FIGURE 9. RIC2 Nero 44, Gold Aureus. Obverse: NERO CAESAR AVGVSTVS, “Nero Caesar Augustus.” Reverse: AVGVSTVS AVGVSTA, “Augustus Augusta.” From the collection of Andreas Pangerl ∕ romancoins.info.
THE EMPEROR’S WIVES
INTRODUCTION
The transition of the Roman state from republic to principate represented a major constitutional adaptation at the state level. At a more personal level, the evolution of the household of the princeps was in its way no less remarkable. Like the principate as a whole, the imperial household developed out of the precedents established in the republic and reflected the hierarchy and structure of the earlier institution. By a gradual process, the domus (household) presided over by the princeps became an idealized microcosm of the state over which he presided. And as the state became more overtly monarchical than republican, its ruler more emperor than princeps, the domus evolved into an aula, or court, administered by a body of freedmen whose powerful presence was a humiliating and offensive reminder that real power had passed from the purview of the traditional powerful classes into the hands of personal appointees of the emperor.
The need for appropriate balances and modi operandi presented a great problem for each successive emperor and possibly an even greater one for the members of his family, especially the women. For the emperors, a valuable precedent had been set by Augustus, and it is probably fair to say that throughout the whole of imperial history none could boast the success of Augustus himself. The same might arguably be said of Augustus’s wife, Livia, who, although prohibited from holding public office, deftly exercised enormous influence as the emperor’s consort, probably more skillfully than any subsequent imperial wife; she had less success as an imperial mother, although her failure in this sphere was well replicated by Agrippina later. The women of Nero’s court, accordingly, are well worth studying in this period of political change and evolution. But the reign of Nero also provides another dimension that adds a special level of fascination to the topic. The women who play a major role in his life, at both the upper and lower levels of the social scale, happened to be individuals with powerful personalities and determined wills. Initially, this could be said to be the consequence of circumstances; later it seems to have reflected Nero’s perhaps unconscious choice. His relationship with them was a psychologically complex one, of subservience followed by a resentment that could result in violence and even death. One may wonder to what extent Nero’s determination to define himself as artist and performer was a declaration of independence from the powerful female figures who had played such a dominating role in his life.
Octavia
Octavia was the daughter of Claudius and Messalina, and was probably born in early AD 40. At the age of two, she was betrothed to Lucius Junius Silanus Torquatus, great-great-grandson of Augustus (Tac. Ann. 12.3.2; Suet. Claud. 27.2; Dio 60.5.7). Through the machinations of Agrippina, she was betrothed to Nero in AD 49 (Tac. Ann. 12.9.1) and married to him in 53 (Tac. Ann. 12.58.1; Suet. Ner. 7.2). There seems to have been little affection between the two, and Nero developed a strong attachment to the freedwoman Acte and later to Poppaea Sabina. On the pretense that she was barren and had committed adultery with a slave, Nero divorced Octavia and banished her to Campania (Tac. Ann. 14.60.1, 4; Suet. Ner. 35.2). She was later accused of adultery with the prefect of the fleet Anicetus and confined on the island of Pandateria, where she was put to death in June 62 (Tac. Ann. 14.63–64; Suet. Ner. 35.2).
