As
Roman emperor, Nero’s reign was lavish and tyrannical. He killed his mother,
persecuted Christians and is said to have "fiddled while Rome
burned."
Nero was born in 37 A.D., the nephew of the emperor. After
his father’s death, his mother married his uncle and persuaded him to name Nero
his successor. Nero took the throne at 17, rebuffed his mother’s attempts to
control him, and had her killed. He spent lavishly and behaved inappropriately.
He began executing opponents and Christians. In 68, he committed suicide when
the empire revolted.
Early Life and Ascent to the Throne
Nero was born as Lucius Domitius
Ahenobarbus, the son of Gnaeus Domitius Ahenobarbus and Agrippina, who was the
great-granddaughter of the emperor Augustus. He was educated in the classical
tradition by the philosopher Seneca and studied Greek, philosophy and rhetoric.
After Ahenobarbus died in 48 A.D.,
Agrippina married her uncle, the emperor Claudius. She persuaded him to name
Nero as his successor rather than his own son, Britannicus, and to offer his
daughter, Octavia, as Nero’s wife, which he did in 50 A.D.
Claudius died in 54 A.D., and it
is widely suspected that Agrippina had Claudius poisoned. Nero presented
himself to the Senate to deliver a eulogy in Claudius’s honor and was named
Emperor of Rome. He took the name Nero Claudius Caesar Augustus Germanicus, and
ascended to the throne at the age of 17.
Agrippina’s
Influence
Agrippina was domineering and
attempted to influence her son’s rule. She was angered by the more moderate
advice of Nero’s advisors, his former tutor Seneca and the commander of the
Praetorian Guard, Burrus.
Agrippina also tried to assert her
authority in Nero’s private life. When Nero began an affair with Claudia Acte,
a former slave, and threatened to divorce Octavia, Agrippina advocated for
Octavia and demanded that her son dismiss Acte. Although he and Octavia
remained married, Nero began living openly with Acte as his wife in spite of
his mother’s protests.
After Nero spurned his mother’s
influence in both public and private affairs, she was infuriated. She began
championing Britannicus, then still a minor, as emperor. However, Britannicus
died suddenly in 55, the day before he was to be proclaimed an adult. It is
widely assumed that Nero poisoned Britannicus, although Nero claimed that he
died from a seizure. Even after Britannicus had died, Agrippina tried to
agitate the public against Nero, and Nero banished her from the family palace.
By 58, Nero had dismissed Acte and
fallen for Poppaea Sabina, a noblewoman who was married to a member of the
Roman aristocracy. He wanted to marry her, but public opinion did not look
favorably upon a divorce from Octavia and his mother staunchly opposed it. Fed
up with his mother’s interference and no longer content with her removal from
the palace, Nero took matters into his own hands. Agrippina was murdered in 59
at Nero’s command.
Nero’s Reign
Until the year 59, Nero was
described as a generous and reasonable leader. He eliminated capital
punishment, lowered taxes and allowed slaves to bring complaints against their
masters. He supported the arts and athletics above gladiator entertainment and
gave aid to other cities in crisis. Although he was known for his nighttime
frolicking, his actions were good-natured, if irresponsible and self-indulgent.
But after Agrippina’s murder, Nero
descended into a hedonic lifestyle that was marked not just by lavish
self-indulgence but tyranny. He spent exorbitant amounts of money on artistic
pursuits and around 59 A.D., began to give public performances as a poet and
lyre player, a significant breach of etiquette for a member of the ruling
class.
When Burrus died and Seneca
retired in the year 62, Nero divorced Octavia and had her killed, then married
Poppaea. Around this time accusations of treason against Nero and the Senate
began to surface, and Nero began to react harshly to any form of perceived
disloyalty or criticism. One army commander was executed for badmouthing him at
a party; another politician was exiled for writing a book that made negative
remarks about the Senate. Other rivals were executed in the ensuing years,
allowing Nero to reduce opposition and consolidate his power.
The Great Fire
By 64, the scandalous nature of
Nero’s artistic antics may have begun to cause controversy, but the public’s
attention was diverted by the Great Fire. The fire began in stores at the
southeastern end of the Circus Maximus and ravaged Rome for 10 days, decimating
75 percent of the city. Although accidental fires were common at the time, many
Romans believed Nero started the fire to make room for his planned villa, the
Domus Aurea. Whether or not Nero started the fire, he determined that a guilty
party must be found, and he pointed the finger at the Christians, still a new
and underground religion. With this accusation, persecution and torture of the
Christians began in Rome.
Political Demise
and Death
After the Great Fire, Nero resumed
plans for the Domus Aurea. In order to finance this project, Nero needed money
and set about to get it however he pleased. He sold positions in public office
to the highest bidder, increased taxes and took money from the temples. He
devalued currency and reinstituted policies to confiscate property in cases of
suspected treason.
These new policies resulted in the
Pisonian conspiracy, a plot formed in 65 by Gaius Calpurnius Piso, an
aristocrat, along with knights, senators, poets and Nero's former mentor,
Seneca. They planned to assassinate Nero and crown Piso the ruler of Rome. The
plan was discovered, however, and the leading conspirators, as well as many
other wealthy Romans, were executed.
Just three years later, in March
68, the governor Gaius Julius Vindex rebelled against Nero's tax policies. He
recruited another governor, Servius Sulpicius Galba, to join him and to declare
himself emperor. While these forces were defeated and Galba was declared a
public enemy, support for him increased, despite his categorization as a public
enemy. Even Nero’s own bodyguards defected in support of Galba.
Fearing that his demise was
imminent, Nero fled. He planned to head east, where many provinces were still
loyal to him, but had to abandon the plan after his officers refused to obey
him. He returned to his palace, but his guards and friends had left. He
ultimately received word that the Senate had condemned him to death by beating
and so he decided to commit suicide. Unable to carry out the deed by himself,
however, his secretary, Epaphroditos, assisted him. As he died, Nero was said
to have exclaimed, ‘What an artist dies in me!' He was the last of the
Julio-Claudian emperors.
