I. THE patrician branch of the CIaudian family (for there
was, besides, a plebeian branch of no less influence and prestige)
originated at Regilli, a town of the Sabines. From there it moved to
Rome shortly after the founding of the city with a large band of
dependents, through the influence of Titus Tatius, who shared the kingly
power with Romulus (or, according to the generally accepted view, of
Atta Claudius, the head of the family) about six years after the
expulsion of the kings [504 B.C.]. It was admitted among the patrician
families, receiving, besides, from the State a piece of land on the
farther side of the Anio for its dependents, and a burial-site for the
family at the foot of the Capitoline hill. Then as time went on it was
honoured with twenty-eight consulships, five dictatorships, seven
censorships, six triumphs, and two ovations. While the members of the
family were known by various forenames and surnames, they discarded the
forename "Lucius" by common consent after two of the family who bore it
had been found guilty, the one of highway robbery, and the other of
murder. To their surnames, on the other hand, they added that of Nero,
which in the Sabine tongue means "strong and valiant."
II.. There are on record many distinguished services of
the Claudii to their country, as well as many deeds of the opposite
character. But to mention only the principal instances, Appius Caecus [
"the Blind"] advised [280 B.C.] against forming an alliance with King
Pyrrhus as not at all expedient. Claudius Caudex was the first to cross
the straits with a fleet [264 B.C.], and drove the Carthaginians from
Sicily. Tiberius Nero crushed Hasdrubal, on his arrival from Spain with
a vast army [207 B.C.] before he could unite with his brother Hannibal.
On the other hand, Claudius Regillianus, decemvir for codifying the
laws, through his lawless attempt to enslave a freeborn maid, to gratify
his passion for her, was the cause of the second secession of the
plebeians from the patricians [449 B.C.]. Claudius Russus, having set up
his statue at Forum Appi with a crown upon its head, tried to take
possession of Italy through his dependents. Claudius Pulcher began a
sea-fight off Sicily [249 B.C.], though the sacred chickens would not
eat when he took the auspices, throwing them into the sea in defiance of
the omen, and saying that they might drink, since they would not eat. He
was defeated, and on being bidden by the Senate to appoint a dictator,
he appointed his messenger Glycias, as if again making a jest of his
country's peril. The women also have records equally diverse, since both
the famous Claudias belonged to that family: the one who drew the ship
with the sacred properties of the Idaean Magna Mater from the shoal in
the Tiber on which it was stranded, after first publicly praying that it
might yield to her efforts only if her chastity were beyond question
[204 B.C.]; and the one who was tried by the people for treason [246
B.C.], an unprecedented thing in the case of a woman, because when her
carriage made but slow progress through the throng, she openly gave vent
to the wish that her brother Pulcher might come to life and lose another
fleet, to make less of a crowd in Rome. It is notorious besides that all
the Claudii were aristocrats and staunch upholders of the prestige and
influence of the patricians, with the sole exception of Publius Clodius,
who for the sake of driving Cicero from the city had himself adopted by
a plebeian [60 B.C.] and one too who was younger than himself. Their
attitude towards the commons was so headstrong and stubborn that not
even when on trial for his life before the people did any one of them
deign to put on mourning or beg for mercy; and some of them during
bickerings and disputes struck the tribunes of the commons. Even a
Vestal virgin mounted her brother's chariot with him [143 B.C.], when he
was celebrating a triumph without the sanction of the people, and
attended him all the way to the Capitol, in order to make it an act of
sacrilege for any one of the tribunes to forbid him or interpose his
veto.
III. Such was the stock from which Tiberius Caesar
derived his origin, and that too on both sides: on his father's from
Tiberius Nero; on his mother's from Appius Pulcher, both of whom were
sons of Appius Caecus. He was a member also of the family of the Livii,
through the adoption into it of his maternal grandfather. This family
too, though of plebeian origin, was yet of great prominence and had been
honoured with eight consulships, two censorships, and three triumphs, as
well as with the offices of dictator and master of the horse. It was
made illustrious too by distinguished members, in particular Salinator
and the Drusi. The former in his censorship put the brand on all the
tribes [204 B.C.] the charge of fickleness, because having convicted and
fined him after a previous consulship, they made him consul a second
time and censor as well. Drusus gained a surname for himself and his
descendants by slaying Drausus, leader of the enemy, in single combat.
It is also said that when propraetor he brought back from his province
of Gaul the gold which was paid long before to the Senones, when they
beleaguered the Capitol [390 B.C.], and that this had not been wrested
from them by Camillus, as tradition has it. His grandson's grandson,
called "Patron of the Senate" because of his distinguished services
against the Gracchi, left a son who was [122 B.C.] treacherously slain
by the party of his opponents, while he was busily agitating many plans
during a similar dissension [91 B.C.].
IV. Nero, the father of Tiberius, as a quaestor of Julius
Caesar during the Alexandrian War [48-47 B.C.] and commander of a fleet,
contributed materially to the victory. For this he was made pontiff in
place of Publius Scipio and sent to conduct colonies to Gaul, among them
Narbo and Arelate. Yet, after the murder of Caesar, when all the others
voted for an amnesty through fear of mob violence, he even favoured a
proposal for rewarding the tyrannicides. Later on, having held the
praetorship, since a dispute arose among the triumvirs at the close of
his term, he retained the badges of his rank beyond the legitimate time
and followed Lucius Antonius, consul [41 B.C.] and brother of the
triumvir, to Perusia. When the others capitulated, he alone held to his
allegiance and got away first to Praeneste and then to Naples; and after
vainly trying to enlist the slaves by a promise of freedom, he took
refuge in Sicily. Piqued however because he was not at once given an
audience with Sextus Pompeius, and was denied the use of the fasces,
he crossed to Achaia and joined Marcus Antonius. With him he shortly
returned to Rome, on the conclusion of a general peace, and gave up to
Augustus at his request his wife Livia Drusilla, who was pregnant at the
time and had already borne him a son. Not long afterward he died,
survived by both his sons, Tiberius Nero and Drusus Nero.
V. Some have supposed that Tiberius was born at Fundi, on
no better evidence than that his maternal grandmother was a native of
that place, and that later a statue of Good Fortune was set up there by
decree of the Senate. But according to the most numerous and trustworthy
authorities, he was born at Rome, on the Palatine, the sixteenth day
before the Kalends of December, in the consulship of Marcus Aemilius
Lepidus and Lucius Munatius Plancus (the former for the second time)
while the war of Philippi was going on [November 16, 42 B.C.]. In fact
it is so recorded both in the calendar and in the public gazette. Yet in
spite of this some write that he was born in the preceding year, that of
Hirtius and Pansa, and others in the following year, in the consulate of
Servilius Isauricus and Lucius Antonius.
VI. He passed his infancy and his youth amid hardship and
tribulation, since he was everywhere the companion of his parents in
their flight; at Naples indeed he all but betrayed them twice by his
crying, as they were secretly on their way to a ship just as the enemy
burst into the town, being suddenly torn from his nurse's breast and
again from his mother's arms by those who tried to relieve the poor
women of their burdens because of the imminent danger. After being taken
all over Sicily also and Achaia, and consigned to the public care of the
Lacedaemonians, because they were dependents of the Claudii, he almost
lost his life as he was leaving there by night, when the woods suddenly
caught fire all about them, and the flames so encircled the whole
company that part of Livia's robe and her hair were scorched. The gifts
which were given him in Sicily by Pompeia, sister of Sextus Pompeius, a
cloak and clasp, as well as studs of gold, are still kept and exhibited
at Baiae. Being adopted, after his return to the city, in the will of
Marcus Gallius, a senator, he accepted the inheritance, but soon gave up
the name, because Gallius had been a member of the party opposed to
Augustus. At the age of nine he delivered a eulogy of his dead father
from the rostra. Then, just as he was arriving at puberty, he
accompanied the chariot of Augustus in his triumph after Actium [31
B.C.], riding the left trace-horse, while Marcellus, son of Octavia,
rode the one on the right. He presided, too, at the city festival, and
took part in the game of Troy during the performances in the circus,
leading the band of older boys.
VII. The principal events of his youth and later life,
from the assumption of the gown of manhood to the beginning of his
reign, were these. He gave a gladiatorial show in memory of his father,
and a second in honor of his grandfather Drusus, at different times and
in different places, the former in the Forum and the latter in the
amphitheatre, inducing some retired gladiators to appear with the rest
by the payment of a hundred thousand sesterces to each. He also gave
stage-plays, but without being present in person. All these were on a
grand scale, at the expense of his mother and his stepfather.
He married Agrippina, daughter of Marcus Agrippa, and
granddaughter of Caecilius Atticus, a Roman knight, to whom Cicero's
letters are addressed; but after he had acknowledged a son from her,
Drusus, although she was thoroughly congenial and was a second time with
child, he was forced to divorce her [1l B.C.] and to contract a hurried
marriage with Julia, daughter of Augustus. This caused him no little
distress of mind, for he was living happily with Agrippina, and
disapproved of Julia's character, having perceived that she had a
passion for him even during the lifetime of her former husband, as was
in fact the general opinion. But even after the divorce he regretted his
separation from Agrippina, and the only time that he chanced to see her,
he followed her with such an intent and tearful gaze that care was taken
that she should never again come before his eyes. With Julia he lived in
harmony at first, and returned her love; but he soon grew cold, and went
so far as to cease to live with her at all, after the severing of the
tie formed by a child which was born to them, but died at Aquileia in
infancy. He lost his brother Drusus in Germania [9 B.C.] and conveyed
his body to Rome, going before it on foot all the way.