Poppaea
Poppaea Sabina was born about AD 31 to a family that had roots in Campania, the daughter of Titus Ollius and the elder Poppaea Sabina, the mother reputed to be the most beautiful woman of her day. The family distinction was matched by its wealth (Tac. Ann. 13.45.2). Poppaea’s father was brought down through his association with Sejanus, and consequently Poppaea Sabina was named after her renowned maternal grandfather, Gaius Poppaeus Sabinus. She was married first to the equestrian Rufrius Crispinus, praetorian prefect from at least 47 to 51. Rufrius would go on to a number of distinctions, followed by exile to Sardinia after the Pisonian conspiracy and then enforced suicide. In AD 58, Poppaea began an affair with Marcus Salvius Otho, the future emperor, and married him. Suetonius says that she was already mistress of Nero when she married Otho. Suetonius claims that Otho became so jealous that he tried to prevent her from meeting Nero, who obliged them to divorce. In the Histories (1.13.3), Tacitus suggests that Nero used Otho as a front man in his affair until he could divorce Octavia (Plutarch [Galb. 19.2] also claims this), but he suspected that Otho was indulging in Poppaea himself. (Dio [61.11.2] suggests they were both happy to share her.) In the Annals, Tacitus claims that it was Otho who initially roused Nero’s interest in her, either through naïve enthusiasm or by deliberately pandering to her to extend his own influence. Alone of the sources, Tacitus suggests that Poppaea deliberately encouraged Nero (Tac. Ann. 13.46), although Plutarch, while not going that far, claims that she enjoyed the rivalry (Plut. Galb. 19.4). Both Tacitus and Suetonius agree that Nero got rid of Otho by sending him to govern Lusitania, where he acquitted himself with some distinction (Tac. Hist. 1.13.3; Suet. Otho 3). Poppaea’s marriage to Nero was supposedly obstructed by Agrippina, and Poppaea supposedly urged him to a drastic remedy (Tac. Ann. 14.1), but after the death of Agrippina it was in fact another three years before Nero divorced Octavia and married the by now pregnant Poppaea.
In 63 AD, Poppaea gave birth to a daughter, who was given the title of Augusta but lived only four months (Tac. Ann. 15.23.1; Suet. Ner. 35.3). In 65, Poppaea was again pregnant but, according to Tacitus (Ann. 16.6.1), died after Nero, in an outburst of anger, kicked her in the stomach during the pregnancy (Tacitus rejects a claim that she was poisoned). Suetonius (Nero 35.3) says that Nero kicked her to death, when she was pregnant and ill, for berating him for staying too long at the races. Dio (62.27.4) says that he jumped on her, perhaps accidentally. She was not cremated, the usual Roman practice, but embalmed and placed in the tomb of the Julii (Tac. Ann. 16.6.2), and received divine honors.
Poppaea is depicted as the epitome of wild excess. Tacitus says that she had every advantage in life except decency (Ann. 13.45.2). She was said to put golden slippers on the mules that drew her carriage and to bathe daily in the milk of 500 asses to preserve her beauty (Dio 62.28.1; Plin. HN 11.238, 28.183), and she even had a perfume named after her that rich women avidly wore (Juv.6.461–64). In reality, she seems to have been a woman of some ability, with a range of interests. One of these was Judaism, and she met its representatives (Joseph. Vit. 16; AJ 20.195) and involved herself in Judaean administrative issues (Joseph. AJ 20.252). Tacitus concedes that her conversation was engaging and that she had a sharp wit (Tac. Ann. 13.45.2). Nero seems to have sought her counsel during the Pisonian conspiracy (Tac. Ann. 15.61.2; see Chapter VIII).
Statilia Messalina
After the death of Poppaea, Nero seems to have sought marriage with Antonia, the oldest daughter of Claudius, but she refused him and he put her to death, claiming an involvement in the Pisonian conspiracy as a pretext (Tac. Ann. 15.53.3–4; Suet. Ner. 35.4; see Chapter VIII). Instead, his next wife was Statilia Messalina, a much-married woman with a distinguished family pedigree.
Acte was an imperial slave from Asia (Dio 61.17.1), and her relationship with Nero was a major one in his life. Suetonius (Ner. 28.1) claims that Nero was prepared to marry her and that he bribed some ex-consulars to testify that she was of royal blood. Agrippina saw the affair as a threat to her own influence over her son, and for that reason Seneca and Burrus encouraged it (Tac. Ann. 13.12–13). She remained loyal to Nero to the end, and interred his remains. She became prosperous, owning many slaves and property at Puteoli and Velitrae.
SOURCES
Agrippina maneuvers the betrothal of Nero and Octavia.
Suet. Claud. 27.2. He [Claudius] gave Antonia in marriage to Gnaeus Pompeius Magnus and, after him, to Faustus Sulla, both very well-born young men. Octavia, previously engaged to Silanus, he gave to his own stepson, Nero.
