The Twelve Caesars (53 page)
Read The Twelve Caesars Online
Authors: Matthew Dennison
CLAUDIUS
1
Osgood, Josiah,
Claudius Caesar: Image and Power in the Early Roman Empire
, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2010, p 15.
2
Liversidge, Michael & Edwards, Catharine, eds,
Imagining Rome: British Artists and Rome in the Nineteenth Century
, London: Merrell Holberton, 1996, p 60.
3
See Grant, op. cit., p 129.
4
Osgood, op. cit., p 9.
5
Trans. Matyszak, op. cit, p 198.
6
Cassius Dio, op. cit., 60.1.1.
7
Ibid, 60.12.4.
8
See Osgood, op. cit., pp 29–30.
9
Cassius Dio, op cit., 60.15.3.
10
Ibid, 60.15.4
11
See Osgood, op. cit., p 45.
12
Pliny the Elder, op. cit., 10.83.
13
Juvenal,
Satire VI
, quoted Freisenbruch, op. cit., p 128.
14
Tacitus,
Annals
, XI.1.
15
See Alston, Richard,
Aspects of Roman History
,
AD14–117
, London: Routledge, 1998, p 95.
16
Tacitus,
Histories
, 1.30.
NERO
1
Cassius Dio, op. cit., 61.10.3.
2
Sommer, Michael,
The Complete Roman Emperor: Imperial Life at Court and on Campaign
, London: Thames & Hudson, 2010, p 49.
3
Bishop, John,
Nero: The Man and the Legend
, London: Robert Hale, 1964, pp 21–2.
4
Cassius Dio, op cit., 63.27.2.
5
Seneca,
On the Happy Life
, 7.7, quoted Laurence, Ray,
Roman Passions: A History of Pleasure in Imperial Rome
, London: Continuum,
2009, p 9.
6
Ibid, p 14.
7
Cassius Dio, op cit., 61.3.2.
8
Tacitus, Annals, XIII.4, quoted Sutherland, op. cit., p 149.
9
Cassius Dio, op cit., 61.4.
10
Tacitus, Annals, XIII.2.
11
Ibid, XIII.5.
12
See Barrett, Anthony A.,
Caligula The Corruption of Power
London: Batsford, 1989, pp 167–8.
13
Holland, Richard,
Nero: the Man Behind the Myth
, Stroud: Sutton, 2000, p 87.
14
Tacitus,
Annals
, 14.50.
15
Holland, op. cit., p 160.
16
Tacitus,
Annals
, 15.44.
17
Sommer, op. cit., p 74.
18
Tacitus,
Annals
, 15. 41.
19
Quoted Matyszak, op. cit., p 263.
20
Cassius Dio, op. cit., 62.24.2.
21
Quoted Grant, op. cit., p 171.
22
Cassius Dio, op. cit., 63.27.2.
GALBA
1
Tacitus, Histories, 1.18.
2
Griffin, Miriam,
Nero: The End of a Dynasty
, London: Batsford, 1984, p 27.
3
Tacitus,
Histories
, 1.6.
4
Tacitus,
Histories
, 1.13.
5
Plutarch,
Life of Galba
, 3.3.
6
Tacitus,
Histories
, 1.7.
7
Ibid, 1.49.
8
See Morgan, Gwyn,
69AD: The Year of the Four
Emperors, Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2006, p 25.
9
Ibid, p 28.
10
Greenhalgh, P. A. L.,
The Year of the Four Emperors
, London: Weidenfeld & Nicolson, 1975, p 19.
11
Cassius Dio, op. cit., 64.3.2.
12
Ibid, 63.2.1.
13
Ibid, 64.16.3.
14
Tacitus,
Histories
, 1.12.
OTHO
1
Plutarch,
Life of Otho
, 4.4.
2
Ibid, 15.4
3
Ibid.
4
Tacitus,
Histories
, 1.50.