VIII. He began his civil career by a defence of king
Archelaus, the people of Tralles, and those of Thessaly, before the
judgment seat of Augustus, the charge in each case being different. He
made a plea to the Senate in behalf of the citizens of Laodicea,
Thyatira and Chios, who had suffered loss from an earthquake and begged
for help. Fannius Caepio, who had conspired with Varro Murena against
Augustus [23 B.C.], he arraigned for high treason and secured his
condemnation. In the meantime he undertook two public charges: that of
the grain supply, which, as it happened, was deficient; and the
investigation of the slave-prisons throughout Italy, the owners of which
had gained a bad reputation; for they were charged with holding in
durance not only travellers, but also those whom dread of military
service had driven to such places of concealment.
IX. His first military service was as tribune of the
soldiers in the campaign against the Cantabrians [25 B.C.]; then he led
an army to the Orient and restored the throne of Armenia to Tigranes,
crowning him on the tribunal. He besides recovered the standards which
the Parthians had taken from Marcus Crassus. Then for about a year he
was governor of Gallia Comata [Transalpine Gaul], which was in a state
of unrest through the inroads of the barbarians and the dissensions of
its chiefs. Next he carried on war with the Raeti and Vindelici, then in
Pannonia, and finally in Germania. In the first of these wars he subdued
the Alpine tribes, in the second the Breuci and Dalmatians, and in the
third he brought forty thousand prisoners of war over into Gaul and
assigned them homes near the bank of the Rhine. Because of these
exploits he entered the city both in an ovation [7 B.C.] and riding in a
chariot [9 B.C.], having previously, as some think, been honoured with
the triumphal regalia, a new kind of distinction never before conferred
upon anyone. He entered upon the offices of quaestor, praetor, and
consul before the usual age, and held them almostwithout an interval;
then after a time he was made consul again [6 B.C.], at the same time
receiving the tribunicial power for five years.
X. At the flood-tide of success, though in the prime of
life and health, he suddenly decided to go into retirement and to
withdraw as far as possible from the centre of the stage; perhaps from
disgust at his wife, whom he dared neither accuse nor put away, though
he could no longer endure her; or perhaps, avoiding the contempt born of
familiarity, to keep up his prestige by absence, or even add to it, in
case his country should ever need him. Some think that, since the
children of Augustus were now of age, he voluntarily gave up the
position and the virtual assumption of the second rank which he had long
held, thus following the example of Marcus Agrippa, who withdrew to
Mytilene when Marcellus began his public career, so that he might not
seem either to oppose or belittle him by his presence. This was, in
fact, the reason which Tiberius himself gave, but afterwards. At the
time he asked for leave of absence on the ground of weariness of office
and a desire to rest; and he would not give way either to his mother's
urgent entreaties or to the complaint which his step-father openly made
in the Senate, that he was being forsaken. On the contrary, when they
made more strenuous efforts to detain him, he refused to take food for
four days. Being at last allowed to depart, he left his wife and son in
Rome and went down to Ostia in haste, without saying a single word to
any of those who saw him off, and kissing only a very few when he left.
XI. From Ostia he coasted along the shore of Campania,
and learning of an indisposition of Augustus, he stopped for a while.
But since gossip was rife that he was lingering on the chance of
realizing his highest hopes, although the wind was all but dead ahead,
he sailed directly to Rhodes, for he had been attracted by the charm and
healthfulness of that island ever since the time when he put in there on
his return from Armenia. Content there with a modest house and a villa
in the suburbs not much more spacious, he adopted a most unassuming
manner of life, at times walking in the gymnasium without a lictor or a
messenger, and: exchanging courtesies with the good people of Greece
with almost the air of an equal. It chanced one morning in arranging his
program for the day, that he had announced his wish to visit whatever
sick folk there were in the city. This was misunderstood by his
attendants, and orders were given that all the sick should be taken to a
public colonnade and arranged according to the nature of their
complaints. Whereupon Tiberius, shocked at this unexpected sight, and in
doubt for some time what to do, at last went about to each one,
apologizing for what had happened even to the humblest and most obscure
of them. Only one single instance was noticed of a visible exercise of
the rights of the tribunicial authority. He was a constant attendant at
the schools and lecture-rooms of the professors of philosophy, and once
when a hot dispute had arisen among rival sophists, a fellow had the
audacity to ply him with abuse when he took part and appeared to favour
one side. Thereupon he gradually backed away to his house, and then
suddenly coming out with his lictors and attendants, and bidding his
crier to summon the foul-mouthed fellow before his tribunal, he had him
taken off to prison. Shortly after this he learned that his wife Julia
had been banished because of her immorality and adulteries, and that a
bill of divorce had been sent her in his name by authority of Augustus;
but welcome as this news was, he yet considered it his duty to make
every possible effort in numerous letters to reconcile the father to his
daughter; and regardless of her deserts, to allow her to keep any gifts
which he had himself made her at any time. Moreover, when the term of
his tribunician power was at an end, at last admitting that the sole
object of his retirement had been to avoid the suspicion of rivalry with
Gaius and Lucius, he asked that inasmuch as he was free from care in
that regard, since they were now grown up and had an undisputed claim on
the succession, he be allowed to visit his relatives, whom he sorely
missed. But his request was denied and he was besides admonished to give
up all thought of his kindred, whom he had so eagerly abandoned.
XII. Accordingly he remained in Rhodes against his will,
having with difficulty through his mother's aid secured permission that,
while away from Rome, he should have the title of legatus of
Augustus, so as to conceal his disgrace. Then in very truth he lived not
only in private, but even in danger and fear, secluded in his country
away from the sea, and shunning the attentions of those that sailed that
way; these, however, were constantly thrust on him, since no general or
magistrate who was on his way to any province failed to put in at
Rhodes. He had besides reasons for still greater anxiety; for when he
had crossed to Samos to visit his stepson Gaius, who had been made
governor of the Orient, he found him somewhat estranged through the
slanders of Marcus Lollius, a member of Gaius' staff and his guardian.
He also incurred the suspicion of having through some centurions of his
appointment, who were returning to camp after a furlough, sent messages
to several persons which were of an ambiguous character and apparently
designed to incite them to revolution. On being informed by Augustus of
this suspicion, he unceasingly demanded the appointment of someone, of
any rank whatsoever, to keep watch over his actions and words.
XIII. He also gave up his usual exercises with horses and
arms, and laying aside the garb of his country, took to the cloak and
slippers; and in this state he continued for upwards of two years,
becoming daily an object of greater contempt and aversion. This went so
far that the citizens of Nemausus threw down his statues and busts, and
when mention was once made of him at a private dinner party, a man got
up and assured Gaius that if he would say the word, he would at once
take ship for Rhodes and bring back the head of "the exile," as he was
commonly called. It was this act especially, which made his position no
longer one of mere fear but of actual peril, that drove Tiberius to sue
for his recall with most urgent prayers, in which his mother joined; and
he obtained it, although partly owing to a fortunate chance. Augustus
had resolved to come to no decision of the question which was not
agreeable to his elder son, who, as it happened, was at the time
somewhat at odds with Marcus Lollius, and accordingly ready to lend an
ear to his stepfather's prayers. With his consent therefore Tiberius was
recalled, but on the understanding that he should take no part or active
interest in public affairs.
XIV. So he returned in the eighth year after his
retirement [2 A.D.], with that strong and unwavering confidence in his
destiny, which he had conceived from his early years because of omens
and predictions. When Livia was with child with him, and was trying to
divine by various omens whether she would bring forth a male, she took
an egg from under a setting-hen, and when she had warmed it in her own
hand and those of her attendants in turn, a cock with a fine crest was
hatched. In his infancy the astrologer Scribonius promised him an
illustrious career and even that he would one day be king, but without
the crown of royalty; for at that time of course the rule of the Caesars
was as yet unheard of. Again, on his first campaign, when he was leading
an army through Macedonia into Syria, it chanced that at Philippi the
altars consecrated in bygone days by the victorious legions gleamed of
their own accord with sudden fires. When later, on his way to Illyricum,
he visited the oracle of Geryon near Patavium, and drew a lot which
advised him to seek an answer to his inquiries by throwing golden dice
into the fount of Aponus, it came to pass that the dice which he threw
showed the highest posssible number; and those dice may be seen today
under the water. A few days before his recall an eagle, a bird never
before seen in Rhodes, perched upon the roof of his house; and the day
before he was notified that he might return, his tunic seemed to blaze
as he was changing his clothes. It was just at this time that he was
convinced of the powers of the astrologer Thrasyllus, whom he had
attached to his household as a learned man; for as soon as he caught
sight of the ship, Thrasyllus declared that it brought good news---this
too at the very moment when Tiberius had made up his mind to push the
man off into the sea as they were strolling together, believing him a
false prophet and too hastily made the confidant of his secrets, because
things were turning out adversely and contrary to his predictions.
XV. On his return to Rome, after introducing his son
Drusus to public life, he at once moved from the Carinae [the western
end of the southern slope of the Esquiline] and the house of the Pompeys
to the gardens of Maecenas on the Esquiline, where he led a very retired
life, merely attending to his personal affairs and exercising no public
functions. When Gaius and Lucius died within three years, he was adopted
by Augustus along with their brother Marcus Agrippa, being himself first
compelled to adopt his nephew Germanicus. And from that time on he
ceased to act as the head of a family, or to retain in any particular
the privileges which he had given up. For he neither made gifts nor
freed slaves, and he did not even accept an inheritance or any legacies,
except to enter them as an addition to his personal property. From this
time on nothing was left undone which could add to his prestige,
especially after the disowning and banishment of Agrippa made it clear
that the hope of the succession lay in him alone.
