pomp and magnificence pronouncing the funeral oration himself and then had him enrolled amongst the gods he paid likewise the highest honors to the memory of his father Demitius he left the management of affairs both public and private to his mother the word which he gave the first day of his reign to the tribune on guard was the best of mothers and afterwards he frequently appeared with her in the streets of Rome in her litter he settled a colony at Antium in which he placed the veteran soldiers belonging to the guards and obliged several of the richest centurions of the first rank to transfer their residence to that place where he likewise made a noble harbor at a prodigious expense to establish still further his character he declared that he designed to govern according to the model of Augustus and omitted no opportunity of showing his generosity clemency and complacence the more burdensome taxes he either entirely took off or diminished the rewards appointed for informers by the papian law he reduced to a fourth part and distributed to the people four hundred cisterces a man to the noblest of the senators who were much reduced in their circumstances he granted annual allowances in some cases as much as five hundred thousand cisterces and to the Praetorian cohorts a monthly allowance of corn gratis when called upon to subscribe the sentence according to custom of a criminal condemned to die I wish said he I had never learned to read and write he continually saluted people of the several orders by name without a prompter when the senate returned him their thanks for his good government he replied to them it will be time enough to do so when I shall have deserved it he admitted the common people to see him perform his exercises in the campus marshes he frequently declined in public and recited verses of his own composing not only at home but in the theater so much to the joy of all the people that public prayers were appointed to be put up to the gods upon that account and the verses which he had publicly read were after being written in gold letters consecrated to Jupiter capitalinas he presented the people with a great number and variety of spectacles as the juvenile and secensian games stage plays and an exhibition of gladiators in the juvenile he even admitted senators and aged matrons to perform parts in the secensian games he assigned the equestrian order seats apart from the rest of the people and had races performed by chariots drawn each by four camels in the games which he instituted for the eternal duration of the empire and therefore ordered to be called maximi many of the senatorian and equestrian order of both sexes performed a distinguished roman knight descended on the stage by a rope mounted on an elephant a roman play likewise composed by a franias was brought upon the stage it was entitled the fire and in it the performers were allowed to carry off and to keep to themselves the furniture of the house which as the plot of the play required was burnt down in the theater every day during the solemnity many thousand articles for all descriptions were thrown amongst the people to scramble for such as fowls of different kinds tickets for corn clothes gold silver gems pearls pictures slaves beasts of burden wild beasts that have been tamed at last ships lots of houses and lands were offered as prizes in a lottery these games he beheld from the front of the proscenium in the show of gladiators which he exhibited in a wooden amphitheater built within a year in the district of the campus he ordered that none should be slain not even the condemned criminals employed in the combats he secured 400 senators and 600 roman knights amongst whom were some of unbroken fortunes and unblemished reputation to act as gladiators from the same orders he engaged persons to encounter wild beasts and for various other services in the theater he presented the public with the representation of a naval fight upon seawater with huge fishes swimming in it as also with the Pyrrhic dance performed by certain youths to each of whom after the performance was over he granted the freedom of Rome during this diversion a bull covered pacify concealed within a wooden statue of a cow as many of the spectators believed Icarus upon his first attempt to fly fell on the stage close to the emperor's pavilion and bespattered him with blood for he very seldom presided in the games but used to view them reclining on a couch at first through some narrow apertures but afterwards with the podium quite open he was the first to instituted in imitation of the Greeks a trial of skill in the three several exercises of music wrestling and horse racing to be performed at Rome every five years and which he called Nearonia upon the dedication of his bath and gymnasium he furnished the senate and the equestrian order with oil he appointed as judges of the trial men of consular rank chosen by lot who sat with the praetors at this time he went down into the orchestra amongst the senators and received the crown for the best performance in latin prose and verse for which several persons of the greatest merit contended but they unanimously yielded to him the crown for the best performer on the harp being likewise awarded to him by the judges he devoutly saluted it and ordered it to be carried to the statue of augustus in the gymnastic exercises which he presented in the scepter while they were