5
Plutarch,
Life of Otho
, 4.3.
6
Tacitus,
Histories
, 1.36.
7
Morgan, op. cit., p 97.
8
See ibid, p 94; Vinius: Tacitus,
Histories
, 1.37.
9
Tacitus,
Histories
, 1.30.
10
Plutarch,
Life of Galba
, 20.2.
11
Tacitus,
Histories
, 1.45.
12
Ibid, 1.21.
13
Ibid, 1.43.
14
Morgan, op. cit., p 97.
15
Cassius Dio, op. cit., 63.7.3.
16
Plutarch,
Life of Otho
, 3.
17
See Greenhalgh, op. cit., p 56.
18
Tacitus,
Histories
, 1.71.
19
Ibid, 1.83.
20
Plutarch,
Life of Otho
, 1.
21
Juvenal,
Satire II.
22
Plutarch,
Life of Otho
, 4.3
23
Ibid, 4.4
24
Ibid, 5.5
25
Ibid, 9.2
26
Martial,
Epigrams
6, quoted Grant, op. cit., p 195.
27
Plutarch,
Life of Otho
, 16.2.
VITELLIUS
1
Tacitus,
Histories
, 2.95.
2
Ibid, 2.94.
3
Cassius Dio, op. cit., 65.3.
4
Ibid, 65.2.
5
Tacitus,
Histories
, 2.67.
6
Ibid, 2.66.
7
Cassius Dio, op. cit., 65.10.
8
Ibid, 65.3.
9
Tacitus,
Histories
, 1.52.
10
Ibid, 1.53.
11
Ibid, 2.62.
12
Ibid, 2.55.
13
See Grant, op. cit., p 203.
14
Quoted Morgan, op. cit., p 215.
15
Cassius Dio, op. cit., 65.16.
16
Tacitus,
Histories
, 3.68.
VESPASIAN
1
Cassius Dio, op. cit., 65.14.3–4.
2
Levick, Barbara,
Vespasian
, London and New York: Routledge, 1999, p 126.
3
Laurence, op. cit., pp 44–5.
4
Cassius Dio, op. cit., 65.8.3.
5
Tacitus,
Histories
, 1.10.
6
Cassius Dio, op. cit., 66.2.
7
Southern, Pat,
Domitian: Tragic Tyrant
, London: Routledge, 1997, p 4.
8
Freisenbruch, op. cit., p 168.
9
Levick, Barbara, op. cit. p 15.
10
Tacitus,
Histories
, 2. (For a brief discussion of Vespasian’s style of generalship, see Greenhalgh, op. cit., p 125.)
11
Josephus,
The Wars of the Jews
, 1.4 trans. H. St J. Thackeray.
12
Levick, op. cit., p 31.
13
Augustus, op. cit., 22.16.
14
Greenhalgh, op. cit., p 133.
15
Alston, op. cit., p 169.
16
Grant, op. cit., p 221.
17
K. Hopkins: see Levick, op. cit., p 95.
18
Cassius Dio, op. cit., 66.2.5.
19
Greenhalgh, op. cit., p 247.
20
Levick, op. cit., p 76.
21
Shakespeare, William,
Julius Caesar
, II.ii.
22
Cassius Dio, op. cit., 66.17.2.
23
Levick, op. cit., p 197.
24
Sumi, Geoffrey S., ‘Impersonating the Dead: Mimes at Roman Funerals’,
The American Journal of Philology
, vol. 123, no. 4 (Winter, 2002), p 559
25
Flower, Harriet I.,
The Art of Forgetting: Disgrace and Oblivion in Roman Political Culture
(University of North Carolina Press, Chapel Hill, 2006), p 106.
TITUS
1
Cassius Dio, op. cit., 66.18.1.
2
Ibid, 66.18.3; Ausonius, see Grant, op. cit., pp 238–9.