XVI. He was given the tribunician power for a second term
of three years, the duty of subjugating Germania was assigned him, and
the envoys of the Parthians, after presenting their instructions to
Augustus in Rome, were bidden to appear also before him in his province.
But when the revolt of Illyricum was reported, he was transferred to the
charge of a new war, the most serious of all foreign wars since those
with Carthage, which he carried on for three years with fifteen legions
and a corresponding force of auxiliaries, amid great difficulties of
every kind and the utmost scarcity of supplies. But though he was often
recalled, he nonetheless kept on, for fear that the enemy, who were
close at hand and very strong, might assume the offensive if the Romans
gave ground. He reaped an ample reward for his perseverance, for he
completely subdued and reduced to submission the whole of Illyricum,
which is bounded by Italy and the kingdom of Noricum, by Thrace and
Macedonia, by the Danube, and by the Adriatic sea.
XVII. Circumstances gave this exploit a larger and
crowning glory; for it was at just about that time that Quintilius Varus
perished with three legions in Germania, and no one doubted that the
victorious Germans would have united with the Pannonians, had not
Illyricum been subdued first. Consequently a triumph was voted him and
many high honours. Some also recommended that he be given the surname of
Pannonicus, others of Invictus, others of Pius. Augustus however vetoed
the surname, reiterating the promise that Tiberius would be satisfied
with the one which he would receive at his father's death. Tiberius
himself put off the triumph, because the country was in mourning for the
disaster to Varus; but he entered the city clad in the purple-bordered
toga and crowned with laurel, and mounting a tribunal which had been set
up in the Saepta, while the Senate stood alongside, he took his seat
beside Augustus between the two consuls. Having greeted the people from
this position, he was escorted to the various temples.
XVIII. The next year he returned to Germania, and
realising that the disaster to Varus was due to that general's rashness
and lack of care, he took no step without the approval of a council;
while he had always before been a man of independent judgment and
self-reliance, then contrary to his habit he consulted with many
advisers about the conduct of the campaign. He also observed more
scrupulous care than usual. When on the point of crossing the Rhine, he
reduced all the baggage to a prescribed limit, and would not start
without standing on the bank and inspecting the loads of the wagons, to
make sure that nothing was taken except what was allowed or necessary.
Once on the other side, he adopted the following manner of life: he took
his meals sitting on the bare turf, often passed the night without a
tent, and gave all his orders for the following day, as well as notice
of any sudden emergency, in writing; adding the injunction that if
anyone was in doubt about any matter, he was to consult him personally
at any hour whatsoever, even of the night.
XIX. He required the strictest discipline, reviving
bygone methods of punishment and ignominy, and even degrading the
commander of a legion for sending a few soldiers across the river to
accompany one of his freedmen on a hunting expedition. Although he left
very little to fortune and chance, he entered battles with considerably
greater confidence whenever it happened that, as he was working at
night, his lamp suddenly and without human agency died down and went
out; trusting, as he used to say, to an omen in which he had great
confidence, since both he and his ancestors had found it trustworthy in
all of their campaigns. Yet in the very hour of victory he narrowly
escaped assassination by one of the Bructeri, who got access to him
among his attendants, but was detected through his nervousness;
whereupon a confession of his intended crime was wrung from him by
torture.
XX. After two years he returned to the city from Germania
[12 A.D.] and celebrated the triumph which he had postponed, accompanied
also by his generals, for whom he had obtained the triumphal regalia.
And before turning to enter the Capitol, he dismounted from his chariot
and fell at the knees of his father, who was presiding over the knees of
his father, who was presiding over the ceremonies. He sent Bato, the
leader of the Pannonians, to Ravenna, after presenting him with rich
gifts; thus showing his gratitude to him for allowing him to escape when
he was trapped with his army in a dangerous place. Then he gave a
banquet to the people at a thousand tables, and a largess of three
hundred sesterces to every man. With the proceeds of his spoils he
restored and dedicated the temple of Concord, as well as that of Pollux
and Castor, in his own name and that of his brother.
XXI. Since the consuls caused a law to be passed soon
after this that he should govern the provinces jointly with Augustus and
hold the census with him, he set out for Illyricum on the conclusion of
the lustral ceremonies; but he was at once recalled, and finding
Augustus in his last illness but still alive, he spent an entire day
with him in private. I know that it is commonly believed, that when
Tiberius left the room after this confidential talk, Augustus was
overheard by his chamberlains to say: "Alas for the Roman people, to be
ground by jaws that crunch so slowly!" I also am aware that some have
written that Augustus so openly and unreservedly disapproved of his
austere manners, that he sometimes broke off his freer and lighter
conversation when Tiberius appeared; but that overcome by his wife's
entreaties he did not reject his adoption, or perhaps was even led by
selfish considerations, that with such a successor he himself might one
day be more regretted. But after all I cannot be led to believe that an
emperor of the utmost prudence and foresight acted without
consideration, especially in a matter of so great moment. It is my
opinion that after weighing the faults and the merits of Tiberius, he
decided that the latter preponderated, especially since he took oath
before the people that he was adopting Tiberius for the good of the
country, and alludes to him in several letters as a most able general
and the sole defence of the Roman people. In illustration of both these
points, I append a few extracts from these letters:
"Fare thee well, Tiberius, most charming of men, and
success go with you, as you war for me and for the Muses. Fare thee
well, most charming and valiant of men and most conscientious of
generals, or may I never know happiness."
"I have only praise for the conduct of your summer
campaigns, dear Tiberius, and I am sure that no one could have acted
with better judgment than you did amid so many difficulties and such
apathy of your army. All who were with you agree that the well-known
line could be applied to you: 'One man alone by his foresight has
saved our dear country from ruin.'"
"If anything comes up that calls for careful thought,
or if I am vexed at anything, I long mightily, so help me Heaven, for
my dear Tiberius, and the lines of Homer come to my mind: 'Let him but
follow and we too, though flames round about us be raging, Both may
return to our homes, since great are his wisdom and knowledge.'"
"When I hear and read that you are worn out by constant
hardships, may the Gods confound me if my own body does not wince in
sympathy; and I beseech you to spare yourself, that the news of your
illness may not kill your mother and me, and endanger the Roman people
in the person of their future ruler."
"It matters not whether I am well or not, if you are
not well."
"I pray the Gods to preserve you to us and to grant you
good health now and forever, if they do not utterly hate the people of
Rome."
XXII. Tiberius did not make the death of Augustus public
until the young Agrippa had been disposed of. The latter was slain by a
tribune of the soldiers appointed to guard him, who received a letter in
which he was bidden to do the deed; but it is not known whether Augustus
left this letter when he died, to remove a future source of discord, or
whether Livia wrote it herself in the name of her husband; and in the
latter case, whether it was with or without the connivance of Tiberius.
At all events, when the tribune reported that he had done his bidding,
Tiberius replied that he had given no such order, and that the man must
render an account to the Senate; apparently trying to avoid odium at the
time, for later his silence consigned the matter to oblivion.
XXIII. When, however, by virtue or his tribunicial power,
he had convened the Senate and had begun to address it, he suddenly
groaned aloud, as if overcome by grief, and with the wish that not only
his voice, but his life as well might leave him, handed the written
speech to his son Drusus to finish. Then bringing in the will of
Augustus, he had it read by a freedman, admitting of the signers only
such as were of the senatorial order, while the others acknowledged
their seals outside the House. The will began thus: "Since a cruel fate
has bereft me of my sons Gaius and Lucius, be Tiberius Caesar heir to
two-thirds of my estate." These words in themselves added to the
suspicion of those who believed that he had named Tiberius his successor
from necessity rather than from choice, since he allowed himself to
write such a preamble.
XXIV. Though Tiberius did not hesitate at once to assume
and to exercise the imperial authority, surrounding himself with a guard
of soldiers, that is, with the actual power and the outward sign of
sovereignty, yet he refused the title for a long time, with barefaced
hypocrisy now upbraiding his fiiends who urged him to accept it, saying
that they did not realise what a monster the empire was, and now by
evasive answers and calculating hesitancy keeping the Senators in
suspense when they implored him to yield, and fell at his feet. Finally,
some lost patience, and one man cried out in the confusion: "Let him
take it or leave it!" Another openly voiced the taunt that others were
slow in doing what they promised, but that he was slow to promise what
he was already doing. At last, as though on compulsion, and complaining
that a wretched and burdensome slavery was being forced upon him, he
accepted the empire, but in such fashion as to suggest the hope that he
would one day lav it down. His own words are: "Until I come to the time
when it may seem right to you to grant an old man some repose."