AD 49
Tac. Ann. 12.3.1. Using their family connection as a pretext, she [Agrippina] made frequent visits and so captivated her uncle that she was preferred to her rivals and, though not yet a wife, now wielded the power of a wife. 2. For, once certain of her own marriage, she began to make greater plans and to engineer a marriage between Domitius, the son she had had by Gnaeus Ahenobarbus, and Claudius’s daughter Octavia. This could not be brought off without some criminal act. Claudius had promised Octavia to Lucius Silanus and had brought the young man, already distinguished, popularity with the masses by granting him triumphal insignia and staging a magnificent gladiatorial show in his honor.1 But there seemed no difficulty in manipulating the mind of an emperor whose favor and animosity were always implanted and programmed by others.
4.1. Now Vitellius, who screened his servile intrigues behind his title of censor, and had the ability to foresee the rise of despotic regimes, began to associate himself with Agrippina’s schemes in order to win her favor.2 He brought charges against Silanus, whose sister, Junia Calvina, was indeed attractive and precocious (and she had also been Vitellius’s daughter-in-law shortly before).3 2. It was on this that the allegations were based, with Vitellius putting a sordid interpretation on an affection between the siblings that, while indiscreet, was not incestuous. And Claudius lent an ear, more prepared to listen to innuendo against a son-in-law because of his love for his daughter. 3. Silanus, who was ignorant of the plot and happened to be praetor that year, was suddenly removed from the senatorial order by an edict of Vitellius, despite the fact that the list of senators had long been drafted and the census purification performed. At the same time, Claudius broke off the engagement, and Silanus was forced to resign his magistracy, the one remaining day of his praetorship being conferred on Eprius Marcellus. …4
8.1. On the wedding day, Silanus took his own life.5 Either he had reached that point buoyed with hopes of staying alive or he chose the day to increase public resentment. His sister Calvina was banished from Italy.6 Claudius went further, calling for ceremonies in conformity with the laws of King Tullus, with expiatory rites celebrated by the pontiffs in the grove of Diana, and it brought general amusement that this was the time chosen for punishment and expiation for incest!7 2. But not to have a reputation only for evil deeds, Agrippina successfully petitioned for remission in the case of Annaeus Seneca’s exile, and a praetorship for him along with it.8 She thought this would have public approval in view of Seneca’s literary fame, and she also planned to have Domitius’s early years mature under such a teacher. Moreover, they could profit from the man’s advice in their imperial aspirations, for (it was believed) Seneca would be loyal to Agrippina through remembrance of her benefaction and hostile to Claudius because he was piqued by the wrong he had suffered.
9.1. It was decided that there should be no further delay, and the consul designate Mammius Pollio was induced with lavish promises to put forward a motion in which Claudius would be entreated to sanction the engagement of Octavia to Domitius.9 At the age of the two of them, this was not inappropriate, and it would open the way to greater things. 2. Pollio made the proposal in terms not dissimilar to those recently employed by Vitellius. Octavia was then engaged,10 and, in addition to his previous family connection, Domitius now became the emperor’s promised son-in-law and Britannicus’s equal—all because of his mother’s intrigues and the machinations of those who, having accused Messalina, feared retribution from her son.
Nero marries Octavia.
AD 53
Tac. Ann. 12.58.1. In the consulship of Decimus Junius and Quintus Haterius, Nero, now aged sixteen, married Claudius’s daughter Octavia.11
Nero becomes besotted with Acte.
Tac. Ann.13.12. Meanwhile, the power of the mother was gradually weakened. Nero had fallen in love with a freedwoman called Acte12 and at the same time had enlisted as his confidants Marcus Otho and Claudius Senecio, good-looking young men (Otho came from a consular family,13 and Senecio had an imperial freedman for a father).14 Acte had wormed her way deeply into the emperor’s affections—without the mother’s knowledge, and later despite her attempts to oppose it—by assisting his extravagances and by secret meetings of a dubious nature. Not even the emperor’s older friends objected to seeing a young girl satisfy his urges, with no one harmed, since—whether by some stroke of fate or because the illicit is always more appealing—Nero detested his wife Octavia, a noblewoman of proven virtue, and there were fears that, if disallowed that indulgence, he would go on a rampage of unlawful sex with illustrious ladies.