3
Richardson, Lawrence,
A New Topographical Dictionary of Ancient Rome
, Baltimore: John Hopkins University Press, 1992, pp 350–1.
4
For an alternative interpretation, see Levick, op. cit., p 21.
5
Jones, Brian William,
The Emperor Titus
, London: Palgrave Macmillan, 1984, p 22.
6
Horace,
Odes
4.4, quoted Dennison, op. cit., p 47.
7
Quoted Freisenbruch, op. cit, p 158.
8
Tacitus,
Histories
, 2.1; see Jones, op. cit., p 45.
9
Jones, op. cit., p 46.
10
Josephus,
The Wars of the Jews
, 6.254ff.
11
See Tacitus,
Histories
, fragment 2: Titus ‘holding the destruction of this temple to be a prime necessity in order to wipe out more completely the religion of
the Jews’.
12
Josephus,
The Wars of the Jews
, 7.3.1.37ff, quoted Grant, op. cit, p 229.
13
Laurence, op. cit., p 135.
14
Salisbury, Joyce E.,
Women in the Ancient World
, California: ABC-CLIO, 2001, p 29.
15
Freisenbruch, op. cit., p 163.
16
Tacitus,
Histories
2.2; see Freisenbruch, op. cit., p 164.
17
See Alston, op. cit., p 168.
18
Jones, op. cit., p 78.
19
Grant, op. cit., p 230.
20
Josephus,
The Wars of the Jews
, 7.4.1.
21
Alston, op. cit., p 168.
22
Jones, op. cit., p 116.
23
Tacitus,
Histories
, 2.1.
24
Cassius Dio, op. cit., 65.15.3.
25
Pliny the Younger,
Letters
6.16, trans. Betty Radice, London: Penguin, 1969.
26
Sigurdsson, Haraldur, Cashdollar, Stanford and Sparks, Stephen R. J., ‘The Eruption of Vesuvius in A.D. 79: Reconstruction from Historical and Volcanological
Evidence’,
American Journal of Archaeology
, vol. 86, no. 1, Jan., 1982, p 39.
27
Cassius Dio, op. cit., 66.22.4.
28
Ibid, 66.24.3.
29
Jones, op. cit, p 142.
30
See Laurence, op cit., p 133.
31
Cassius Dio, op. cit., 66.26.1.
32
Meijer, Fik,
Emperors Don’t Die in Bed
, London: Routledge, 2004, p 46.
DOMITIAN
1
Juvenal,
Satire IV
2
Eutropius,
Abridgement of Roman History
, 7.23, trans. Rev. John Selby Watson, 1886.
3
Cassius Dio, op. cit., 67.3.2.
4
Freisenbruch, op. cit., pp 182–3.
5
Grant, op cit., p 241.
6
Tacitus,
Histories
, 4.86.
7
Cassius Dio, op. cit., 66.26.2.
8
Ibid, 67.2.4.
9
Ibid, 67.2
10
Tacitus,
Histories
, 4.86
11
See Southern, Pat,
Domitian Tragic Tyrant
, London and New York: Routledge, 1997, p 18; Morgan, op. cit., p 247.
12
Eutropius, op. cit., 7.23.
13
Cassius Dio, op. cit., 67.1.
14
Pliny the Younger,
Panegyricus
52.4–5, quoted Freisenbruch, op. cit., p 184.
15
Cassius Dio, op. cit., 67.3.5.
16 Ibid, 67.4.
17
Ibid, 67.6.3.
18
Massie, op. cit., p 222.
19
Southern, op. cit. (
Domitian
), p 110.
20
Cassius Dio, op. cit., 67.9.
21
Janzen, E., 1994, ‘The Jesus of the Apocalypse Wears the Emperor’s Clothes’,
SBL 1994 Seminar Papers.
Atlanta: Scholars, p 648, footnote 55.
22
Southern, op. cit., p 35.
23
See Alston, op. cit, p 183.