XXV. The cause of his hesitation was fear of the dangers
which threatened him on every hand, and often led him to say that he was
holding a wolf by the ears. For a slave of Agrippa, Clemens by name had
collected a band of no mean size to avenge his master; Lucius Scribonius
Libo, one of the nobles was secretly plotting a revolution; and a mutiny
of the soldiers broke out in two places, Illyricum and Germania. Both
armies demanded numelous special privileges-above all, that they should
receive the same pay as the praetorians. The army in Germania was,
besides, reluctant to accept an emperor who was not its own choice, and
with the greatest urgency besought Germanicus, their commander at the
time, to assume the purple, in spite of his positive refusal. Fear of
this possibility in particular led Tiberius to ask the Senate for any
part in the administration that it might please them to assign him,
saying that no one man could bear the whole burden without a colleague,
or even several colleagues. He also feigned ill-health, to induce
Germanicus to wait with more patience for a speedy succession, or at
least for a share in the sovereignty. The mutinies were put down, and he
also got Clemens into his power, outwitting him by stratagem. Not until
his second year did he finally arraign Libo in the Senate, fearing to
take any severe measures before his power was secure, and satisfied in
the meantime merely to be on his guard. Thus, when Libo was offering
sacrifice with him among the pontiffs, he had a leaden knife substituted
for the usual one, and when he asked for a private interview, Tiberius
would not grant it except with his son Drusus present, and as long as
the conference lasted he held fast to Libo's right arm, under pretence
of leaning on it as they walked together.
XXVI. Once relieved of fear, he at first played a most
unassuming part, almost humbler than that of a private citizen. Of many
high honours he accepted only a few of the more modest. He barely
consented to allow his birthday, which came at the time of the Plebeian
games in the Circus, to be recognized by the addition of a single
two-horse chariot. He forbade the voting of temples, flamens, and
priests in his honour, and even the setting up of statues and busts
without his permission; and this he gave only with the understanding
that they were not to be placed among the likenesses of the gods, but
among the adornments of the temples. He would not allow an oath to be
taken ratifying his acts nor the name "Tiberius" to be given to the
month of September, or that of Livia to October. He also declined the
forename "Imperator," the surname of "Father of his Country," and the
placing of the civic crown at his door; and he did not even use the
title of "Augustus" in any letters except those to kings and potentates,
although it was his by inheritance. He held but three consulships after
becoming emperor---one for a few days [18 A.D.], a second for three
months [21 A.D.], and a third, during his absence from the city, until
the Ides of May [31 A.D.]
XXVII. He so loathed flattery that he would not allow any
Senator to approach his litter, either to pay his respects or on
business, and when an ex-consul in apologizing to him attempted to
embrace his knees, he drew back in such haste that he fell over
backward. In fact, if anyone in conversation or in a set speech spoke of
him in too flattering terms, he did not hesitate to interrupt him, to
take him to task, and to correct his language on the spot. Being once
called Dominus [ "Lord"] he warned the speaker not to address him
again in an insulting fashion. When another spoke of his "sacred
duties," and still another said that he appeared before the Senate "by
the emperor's authority," he forced them to change their language,
substituting "advice" for "authority" and "laborious" for "sacred."
XXVIII. More than that, he was self-contained and patient
in the face of abuse and slander, and of lampoons on himself and his
family, often asserting that in a free country there should be free
speech and free thought. When the Senate on one occasion demanded that
cognizance be taken of such offences and those guilty of them, he said:
"We have not enough spare time to warrant involving ourselves in more
affairs; if you open this loophole you will find no time for any other
business; it will be an excuse for laying everybody's quarrels before
you." A most unassuming remark of his in the Senate is also a matter of
record: "If so and so criticizes me I shall take care to render an
account of my acts and words; if he persists, our enmity wil1 be
mutual."
XXIX. All this was the more noteworthy, because in
addressing and in paying his respects to the Senators individually and
as a body he himself almost exceeded the requirements of courtesy. In a
disagreement with Quintus Haterius in the House, he said: "I crave your
pardon, if in my capacity as Senator I use too free language in opposing
you." Then addressing the whole body: "I say now and have often said
before, Fathers of the Senate, that a well-disposed and helpful prince,
to whom you have given such great and unrestrained power, ought to be
the servant of the Senate, often of the citizens as a whole, and
sometimes even of individuals. I do not regret my words, but I have
looked upon you as kind, just, and indulgent masters, and still so
regard you."
XXX. He even introduced a semblance of free government by
maintaining the ancient dignity and powers of the Senate and the
magistrates; for there was no matter of public or private business so
small or so great that he did not lay it before the Senators, consulting
them about revenues and monopolies, constructing and restoring public
buildings, and even about levying and disbanding the soldiers, and the
disposal of the legionaries and auxiliaries; finally about the extension
of military commands and appointments to the conduct of wars, and the
form and content of his replies to the letters of kings. He forced the
commander of a troop of horse, when charged with violence and robbery,
to plead his cause before the Senate. He always entered the House alone;
and when he was brought in once in a litter because of illness, he
dismissed his attendants.
XXXI. When certain decrees were passed contrary to his
expressed opinion, he did not even remonstrate. Although he declared
that those who were elected to office ought to remain in the city and
give personal attention to their duties, a praetor elect obtained
permission to travel abroad with the privileges of an ambassador. On
another occasion when he recommended that the people of Trebia be
allowed to use, in making a road, a sum of money which had been left
them for the construction of a new theatre, he could not prevent the
wish of the testator from being carried out. When it happened that the
Senate passed a decree by division and he went over to the side of the
minority, not a man followed him. Other business as well was done solely
through the magistrates and the ordinary process of law, while the
importance of the consuls was such that certain envoys from Africa
presented themselves before them with the complaint that their time was
being wasted by Caesar, to whom they had been sent. And this was not
surprising, for it was plain to all that he himself actually arose in
the presence of the consuls, and made way for them on the street.
XXXII. He rebuked some ex-consuls in command of armies,
because they did not write their reports to the Senate, and for
referring to him the award of some military prizes, as if they had not
themselves the right to bestow everything of the kind. He highly
complimented a praetor, because on entering upon his office he had
revived the custom of eulogizing his ancestors before the people. He
attended the obsequies of certain distinguished men, even going to the
funeral-pyre. He showed equal modesty towards persons of lower rank and
in matters of less moment. When he had summoned the magistrates of
Rhodes, because they had written him letters on public business without
the concluding formula, he uttered not a word of censure, but merely
dismissed them with orders to supply the omission. The grammarian
Diogenes, who used to lecture every Saturday at Rhodes, would not admit
Tiberius when he came to hear him on a different day, but sent a message
by a common slave of his, putting him off to the seventh day. When this
man waited before the Emperor's door at Rome to pay his respects,
Tiberius took no further revenge than to bid him return seven years
later. To the governors who recommended burdensome taxes for his
provinces, he wrote in answer that it was the part of a good shepherd to
shear his flock, not skin it.
XXXIII. Little by little he unmasked the ruler, and
although for some time his conduct was variable, yet he more often
showed himself kindly and devoted to the public weal. His intervention
too was at first limited to the prevention of abuses. Thus he revoked
some regulations of the Senate and sometimes offered the magistrates his
services as adviser, when they sat in judgment on the tribunal, taking
his place beside them or opposite them at one end of the platform; and
if it was rumoured that any of the accused were being acquitted through
influence, he would suddenly appear, and either from the floor or from
the judge's a tribunal remind the jurors of the laws and of their oath,
as well as of the nature of the crime on which they were sitting in
judgment. Moreover, if the public morals were in any way affected by
laziness or bad habits he undertook to reform them.
XXXIV. He reduced the cost of the games and shows by
cutting down the pay of the actors and limiting the pairs of gladiators
to a fixed number. Complaining bitterly that the prices of Corinthian
bronzes had risen to an immense figure and that three mullets had been
sold for thirty thousand sesterces, he proposed that a limit be set to
household furniture and that the prices in the market should be
regulated each year at the discretion of the Senate, while the aediles
were instructed to put such restrictions on cook-shops and eating-houses
as not to allow even pastry to be exposed for sale. Furthermore, to
encourage general frugality by his personal example, he often served at
formal dinners meats left over from the day before and partly consumed,
or the half of a boar, declaring that it had all the qualities of a
whole one. He issued an edict forbidding general kissing, as well as the
exchange of New Year's gifts after the Kalends of January. It was his
custom to return a gift of four-fold value, and in person; but annoyed
at being interrupted all through the month by those who did not have
access to him on the holiday, he did not continue it.
XXXV. He revived the custom of our forefathers, that in
the absence of a public prosecutor matrons of ill-repute be punished
according to the decision of a council of their relatives. He absolved a
Roman knight from his oath and allowed him to put away his wife, who was
taken in adultery with her son-in-law, even though he had previously
sworn that he would never divorce her. Notorious women had begun to make
an open profession of prostitution, to avoid the punishment of the laws
by giving up the privileges and rank of matrons, while the most
profligate young men of both orders voluntarily incurred degradation
from their rank, so as not to be prevented by the decree of the Senate
from appearing on the stage and in the arena. All such men and women he
punished with exile, to prevent anyone from shielding himself by such a
device. He deprived a Senator of his broad stripe on learning that he
had moved to his gardens just before the Kalends of July [the first of
July was the date for renting and hiring houses and rooms--hence "moving
day"], with the design of renting a house in the city at a lower figure
after that date. He deposed another from his quaestorship, because he
had taken a wife the day before casting lots [to determine his province
or sphere of duty] and divorced her the day after.
XXXVI. He abolished foreign cults, especially the
Egyptian and the Jewish rites, compelling all who were addicted to such
superstitions to burn their religious vestments and all their
paraphernalia. Those of the Jews who were of military age he assigned to
provinees of less healthy climate, ostensibly to serve in the army; the
others of that same race or of similar beliefs he banished from the
city, on pain of slavery for life if they did not obey. He banished the
astrologers as well, but pardoned such as begged for indulgence and
promised to give up their art.