Tac. Ann. 13.18.3. His mother’s wrath, however, could be appeased by no munificence.15 She became close to Octavia, and often held clandestine meetings with her friends, appropriating cash from all sources, which—her congenital rapacity apart—she considered an emergency fund. She gave a warm welcome to tribunes and centurions, and showed respect for the names and virtues of such nobles as still survived, as if she were searching for a leader and a party.16
The situation is further complicated when Nero falls in love with Poppaea Sabina.
Tac. Ann. 13.45.1. A no less scandalous case of immorality that year proved to be the start of deep troubles for the state. One Sabina Poppaea lived in the city.17 She was the daughter of Titus Ollius, but she had adopted the name of her maternal grandfather, Poppaeus Sabinus, who had an illustrious history and was preeminent as an ex-consul who had also celebrated a triumph.18 For Ollius had been brought low by his friendship with Sejanus even before holding the high offices.19 2. This lady had to her credit everything but decency. Her mother had surpassed all women of her generation in beauty and had bestowed on her both distinction and good looks, and Poppaea’s finances were in line with the renown of her family. 3. She had refined conversation and was not dim-witted. She had a modest air and a salacious lifestyle. She rarely made an appearance in public, and when she did so it was with face partially veiled so as not to satisfy men’s glances or because that suited her appearance. She had no concern for her reputation, making no distinction between husbands and lovers. She was not controlled by feelings, either her own or another’s, ever redirecting her sexuality to where material benefit was in evidence. 4. So it was that, while she was living married to a Roman knight, Rufrius Crispinus, by whom she had had a son,20 Otho seduced her by his youth and his luxurious lifestyle, and by the fact that he was a notoriously close friend of Nero’s. The affair was quickly followed by marriage.21
46.1. Otho now proceeded to sing the praises of his wife’s looks and refinement in the emperor’s presence, either because love made him incautious or to rouse Nero’s passions and have the bond of their possessing the same woman increase his influence. He was often heard rising from the emperor’s dinner table saying that he was going to her, that he had been granted a nobility and beauty that all wanted and the fortunate enjoyed.
2. With these and other such incitements, it did not take long. Accepting an audience, Poppaea first established herself by her sweet talk and wiles, pretending she could not control her passion and was captivated by Nero’s looks. Presently, as Nero’s infatuation intensified, she began to give herself airs. If kept there beyond one or two nights, she would say repeatedly that she was a married woman and could not abandon her marriage—she was bound to Otho by a quality of life that none could match. Otho was a man of magnificent spirit and refinement, she would say; in him, she could see qualities deserving the highest fortune. But as for Nero, he was bound to a chambermaid-whore in his relationship with Acte, and he had drawn from his cohabitation with a slave nothing that was not degrading and sordid!22
3. Otho was cut off from his normal intimacy with Nero and then from his position as courtier and member of the imperial retinue. Finally, so he would not be in the city as Nero’s rival, he was made governor of the province of Lusitania.23 There he lived right up to the civil war, not in the disreputable fashion of earlier days but in an upright and virtuous manner, mischievous in his leisure time but quite self-controlled in his exercise of power.24
Nero decides to murder his mother.
Tac. Ann. 14.1. During the consulship of Gaius Vipstanus and Gaius Fonteius, Nero put off no longer the fiendish act he had been mulling over for quite some time.25 His rule was established well enough to bolster his confidence, and his love for Poppaea was burning hotter every day. Poppaea could not hope to be married herself, or for Octavia to be divorced, while Agrippina lived, and with frequent taunts and occasional teasing she would jeer at the emperor, calling him “the ward” and saying that he was subject to the orders of others and, so far from wielding power, did not even have his own freedom.26 2. Why else was her wedding being put off? she asked. Nero must be displeased with her looks and her triumph-celebrating forebears!27 Or was it with her fertility and the sincerity of her feelings?28 No, it was fear that, as his wife, she would reveal the insults heaped on the senators and the resentment felt by the people over his mother’s arrogance and greed.29 But if Agrippina could countenance only a daughter-in-law who hated her son,30 she concluded, then Poppaea should return to her marriage to Otho—she would go anywhere in the world where she would only hear the vilification of the emperor and not be personally witnessing it while also sharing his perils.31 3. Tearfully directed with the artfulness of an adulteress, these and other such comments were beginning to strike home, and no one tried to stop them. Everybody wanted to see the mother’s power destroyed, and none thought the son’s hatred would harden to the point of his murdering her.