24
Tacitus,
Agricola
2, trans. Edward Brooks Jr. 1897.
25
Juvenal,
Satire
IV.
26
Flower, op. cit., p 256;
Statius, The Silvae
, 4.3.
Aedile
– One of the senatorial magistracies which together made up the ‘cursus honorum’ or sequence of offices followed by
Roman politicians. Responsible for public and private buildings, roads, aqueducts and sewers, public lands, public spectacles and police, as well as the distribution of corn, markets, weights
and measures.
Atrium
– The hall, close to the entrance of the Roman house; among the most important rooms of the house.
Auctoritas
– A Roman senator’s prestige and influence – greatly increased by military achievements.
Consul
– The most senior magistracy of the ‘cursus honorum’. Two consuls were appointed annually, with powers roughly akin to a shared prime
ministership.
Cursus honorum
– The ‘course of honours’ was a sequence of offices followed by career politicians of the Republic and early Empire. A minimum-age
qualification attached to each administrative appointment, with regulations governing the interval between appointments and repeat office-holding.
Damnatio memoriae
– Official condemnation after death of those felt to bring discredit and dishonour on the Roman state; the intention was to eradicate all
traces of the offender and his or her existence from Roman life and included, for example, the destruction of states and erasure of inscriptions.
Dictator
– Under the Republic, a six month appointment granting supreme military and civil power to an individual during a period of extreme crisis.
Imagines maiorum
– Roman portraits of their ancestors. Sources suggest that these took the form of realistic wax masks. Displayed in cupboards called
armaria
in the atrium, they were worn or carried by actors in funeral processions.
Imperium
– A concept of power which implied sovereignty or command and the official right, among others, of inflicting punishment. It exceeded simple
authority.
Interrex
– A provisional office of principal magistrate, rare in the late Republic. Among traditional duties of the ‘interrex’ was overseeing the
election of new consuls
Magister Equitum
– The ‘Master of the Horse’ was the second-in-command to the Republican dictator, chosen by the dictator, the two offices expiring
simultaneously; traditional duties included command of the cavalry; invested with imperium, but of a lesser variety to that of the dictator himself.
Novus homo
(‘new man’)
– A man not born into Rome’s ruling class, who became the first member of his family to serve in the Senate.
Ovation
– A public celebration in which a general rode through the city on horseback (a lesser form of the triumph).
Paterfamilias
– The male head of the family who, possessing
patria potestas
(‘the power of the father’) held far-reaching legal powers over
descendants through the male line or adoption. In practice, by the late Republic, these powers had been significantly eroded.
Patron/client
– The patron/client relationship was one respectively of protection and dependency and existed between individuals – a wealthy Roman and his
freedman, for example – and between influential individuals and communities, for example, a Roman senator and a community outside Rome who, as the senator’s clients, could expect
him to advance the community’s needs in Rome. The patron offered support (both financial and legal) to his client; the client responded with support in public elections and attendance at
the morning
salutatio
(an informal business forum held in the patron’s atrium, at which clients formally greeted their patron and received in return a monetary handout or
sportula
).
Pontifex maximu
s
– The chief priest of the Roman state cult, a lifelong appointment.
Praetor
– A magistracy of the ‘cursus honorum’, senior to the position of Aedile, with responsibility for administering justice.
Proscripti
– Those whose names were publicly ‘proscribed’: their lives were forfeit and their property confiscated or sold. Proscription was
developed in 82BC by Sulla as a means of disposing of his enemies, and reintroduced by the second Triumvirate in 43BC.
Quaestor
– A junior magistracy of the ‘cursus honorum’, with mostly financial duties.
Tribune of the plebs
– An elected office open to plebeians, the only form of plebeian representation in the Senate.
Triumph
– The public celebration, in the Senate’s gift, awarded to a successful general. The general processed in a chariot along Rome’s Sacra Via in
company with the captives of his victory and the spoils of conquest.