and resolved to marry her. According to the historian Suetonius, Poppaeaâs husband was âpersuadedâ to grant her a divorce, while Neroâs wife Octavia was first exiled and then murdered on the emperorâs ordersâpaving the way for the NeroâPoppaea union.
In AD 64, a huge fire swept through Rome which the emperor observed with indifference, supposedly playing his lyre. Indeed, according to the Roman chronicler Tacitus, Nero himself was behind the inferno, which was started to make room for his new palace. In fact he probably helped extinguish the fire and gave shelter to the homeless in his gardens. But his reputation for being frivolous, feckless and inept was established. In an effort to divert attention, Nero sought a scapegoat, thus beginning his persecution of the Christians. Tacitus recounts the atrocities committed: âMockery of every sort was added to their deaths. Covered with the skins of beasts, they were torn by dogs and perished, or were nailed to crosses, or were doomed to the flames and burned, to serve as a nightly illumination, when daylight had expired.â
Increasingly convinced that rivals were plotting against him, Nero had any potential critics executed, including, in AD 62â3,Marcus Antonius Pallas, Rubellius Plautus and Faustus Sulla. Then, in AD 65, a conspiracy led by Gaius Calpurnius Piso to oust the emperor and restore the republic was uncovered. Nearly half of the forty-one accused were either executed or forced to commit suicide, Seneca among them. Taking himself increasingly seriously as an actor and neglecting his duties as the Roman economy faltered and disorder spread, Nero began to sing and act on the public stage, spending more time in the theater than running the empire. He also fancied himself as a sportsman, even taking part in the Olympic Games of AD 67âostensibly to improve relations with Greece, but more likely to milk the obsequious praise that invariably greeted his efforts. He won various awardsâmostly secured in advance by hefty bribes from the imperial exchequer.
By AD 68, elements within the armyâwhich the dilettante emperor had largely ignoredâdecided that things could not continue. The governor of one of the provinces in Gaul rebelled and persuaded a fellow governor, Galba, to join him. Galba emerged as a popular focus for opposition to Nero and, crucially, the Praetorian Guard now declared their support for him. Faced with the desertion of the army, Nero was forced to flee Rome and went into hiding; a short time later, he committed suicide with the words âWhat an artist the world is losing in me.â His legacy was one of unrest across the empire, as Rome suffered the Year of the Four Emperors, during which civil war broke out between competing claimants to the throne. Hostilities ended only with the emergence of Vespasian and the founding of the Flavian dynasty.
MARCUS AURELIUS
121â180
Every instant of time is a pinprick of eternity. All things are petty, easily changed, vanishing away
.
Marcus Aurelius,
Meditations
6.36
Marcus Aurelius was the philosopher-king of the Roman empire, who exemplified the qualities he praised in his philosophical writings in a reign marked by principled and reforming rule over a vast and turbulent domain. He had an unselfish and pragmatic approach to governing his empire and did not shirk from sharing supreme power for the greater political good. His major written work, the
Meditations
, is an urbane and civilized commentary on life, expressing in a tender and personal voice a Stoic view of life, death and the vicissitudes of fortune.
Marcus Aurelius, born Marcus Annius Verus in AD 121, came from a family well acquainted with high office. His paternal grandfather was a consul and the prefect of Rome. An aunt was married to Titus Aurelius Antoninus, who would later become the emperor Antoninus Pius. And his maternal grandmother stood to inherit one of the largest
In AD 64, a huge fire swept through Rome which the emperor observed with indifference, supposedly playing his lyre. Indeed, according to the Roman chronicler Tacitus, Nero himself was behind the inferno, which was started to make room for his new palace. In fact he probably helped extinguish the fire and gave shelter to the homeless in his gardens. But his reputation for being frivolous, feckless and inept was established. In an effort to divert attention, Nero sought a scapegoat, thus beginning his persecution of the Christians. Tacitus recounts the atrocities committed: âMockery of every sort was added to their deaths. Covered with the skins of beasts, they were torn by dogs and perished, or were nailed to crosses, or were doomed to the flames and burned, to serve as a nightly illumination, when daylight had expired.â
Increasingly convinced that rivals were plotting against him, Nero had any potential critics executed, including, in AD 62â3,Marcus Antonius Pallas, Rubellius Plautus and Faustus Sulla. Then, in AD 65, a conspiracy led by Gaius Calpurnius Piso to oust the emperor and restore the republic was uncovered. Nearly half of the forty-one accused were either executed or forced to commit suicide, Seneca among them. Taking himself increasingly seriously as an actor and neglecting his duties as the Roman economy faltered and disorder spread, Nero began to sing and act on the public stage, spending more time in the theater than running the empire. He also fancied himself as a sportsman, even taking part in the Olympic Games of AD 67âostensibly to improve relations with Greece, but more likely to milk the obsequious praise that invariably greeted his efforts. He won various awardsâmostly secured in advance by hefty bribes from the imperial exchequer.
By AD 68, elements within the armyâwhich the dilettante emperor had largely ignoredâdecided that things could not continue. The governor of one of the provinces in Gaul rebelled and persuaded a fellow governor, Galba, to join him. Galba emerged as a popular focus for opposition to Nero and, crucially, the Praetorian Guard now declared their support for him. Faced with the desertion of the army, Nero was forced to flee Rome and went into hiding; a short time later, he committed suicide with the words âWhat an artist the world is losing in me.â His legacy was one of unrest across the empire, as Rome suffered the Year of the Four Emperors, during which civil war broke out between competing claimants to the throne. Hostilities ended only with the emergence of Vespasian and the founding of the Flavian dynasty.
MARCUS AURELIUS
121â180
Every instant of time is a pinprick of eternity. All things are petty, easily changed, vanishing away
.
Marcus Aurelius,
Meditations
6.36
Marcus Aurelius was the philosopher-king of the Roman empire, who exemplified the qualities he praised in his philosophical writings in a reign marked by principled and reforming rule over a vast and turbulent domain. He had an unselfish and pragmatic approach to governing his empire and did not shirk from sharing supreme power for the greater political good. His major written work, the
Meditations
, is an urbane and civilized commentary on life, expressing in a tender and personal voice a Stoic view of life, death and the vicissitudes of fortune.
Marcus Aurelius, born Marcus Annius Verus in AD 121, came from a family well acquainted with high office. His paternal grandfather was a consul and the prefect of Rome. An aunt was married to Titus Aurelius Antoninus, who would later become the emperor Antoninus Pius. And his maternal grandmother stood to inherit one of the largest
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