XXXVII. He gave special attention to securing safety from
prowling brigands and lawless outbreaks, He stationed garrisons of
soldiers nearer together than before throughout Italy, while at Rome he
established a camp for the barracks of the praetorian cohorts, which
before that time had been quartered in isolated groups in divers lodging
houses. He took great pains to prevent outbreaks of the populace and
punished such as occurred with the utmost severity. When a quarrel in
the theatre ended in bloodshed, he banished the leaders of the factions,
as well as the actors who were the cause of the dissension; and no
entreaties of the people could ever induce him to recall them. When the
populace of Pollentia would not allow the body of a chief centurion to
be taken from the forum until their violence had extorted money from his
heirs for a gladiatorial show, he dispatched one cohort from the city
and another from the kingdom of Cottius, concealing the reason for the
move, sent them into the city by different gates, suddenly revealing
their arms and sounding their trumpets, and consigned the greater part
of the populace and of the decurions to life imprisonment. He abolished
the customary right of asylum in all parts of the empire. Because the
people of Cyzicus ventured to commit acts of special lawlessness against
Roman citizens, he took from them the freedom which they had earned in
the war with Mithridates. He undertook no campaign after his accession,
but quelled outbreaks of the enemy through his generals; and even this
he did only reluctantly and of necessity. Such kings as were disaffected
and objects of his suspicion he held in check rather by threats and
remonstrances than by force; some he lured to Rome by flattering
promises and detained there, such as Marobodus the German, Rhascuporis
the Thracian, and Archelaus of Cappadocia, whose realm he also reduced
to the form of a province.
XXXVIII. For two whole years after becoming emperor he
did not set foot outside the gates; after that he went nowhere except to
the neighbouring towns, at farthest to Antium, and even that very seldom
and for a few days at a time. Yet he often gave out that he would
revisit the provinces too and the armies, and nearly every year he made
preparations for a journey by chartering carriages and arranging for
supplies in the free towns and colonies. Finally he allowed vows to be
put up for his voyage and return, so that at last everybody jokingly
gave him the name of Callippides, who was proverbial among the Greeks
for running without getting ahead a cubits length.
XXXIX. But after being bereft of both his sons---Germanicus
had died in Syria and Drusus at Rome----he retired to Campania, and
almost everyone firmly believed and openly declared that he would never
come back, but would soon die there. And both predictions were all but
fulfilled; for he did not return again to Rome, and it chanced a few
days later that as he was dining near Tarracina in a villa called the
Grotto, many huge rocks fell from the ceiling and crushed a number of
the guests and servants, while the emperor himself had a narrow escape.
XL. After traversing Campania and dedicating the
Capitolium at Capua and a temple to Augustus at Nola, which was the
pretext he had given for his journey, he went to Capreae, particularly
attracted to that island because it was accessible by only one small
beach, being everywhere else girt with sheer cliffs of great height and
by deep water. But he was at once recalled by the constant entreaties of
the people, because of a disaster at Fidenae, where more than twenty
thousand spectators had perished through the collapse of the
amphitheatre during a gladiatorial show. So he crossed to the mainland
and made himself accessible to all, the more willingly because he had
given orders on leaving the city that no one was to disturb him, and
during the whole trip had repulsed those who tried to approach him.
XLI. Then returning to the island, he utterly neglected
the conduct of state affairs, from that time on never filling the
vacancies in the decuries of the knights, nor changing the tribunes of
the soldiers and prefects or the governors of any of his provinces He
left Spain and Syria without consular governors for several years,
suffered Armenia to be overrun by the Parthians, Moesia to be laid waste
by the Dacians and Sarmatians, and the Gallic provinces by the Germans,
to the great dishonour of the empire and no less to its danger.
XLII. Moreover, having gained the licence of privacy, and
being as it were out of sight of the citizens, he at last gave free rein
at once to all the vices which he had for a long time ill concealed; and
of these I shall give a detailed account from the beginning. Even at the
outset of his military career his excessive love of wine gave him the
name of Biberius, instead of Tiberius, Caldius for Claudius, and Mero
for Nero. Later, when emperor and at the very time that he was busy
correcting the public morals, he spent a night and two whole days
feasting and drinking with Pomponius Flaccus and Lucius Piso,
immediately afterward making the one governor of the province of Syria
and the other prefect of the city, and even declaring in their
commissions that they were the most agreeable of friends, who could
always be counted on. He had a dinner given him by Cestius Gallus, a
lustful and prodigal old man, who had once been degraded by Augustus and
whom he had himself rebuked a few days before in the Senate, making the
condition that Cestius should change or omit none of his usual customs,
and that nude girls should wait upon them at table. He gave a very
obscure candidate for the quaestorship preference over men of the
noblest families, because at the emperor's challenge he had drained an
amphora of wine at a banquet. He paid Asellius Sabinus two hundred
thousand sesterces for a dialogue, in which he had introduced a contest
of a mushroom, a fig-pecker, an oyster and a thrush. Finally he
established a new office, master of the imperial pleasures, assigning it
to Titus Caesonius Priscus, a Roman knight.
XLIII. Secessu vero Caprensi etiam sellaria excogitavit,
sedem arcanarum libidinum, in quam undique conquisiti puellarum et
exoletorum greges monstrosique concubitus repertores, quos spintrias
appellabat, triplici serie conexi, in vicem incestarent coram ipso, ut
aspectu deficientis libidines excitaret. Cubicula plurifariam disposita
tabellis ac sigillis lascivissimarum picturarum et figurarum adornavit
librisque Elephantidis instruxit, ne cui in opera edenda exemplar
imperatae schemae deesset. In silvis quoque ac nemoribus passim Venerios
locos commentus est prostantisque per antra et cavas rupes ex utriusque
sexus pube Paniscorum et Nympharum habitu, quae palam iam et vulgo
nomine insulae abutentes "Caprineum" dictitabant.
[XLIII and XLIV are examples of Prudishness in the Loeb
translations, which refused to translate the "dirty" bits. Here is a
synopsis, after Robert Graves' translation]: After retiring to Capri,
where he had a private pleasure palace built, many young men and women
trained in sexual practices were brought there for his pleasure, and
would have sex in groups in front of him. Some rooms were furnished
with pornography and sex manuals from Egypt - which let the people
there know what was expected of them. Tiberius also created lechery
nooks in the woods and had girls and boys dressed as nymphs and Pans
prostitute themselves in the open. The place was known popularly as
"goat-pri".]
XLIV. Maiore adhuc ac turpiore infamia flagravit, vix ut
referri audirive, nedum credi fas sit, quasi pueros primae teneritudinis,
quos pisciculos vocabat, institueret, ut natanti sibi inter femina
versarentur ac luderent lingua morsuque sensim adpetentes; atque etiam
quasi infantes firmiores, necdum tamen lacte depulsos, inguini ceu
papillae admoveret, pronior sane ad id genus libidinis et natura et
aetate. Quare Parrasi quoque tabulam, in qua Meleagro Atalanta ore
morigeratur, legatam sibi sub condicione, ut si argumento offenderetur
decies pro ea sestertium acciperet, non modo praetulit, sed et in
cubiculo dedicavit. Fertur etiam in sacrificando quondam captus facie
ministri acerram praeferentis nequisse abstinere, quin paene vixdum re
divina peracta ibidem statim seductum constupraret simulque fratrem eius
tibicinem; atque utrique mox,quod mutuo flagitium exprobrarant, crura
fregisse.
[Synopsis, after Robert Graves' translation]: Some of
the things he did are hard to believe. He had little boys trained as
minnows to chase him when he went swimming and to get between his legs
and nibble him. He also had babies not weaned from their mother breast
suck at his chest and groin. There was a painting left to him, with
the provision that if he did not like it he could have 10,000 gold
pieces, and Tiberius kept the picture. It showed Atalanta sucking off
Meleager. One in a frenzy, while sacrificing he was attracted to the
acolyte and could not wait to hurry the acolyte and his brother out of
the temple and assault them. When they protested, he had their legs
broken.
XLV. How grossly he was in the habit of abusing women
even of high birth is very clearly shown by the death of a certain
Mallonia. When she was brought to his bed and refused most vigorously to
submit to his lust, he turned her over to the informers, and even when
she was on trial he did not cease to call out and ask her "whether she
was sorry"; so that finally she left the court and went home, where she
stabbed herself, openly upbraiding the ugly old man for his obscenity.
Hence a stigma put upon him at the next plays in an Atellan farce was
received with great applause and became current, that "the old goat was
licking the does."
XLVI. In money matters he was frugal and close, never
allowing the companions of his foreign tours and campaigns a salary, but
merely their keep. Only once did he treat them liberally, and then
through the generosity of his stepfather, when he formed three classes
according to each man's rank and gave to the first six hundred thousand
sesterces, to the second four hundred thousand, and to the third, which
he called one, not of his friends, but of his Greeks, two hundred
thousand.
XLVII. While emperor he constructed no magnificent public
works, for the only ones which he undertook, the temple of Augustus and
the restoration of Pompey's theatre, he left unfinished after so many
years. He gave no public shows at all, and very seldom attended those
given by others, for fear that some request would be made of him,
especially after he was forced to buy the freedom of a comic actor named
Actius. Having relieved the neediness of a few senators, he avoided the
necessity of further aid by declaring that he would help no others
unless they proved to the Senate that there were legitimate causes for
their condition. Therefore diffidence and a sense of shame kept many
from applying, among them Hortalus, grandson of Quintus Hortensius the
orator, who though of very limited means had begotten four children with
the encouragement of Augustus.