preparing the great sacrifice of an ox he shaved his beard for the first time and putting it up in a casket of gold studied with pearls of great price consecrated it to Jupiter capitalinas he invited the vestal virgins to see the wrestlers perform because at Olympia the priestesses of ceres are allowed the privilege of witnessing that exhibition amongst the spectacles presented by him the solemn entrance of tiridates into the city deserves to be mentioned this personage who was king of Armenia he invited to roam by very liberal promises but being prevented by unfavorable weather from showing him to the people upon the day fixed by proclamation he took the first opportunity which occurred several cohorts being drawn up under arms about the temples in the forum while he was seated on a curial chair on the rostra in a triumphal dress amidst the military standards and ensigns upon tiridates advancing towards him on a stage made shelving for the purpose he permitted him to throw himself at his feet but quickly raised him with his right hand and kissed him the emperor then at the king's request took the turban from his head and replaced it by a crown whilst a person of praetorian rank proclaimed in latin the words in which the prince addressed the emperor as a supliant after this ceremony the king was conducted to the theater where after renewing his obeisance nero seated him on his right hand being then greeted by universal acclamation with the title of emperor and sending his laurel crown to the capital nero shut the temple of the two-faced janus as though there now existed no war throughout the roman empire he filled the consulship four times the first for two months the second and last for six and the third for four the two intermediate ones he held successively but the others after an interval of some years between them in the administration of justice he scarcely ever gave his decision on the pleadings before the next day and then in writing his manner of hearing causes was not to allow any adjournment but to dispatch them in order as they stood when he withdrew to consult his assessors he did not debate the matter openly with them but silently and privately reading over their opinions which they gave separately in writing he pronounced sentence from the tribunal according to his own view of the case as if it was the opinion of the majority for a long time he would not admit the sons of freedmen into the senate and those who had been admitted by former princes he excluded from all public offices to supernumerary candidates he gave command and allegiance to comfort them under the delay of their hopes the consulship he commonly conferred for six months and one of the two consuls dying a little before the first of january he substituted no one in his place disliking what had been formally done for coninious rebellious on such an occasion who was consul for one day only he allowed the triumphal honors only to those who were of questorian rank and to some of the equestrian order and bestowed them without regard to military service and instead of the questors whose office it properly was he frequently ordered that the addresses which he sent to the senate on certain occasions should be read by the consuls he devised a new style of building in the city ordering piazzas to be erected before all houses both in the streets and detached to give facilities from their terraces in case of fire for preventing it from spreading and these he built at his own expense he likewise designed to extend the city walls as far as austere and bring the sea from thence by a canal into the old city many severe regulations and new orders were made in his time a sumptuary law was enacted public suppers were limited to the sportuli and vittling houses restrained from selling any dressed vitals except pulse and herbs whereas before they sold all kinds of meat he likewise inflicted punishments on the christians a sort of people who held a new and impious superstition he forbade the revels of the charioteers who had long assumed a licenced a stroll about and established for themselves a kind of prescriptive right to cheat and thieve making a jest of it the partisans of the rival theatrical performers were banished as well as the actors themselves to prevent forgery a method was then first invented of having writings bored run through three times with a thread and then sealed it was likewise provided that in wills the two first pages with only the testator's name upon them should be presented blank to those who were to sign them as witnesses and that no one who wrote a will for another should insert any legacy for himself it was likewise ordained that clients should pay their advocates a certain reasonable fee but nothing for the court which was to be gratuitous the charges for it being paid out of the public treasury that causes the cognizance of which before belonged to the judges of the exchequer should be transferred to the forum and the ordinary tribunals and that all appeals from the judges should be made to the senate he never entertained the least ambition or hope of augmenting and extending the frontiers of the empire on the contrary he had thoughts of withdrawing the troops from britain and was only restrained from so doing by the fear of appearing to detract from the glory of his father all that he did was to reduce the kingdom of pontus which was ceded to him by polymon