XLVIII. He showed generosity to the public in but two
instances, once when he offered to lend a hundred million sesterces
without interest for a period of three years, and again when he made
good the losses of some owners of blocks of houses on the Caelian Mount,
which had burned down. The former was forced upon him by the clamour of
the people for help in a time of great financial stress, after he had
failed to relieve the situation by a decree of the Senate, providing
that the moneylenders should invest two-thirds of their property in
land, and that the debtors should at once pay the same proportion of
their indebtedness; and the latter also was to relieve a condition of
great hardship. Yet he made so much of his liberality in the latter
case, that he had the name of the Caelian changed to the Augustan Mount.
After he had doubled the legacies provided for in the will of Augustus,
he never gave largess to the soldiers, with the exception of a thousand
denarii to each of the praetorians, for not taking sides with Sejanus,
and some presents to the legions in Syria, because they alone had
consecrated no image of Sejanus among their standards. He also very
rarely allowed veteran soldiers their discharge, having an eye to their
death from years, and a saving of money through their death. He did not
relieve the provinces either by any act of liberality, except Asia, when
some cities were destroyed by an earthquake.
XLIX. Presently, as time went on, he even resorted to
plunder. All the world knows that he drove Gnaeus Lentulus Augur, a man
of great wealth, to take his own life through fear and mental anxiety,
and to make the emperor his sole heir; that Lepida, too, a woman of very
high birth, was condemned to banishment to gratity Quirinius, an opulent
and childless ex-consul, who had divorced her, and twenty years later
accused her of having attempted to poison him many years before; that
besides this the leading men of the Spanish and Gallic provinces, as
well as of Syria and Greece, had their property confiscated on trivial
and shameless charges, some being accused of nothing more serious than
having a part of their property in ready money ; that many states and
individuals were deprived of immunities of long standing, and of the
right of working mines and collecting revenues; that Vonones, king of
the Parthians, who on being dethroned by his subjects had taken refuge
at Antioch with a vast treasure, in the belief that he was putting
himself under the protection of the Roman people, was treacherously
despoiled and put to death.
L. He first showed his hatred of his kindred in the case
of his brother Drusus, producing a letter of his, in which Drusus
discussed with him the question of compelling Augustus to restore the
Republic; and then he turned against the rest. So far from showing any
courtesy or kindness to his wife Julia, after her banishment, which is
the least that one might expect, although her father's order had merely
confined her to one town, he would not allow her even to leave her house
or enjoy the society of mankind. Nay more, he even deprived her of the
allowance granted her by her father and of her yearly income, under
colour of observance of the common law, since Augustus had made no
provision for these in his will. Vexed at his mother Livia, alleging
that she claimed an equal share in the rule, he shunned frequent
meetings with her and long and confidential conversations, to avoid the
appearance of being guided by her advice; though in point of fact he was
wont every now and then to need and to follow it. He was greatly
offended too by a decree of the Senate, providing that "son of Livia,"
as well as "son of Augustus" should be written in his honorary
inscriptions. For this reason he would not suffer her to be named
"Parent of her Country," nor to receive any conspicuous public honour.
More than that, he often warned her not to meddle with affairs of
importance and unbecoming a woman, especially after he learned that at a
fire near the temple of Vesta she had been present in person, and urged
the people and soldiers to greater efforts, as had been her way while
her husband was alive.
LI. Afterwards he reached the point of open enmity, and
the reason, they say, was this. On her urging him again and again to
appoint among the jurors a man who had been made a citizen, he declared
that he would do it only on condition that she would allow an entry to
be made in the official list that it was forced upon him by his mother.
Then Livia, in a rage, drew from a secret place and read some old
letters written to her by Augustus with regard to the austerity and
stubbornness of Tiberius' disposition. He in turn was so put out that
these had been preserved so long and were thrown up at him in such a
spiteful spirit, that some think that this was the very strongest of the
reasons for his retirement. At all events, during all the three years
that she lived after he left Rome he saw her but once, and then only one
day, for a very few hours; and when shortly after that she fell ill, he
took no trouble to visit her. When she died, and after a delay of
several days, during which he held out hope of his coming, had at last
been buried because the condition of the corpse made it necessary, he
forbade her deification, alleging that he was acting according to her
own instructions. He further disregarded the provisions of her will, and
within a short time caused the downfall of all her friends and
intimates, even of those to whom she had on her deathbed entrusted the
care of her obsequies, actually condemning one of them, and that a man
of equestrian rank, to the treadmill.
LII. He had a father's affection neither for his own son
Drusus nor his adopted son Germanicus, being exasperated at the former's
vices; and, in fact, Drusus led a somewhat loose and dissolute life.
Therefore, even when he died, Tiberius was not greatly affected, but
almost immediately after the funeral returned to his usual routine,
forbidding a longer period of mourning. Nay, more, when a deputation
from Ilium offered him somewhat belated condolences, he replied with a
smile, as if the memory of his bereavement had faded from his mind, that
they, too, had his sympathy for the loss of their eminent fellow-citizen
Hector. As to Germanicus, he was so far from appreciating him, that he
made light of his illustrious deeds as unimportant, and railed at his
brilliant victories as ruinous to his country. He even made complaint in
the Senate when Germanicus, on the occasion of a sudden and terrible
famine, went to Alexandria without consulting him. It is even believed
that he caused his death at the hands of Gnaeus Piso, governor of Syria,
and some think that when Piso was tried on that charge, he would have
produced his instructions, had not Tiberius caused them to be taken from
him when Piso privately showed them, and the man himself to be put to
death. Because of this the words, "Give us back Germanicus," were posted
in many places, and shouted at night all over the city. And Tiberius
afterwards strengthened this suspicion by cruelly abusing the wife and
children of Germanicus as well.
LIII. When his daughter-in-law Agrippina was somewhat
outspoken in her complaints after her husband's death, he took her by
the hand and quoted a Greek verse, meaning "Do you think a wrong is done
you, dear daughter, if you are not empress?" After that he never deigned
to hold any conversation with her. Indeed, after she showed fear of
tasting an apple which he handed her at dinner, he even ceased to invite
her to his table, alleging that he had been charged with an attempt to
poison her; but as a matter of fact, the whole affair had been
prearranged, that he should offer her the fruit to test her, and that
she should refuse it as containing certain death. At last, falsely
charging her with a desire to take refuge, now at the statue of Augustus
and now with the armies, he exiled her to Pandataria, and when she
loaded him with reproaches, he had her beaten by a centurion until one
of her eyes was destroyed. Again, when she resolved to die of
starvation, he had her mouth pried open and food crammed into it. Worst
of all, when she persisted in her resolution and so perished, he
assailed her memory with the basest slanders, persuading the Senate to
add her birthday to the days of ill omen, and actually taking credit to
himself for not having had her strangled and her body cast out on the
Stairs of Mourning. He even allowed a decree to be passed in recognition
of this remarkable clemency, in which thanks were offered him and a
golden gift was consecrated to Jupiter of the Capitol.
LIV. By Germanicus he had three grandsons: Nero, Drusus,
and Gaius, and by Drusus one, called Tiberius. Bereft of his own
children, he recommended Nero and Drusus, the elder sons of Germanicus,
to the Senate, and celebrated the day when each of them came to his
majority by giving largess to the commons. But as soon as he learned
that at the beginning of the year vows were being put up for their
safety also, he referred the matter to the Senate, saying that such
honours ought to be conferred only on those of tried character and
mature years. By revealing his true teelings towards them from that time
on, he exposed them to accusations from all quarters, and after
resorting to various tricks to rouse them to rail at him, and seeing to
it that they were betrayed when they did so, he brought most bitter
charges against them both in writing; and when they had in consequence
been pronounced public enemies, he starved them to death, Nero on the
island of Pontia and Drusus in a lower room of the Palace. It is thought
that Nero was forced to take his own life, since an executioner, who
pretended that he came by authority of the Senate, showed him the noose
and hooks, but that Drusus was so tortured by hunger that he tried to
eat the stuffing of his mattress; while the remains of both were so
scattered that it was with difficulty that they could ever be collected.
LV. In addition to his old friends and intimates, he had
asked for twenty of the leading men of the State as advisers on public
affairs. Of all these he spared hardly two or three; the others he
destroyed on one pretext or another, including Aelius Sejanus, whose
downfall involved the death of many others. This man he had advanced to
the highest power, not so much from regard for him, as that he might
through his services and wiles destroy the children of Germanicus and
secure the succession for his own grandson, the child of his son Drusus.
LVI. He was not a whit milder towards his Greek
companions, in whose society he took special pleasure. When one Xeno was
holding forth in somewhat farfetched phrases, he asked him what dialect
that was which was so affected, and on Xeno's replying that it was
Doric, he banished him to Cinaria, believing that he was being taunted
with his old-time exile, inasmuch as the Rhodians spoke Doric. He had
the habit, too, of putting questions at dinner suggested by his daily
reading, and learning that the grammarian Seleucus inquired of the
imperial attendants what authors Tiberius was reading and so came
primed, he at first banished the offender from his society, and later
even forced him to commit suicide.
LVII. His cruel and cold-blooded character was not
completely hidden even in his boyhood. His teacher of rhetoric,
Theodorus of Gadara, seems first to have had the insight to detect it,
and to have characterized it very aptly, since in taking him to task he
would now and then call him "mud kneaded with blood." But it grew still
more noticeable after he became emperor, even at the beginning, when he
was still courting popularity by a show of moderation. When a funeral
was passing by and a jester called aloud to the corpse to let Augustus
know that the legacies which he had left to the people were not yet
being paid, Tiberius had the man haled before him, ordered that he be
given his due and put to death, and bade him go tell the truth to his
father. Shortly afterwards, when a Roman knight called Pompeius stoutly
opposed some action in the Senate, Tiberius threatened him with
imprisonment, declaring that from a Pompeius he would make of him a
Pompeian, punning cruelly on the man's name and the fate of the old
party
LVIII. It was at about this time that a praetor asked him
whether he should have the courts convened to consider cases of
lese-majesty; to which he replied that the laws must be enforced, and he
did enforce them most rigorously. One man had removed the head from a
statue of Augustus, to substitute that of another; the case was tried in
the Senate, and since the evidence was conflicting, the witnesses were
examined by torture. After the defendant had been condemned, this kind
of accusation gradually went so far that even such acts as these were
regarded as capital crimes: to beat a slave near a statue of Augustus,
or to change one's clothes there; to carry a ring or coin stamped with
his image into a privy or a brothel, or to criticize any word or act of
his. Finally, a man was put to death merely for allowing an honour to be
voted him in his native town on the same day that honours had previously
been voted to Augustus.
LIX. He did so many other cruel and savage deeds under
the guise of strictness and improvement of the public morals, but in
reality rather to gratify his natural instincts, that some resorted to
verses to express their detestation of the present ills and a warning
against those to come:
"Cruel and merciless man, shall I briefly say all I
would utter? Hang me if even your dam for you affection can feel."
"You are no knight. Why so? The hundred thousands are
lacking; If you ask the whole tale, you were an exile at Rhodes."
"You, O Caesar, have altered the golden ages of Saturn;
For while you are alive, iron they ever will be."
"Nothing for wine cares this fellow, since now 'tis for
blood he is thirsting; This he as greedily quaffs as before wine
without water."
"Look, son of Rome, upon Sulla, for himself not for you
blest and happy, Marius too, if you will, but after capturing Rome;
Hands of an Antonius see, rousing the strife of the people, Hands
stained with blood not once, dripping again and again; Then say: Rome
is no more! He ever has reigned with great bloodshed Whoso made
himself king, coming from banishment home."
These at first he wished to be taken as the work of those
who were impatient of his reforms, voicing not so much their real
feelings as their anger and vexation; and he used to say from time to
time: "Let them hate me, provided they respect my conduct." Later he
himself proved them only too true and unerring.
LX. A few days after he reached Capreae and was by
himself, a fisherman appeared unexpectedly and offered him a huge
mullet; whereupon in his alarm that the man had clambered up to him from
the back of the island over rough and pathless rocks, he had the poor
fellow's face scrubbed with the fish. And because in the midst of his
torture the man thanked his stars that he had not given the emperor an
enormous crab that he had caught, Tiberius had his face torn with the
crab also. He punished a soldier of the praetorian guard with death for
having stolen a peacock from his preserves. When the litter in which he
was making a trip was stopped by brambles, he had the man who went ahead
to clear the way, a centurion of the first cohorts, stretched out on the
ground and flogged half to death.
LXI. Presently he broke out into every form of cruelty,
for which he never lacked occasion, venting it on the friends and even
the acquaintances, first of his mother, then of his grandsons and
daughter-in-law, and finally of Sejanus. After the death of Sejanus he
was more cruel than ever, which showed that his favourite was not wont
to egg him on, but on the contrary gave him the opportunities which he
himself desired. Yet in a brief and sketchy autobiography which he
composed he had the assurance to write that he had punished Sejanus
because he found him venting his hatred on the children of his son
Germanicus. Whereas in fact he had himself put one of them to death
after he had begun to suspect Sejanus and the other after the latter's
downfall. It is a long story to run through his acts of cruelty in
detail; it will be enough to mention the forms which they took, as
samples of his barbarity. Not a day passed without an execution, not
even those that were sacred and holy; for he put some to death even on
New Year's day. Many were accused and condemned with their children and
even by their children. The relatives of the victims were forbidden to
mourn for them. Special rewards were voted the accusers and sometimes
even the witnesses. The word of no informer was doubted. Every crime was
treated as capital, even the utterance of a few simple words. A poet was
charged with having slandered Agamemnon in a tragedy, and a writer of
history of having called Brutus and Cassius the last of the Romans. The
writers were at once put to death and their works destroyed, although
they had been read with approval in public some years before in the
presence of Augustus himself. Some of those who were consigned to prison
were denied not only the consolation of reading, but even the privilege
of conversing and talking together. Of those who were cited to plead
their causes some opened their veins at home, feeling sure of being
condemned and wishing to avoid annoyance and humiliation, while others
drank poison in full view of the Senate; yet the wounds of the former
were bandaged and they were hurried half-dead, but still quivering, to
the prison. Every one of those who were executed was thrown out upon the
Stairs of Mourning and dragged to the Tiber with hooks, as many as
twenty being so treated in a single day, including women and children.
Since ancient usage made it impious to strangle maidens, young girls
were first violated by the executioner and then strangled. Those who
wished to die were forced to live; for he thought death so light a
punishment that when he heard that one of the accused, Carnulus by name,
had anticipated his execution, he cried: "Carnulus has given me the
slip"; and when he was inspecting the prisons and a man begged for a
speedy death, he replied: "I have not yet become your friend." An
ex-consul has recorded in his Annals that once at a large dinner-party,
at which the writer himself was present, Tiberius was suddenly asked in
a loud voice by one of the dwarfs that stood beside the table among the
jesters why Paconius, who was charged with treason, remained so long
alive; that the emperor at the time chided him for his saucy tongue, but
a few days later wrote to the Senate to decide as soon as possible about
the execution of Paconius.
LXII. He increased his cruelty and carried it to greater
lengths, exasperated by what he learned about the death of his son
Drusus. At first supposing that he had died of disease, due to his bad
habits, on finally learning that he had been poisoned by the treachery
of his wife Livilla and Sejanus, there was no one whom Tiberius spared
from torment and death. Indeed, he gave himself up so utterly for whole
days to this investigation and was so wrapped up in it, that when he was
told of the arrival of a host of his from Rhodes,whom he had invited to
Rome in a friendly letter, he had him put to the torture at once,
supposing that someone had come whose testimony was important for the
case. On discovering his mistake, he even had the man put to death, to
keep him from giving publicity to the wrong done him. At Capreae they
still point out the scene of his executions, from which he used to order
that those who had been condemned after long and exquisite tortures be
cast headlong into the sea before his eyes, while a band of marines
waited below for the bodies and broke their bones with boathooks and
oars, to prevent any breath of life from remaining in them. Among
various forms of torture he had devised this one: he would trick men
into loading themselves with copious draughts of wine, and then on a
sudden tying up their private parts, would torment them at the same time
by the torture of the cords and of the stoppage of their water. And had
not death prevented him, and Thrasyllus, purposely it is said, induced
him to put off some things through hope of a longer life, it is believed
that still more would have perished, and that he would not even have
spared the rest of his grandsons; for he had his suspicions of Gaius and
detested Tiberius as the fruit of adultery. And this is highly probable,
for he used at times to call Priam happy, because he had outlived all
his kindred.
LXIII. Many things go to show, not only how hated and
execrable he was all this time, but also that he lived a life of extreme
fear and was even exposed to insult. He forbade anyone to consult
soothsayers secretly and without witnesses. Indeed, he even attempted to
do away with the oracles near the city, but forbore through terror at
the divine power of the Praenestine lots; for though he had them sealed
up in a chest and brought to Rome, he could not find them until the box
was taken back to the temple. He had assigned provinces to one or two
ex-consuls, of whom he did not dare to lose sight, but he detained them
at Rome and finally appointed their successors several years later
without their having left the city. In the meantime they retained their
titles, and he even continued to assign them numerous commissions, to
execute through their deputies and assistants.
LXIV. After the exile of his daughter-in-law and
grandchildren he never moved them anywhere except in fetters and in a
tightly closed litter, while a guard of soldiers kept any who met them
on the road from looking at them or even from stopping as they went by.
LXV. When Sejanus was plotting revolution, although he
saw the man's birthday publicly celebrated and his golden statues
honoured everywhere, yet it was with difficulty that he at last
overthrew him, rather by craft and deceit than by his imperial
authority. First of all, to remove him from his person under colour of
showing him honour, he chose him as his colleague in a fifth consulship
[31 A.D.], which, with this very end in view, he assumed after a long
interval while absent from the city. Then beguiling him with hope of
marriage into the imperial family and of the tribunicial power, he
accused him when he least expected it in a shameful and pitiable speech,
begging the senators among other things to send one of the consuls to
bring him, a lonely old man, into their presence under military
protection. Even then distrustful and fearful of an outbreak, he had
given orders that his grandson Drusus, whom he still kept imprisoned in
Rome, should be set free, if occasion demanded, and made commanderin-chief.
He even got ships ready and thought of flight to some of the legions,
constantly watching from a high cliff for the signals which he had
ordered to be raised afar off as each step was taken, for fear the
messengers should be delayed. But even when the conspiracy of Sejanus
was crushed, he was no whit more confident or courageous, but for the
next nine months he did not leave the villa which is called Io's.
LXVI. His anxiety of mind became torture because of
reproaches of all kinds from every quarter, since every single one of
those who were condemned to death heaped all kinds of abuse upon him,
either to his face or by billets placed in the orchestra. By these,
however, he was most diversely affected, now through a sense of shame
desiring that they all be concealed and kept secret, sometimes scorning
them and producing them of his own accord and giving them publicity.
Why, he was even attacked by Artabanus, king of the Parthians, who
charged him in a letter with the murder of his kindred, with other
bloody deeds, and with shameless and dissolute living, counselling him
to gratify the intense and just hatred of the citizens as soon as
possible by a voluntary death.
LXVII. At last in utter self-disgust he all but admitted
the extremity of his wretchedness in a letter [33 A.D.] beginning as
follows: "If I know what to write to you, Fathers of the Senate, or how
to write it, or what to leave unwritten at present, may all gods and
goddesses visit me with more utter destruction than I feel that I am
daily suffering." Some think that through his knowledge of the future he
foresaw this situation, and knew long beforehand what detestation and
ill-repute one day awaited him; and that therefore when he became
emperor, he positively refused the title of "Father of his Country" and
to allow the Senate to take oath to support his acts, for fear that he
might presently be found undeserving of such honours and thus be the
more shamed. In fact, this may be gathered from the speech which he made
regarding these two matters; for example, when he says; "I shall always
be consistent and never change my ways so long as I am in my senses; but
for the sake of precedent the Senate should beware of binding itself to
support the acts of any man, since he might through some mischance
suffer a change." Again: "If you ever come to feel any doubt," he says,
"of my character or of my heartfelt devotion to you (and before that
happens, I pray that my last day may save me from this altered opinion
of me), the title of "Father of my Country" will give me no additional
honour, but will be a reproach to you, either for your hasty action in
conferring the appellation upon me, or for your inconsistency in
changing your estimate of my character."
LXVIII. He was large and strong of frame, and of a
stature above the average; broad of shoulders and chest; well
proportioned and symmetrical from head to foot. His left hand was the
more nimble and stronger, and its joints were so powerful that he could
bore through a fresh, sound apple with his finger, and break the head of
a boy, or even a young man, with a fillip. He was of fair complexion and
wore his hair rather long at the back, so much so as even to cover the
nape of his neck; which was apparently a family trait. His face was
handsome, but would break out on a sudden with many pimples. His eyes
were unusually large and, strange to say, had the power of seeing even
at night and in the dark, but only for a short time when first opened
after sleep; presently they grew dim-sighted again. He strode along with
his neck stiff and bent forward, usually with a stern countenance and
for the most part in silence, never or very rarely conversing with his
companions, and then speaking with great deliberation and with a kind of
supple movement of his fingers. All of these mannerisms of his, which
were disagreeable and signs of arrogance, were remarked by Augustus, who
often tried to excuse them to the Senate and people by declaring that
they were natural failings, and not intentional. He enjoyed excellent
health, which was all but perfect during nearly the whole of his reign,
although from the thirtieth year of his age he took care of it according
to his own ideas, without the aid or advice of physicians.
LXIX. Although somewhat neglectful of the gods and of
religious matters, being addicted to astrology and firmly convinced that
everything was in the hands of fate; he was nevertheless immoderately
afraid of thunder. Whenever the sky was lowering, he always wore a
laurel wreath, because it is said that that kind of leaf is not blasted
by lighting.
LXX. He was greatly devoted to liberal studies in both
languages. In his Latin oratory he followed Messala Corvinus, to whom he
had given attention in his youth, when Messala was an old man. But he so
obscured his style by excessive mannerisms and pedantry, that he was
thought to speak much better offhand than in a prepared address. He also
composed a lyric poem, entitled "A Lament for the Death of Lucius
Caesar," and made Greek verses in imitation of Euphorion, Rhianus, and
Parthenius, poets of whom he was very fond, placing their busts in the
public libraries among those of the eminent writers of old; and on that
account many learned men vied with one another in issuing commentaries
on their works and dedicating them to the emperor. Yet his special aim
was a knowledge of mythology, which he carried to a silly and laughable
extreme; for he used to test even the grammarians, a class of men in
whom, as I have said, he was especially interested, by questions
something like this: "Who was Hecuba's mother?" "What was the name of
Achilles among the maidens?" "What were the Sirens in the habit of
singing?" Moreover, on the first day that he entered the Senate after
the death of Augustus, to satisfy at once the demands of filial piety
and of religion, he offered sacrifice after the example of Minos with
incense and wine, but without a fluteplayer, as Minos had done in
ancient times on the death of his son.
LXXI. Though he spoke Greek readily and fluently, yet he
would not use it on all occasions, and especially eschewed it in the
Senate; so much so that before using the word "monopolium," he begged
pardon for the necessity of employing a foreign term. On another
occasion, when a soldier was asked in Greek to give testimony, he
forbade him to answer except in Latin.
LXXII. Twice only during the whole period of his
retirement did he try to return to Rome, once sailing in a trireme as
far as the gardens near the artificial lake, after first posting a guard
along the banks of the Tiber to keep off those who came out to meet him;
and again coming up the Appian Way as far as the seventh milestone. But
he returned after merely having a distant view of the city walls,
without approaching them; the first time for some unknown reason, the
second through alarm at a portent. He had among his pets a serpent, and
when he was going to feed it from his own hand, as his custom was, and
discovered that it had been devoured by ants, he was warned to beware of
the power of the multitude. So he went back in haste to Campania, fell
ill at Astura, but recovering somewhat kept on to Circeii. To avoid
giving any suspicion of his weak condition, he not only attended the
games of the soldiers, but even threw down darts from his high seat at a
boar which was let into the arena. Immediately he was taken with a pain
in the side, and then being exposed to a draught when he was overheated,
his illness increased. For all that, he kept up for some time, although
he continued his journey as far as Misenum and made no change in his
usual habits, not even giving up his banquets and other pleasures,
partly from lack of self-denial and partly to conceal his condition.
Indeed, when the physician Charicles had taken his hand to kiss it as he
left the dining-room, since he was going away on leave of absence,
Tiberius, thinking that he was trying to feel his pulse, urged him to
remain and take his place again, and prolonged the dinner to a late
hour. Even then he did not give up his custom of standing in the middle
of the dining-room with a lictor by his side and addressing all the
guests by name as they said farewell.
LXXIII. Meanwhile, having read in the proceedings of the
Senate that some of those under accusation, about whom he had written
briefly, merely stating that they had been named by an informer, had
been discharged without a hearing, he cried out in anger that he was
held in contempt, and resolved to return to Capreae at any cost, since
he would not risk any step except from his place of refuge. Detained,
however, by bad weather and the increasing violence of his illness, he
died a little later in the villa of Lucullus, in the seventy-eighth year
of his age and the twenty-third of his reign, on the seventeenth day
before the Kalends of April, in the consulship of Gnaeus Acerronius
Proculus and Gaius Pontius Nigrinus [March 16, 37 A.D.]. Some think that
Gaius gave him a slow and wasting poison; others that during
convalescence from an attack of fever food was refused him when he asked
for it. Some say that a pillow was thrown upon his face, when he came to
and asked for a ring which had been taken from him during a fainting
fit. Seneca writes that conscious of his approaching end, he took off
the ring, as if to give it to someone, but held fast to it for a time;
then he put it back on his finger, and clenching his left hand, lay for
a long time motionless; suddenly he called for his attendants, and on
receiving no response, got up; but his strength failed him and he fell
dead near the couch.
LXXIV. On his last birthday he dreamt that the Apollo of
Temenos, a statue of remarkable size and beauty, which he had brought
from Syracuse to be set up in the library of the new temple, appeared to
him in a dream, declaring that it could not be dedicated by Tiberius. A
few days before his death the lighthouse at Capreae was wrecked by an
earthquake. At Misenum the ashes from the glowing coals and embers
wllich had been brought in to warm his dining-room, after they had died
out and been for a long time cold, suddenly blazed up in the early
evening and glowed without cessation until late at night.
LXXV. The people were so glad of his death, that at the
first news of it some ran about shouting, "Tiberius to the Tiber," while
others prayed to Mother Earth and the Manes to allow the dead man no
abode except among the damned. Still others threatened his body with the
hook and the Stairs of Mourning, especially embittered by a recent
outrage, added to the memory of his former cruelty. It had been provided
by decree of the Senate that the execution of the condemned should in
all cases be put off for ten days, and it chanced that the punishment of
some fell due on the day when the news came about Tiberius. The poor
wretches begged the public for protection; but since in the continued
absence of Gaius there was no one who could be approached and appealed
to, the jailers, fearing to act contrary to the law, strangled them and
cast out their bodies on the Stairs of Mourning. Therefore hatred of the
tyrant waxed greater, since his cruelty endured even after his death.
When the funeral procession left Misenum, many cried out that the body
ought rather to be carried to Atella, and half-burned in the
amphitheatre; but it was taken to Rome by the soldiers and reduced to
ashes with public ceremonies.
LXXVI. Two years before his death he had made two copies
of a will, one in his own hand and the other in that of a freedman, but
of the same content, and had caused them to be signed and sealed by
persons of the very lowest condition. In this will he named his
grandsons, Gaius, son of Germanicus, and Tiberius, son of Drusus, heirs
to equal shares of his estate, each to be sole heir in case of the
other's death. Besides, he gave legacies to several, including the
Vestal virgins, as well as to each and every man of the soldiers and the
commons of Rome, with separate ones to the masters of the city wards.