After the murder of his mother, Nero eventually moves to get rid of Octavia.
Tac. Ann. 14.59. His fear now removed,32 he proceeded to hurry on his marriage to Poppaea,33 which had been delayed by such anxieties, and to remove his wife, Octavia (who, for all her modest demeanor, was offensive to him because of her father’s name and her popularity with the people).34
60. Receiving the decree of the Senate, Nero saw that all his crimes were accepted as good deeds, and so he drove out Octavia, claiming she was barren.35 He then married Poppaea. She had long been Nero’s bedfellow, controlling him first as her adulterer and subsequently as her husband, and now she pushed one of Octavia’s servants into accusing her mistress of a love affair with a slave. A man called Eucaerus, an Alexandrian native who was an expert flute player, was marked out as the defendant. Octavia’s maidservants were interrogated under torture and, though some were so overcome by the severity of their ordeals as to make false statements, more of them resolutely defended the virtue of their mistress (and, when Tigellinus pressed her, one replied that Octavia’s private parts were more pure than his mouth).36
Suetonius’s account of the events is even more laudatory of the conduct of Octavia’s household. Dio’s version reflects far less well on it, since he claims that all went over to the side of Poppaea with the exception of only one, Pythias, who remained loyal, uttering the preceding insult recorded by Tacitus.
Suet. Ner. 35.1. He quickly tired of his relationship with Octavia, and when his friends rebuked him, his reply was that her insignia as his wife should be enough for her.37 2. Presently, he several times tried to strangle her, but without success, and then divorced her on the grounds that she was barren.38 When the people disapproved of the divorce and did not refrain from showing their displeasure, he also banished her, and eventually put her to death on a charge of adultery. The charge was so brazen and groundless that when everybody flatly denied her guilt under torture he made his own pedagogue Anicetus make a false statement that she had been tricked into having sex with him.39
Dio 62.13.4. All the other servants of Octavia joined Sabina in attacking her, because they had no regard for her now that she was in a wretched plight, and they fawned on Sabina because of the power she wielded—all except Pythias. Only Pythias would tell no lie against her, though subjected to the most cruel torture, and finally, when Tigellinus kept pressing her, she spat on him and said: “My mistress’s private parts are cleaner than your mouth, Tigellinus.”
Tac. Ann. 14.60.4. She was removed nonetheless, first under the pretext of a civil divorce, when she was given Burrus’s house and Plautus’s estates—two inauspicious gifts—40 and later she was banished to Campania, where she was also put under a military guard.41 There followed repeated and unconcealed protests among the common people, who have less prudence than others and who, because of their meager fortunes, face fewer dangers.42 From this <arose the rumor> that Nero had regretted his outrageous conduct and recalled his wife Octavia.43
61.1. Then the people joyfully climbed the Capitol and at last paid homage to the gods. They threw down Poppaea’s statues, lifted effigies of Octavia on their shoulders, scattered flowers over them, and set them up in the Forum and temples.44 There was even praise for the emperor, and they once more competed with each other in their homage to him. They were already filling the Palatium with their numbers and their shouting when companies of soldiers were sent forth who broke up the gathering and dispersed them with beatings and drawn swords. The changes they had brought about with the riot were reversed, and Poppaea’s honors were reestablished.
2. Ever vicious in her hatred, she was now wild with fear of increased violence from the mob or a change of heart in Nero because of the mood swing of the people, and she flung herself at his knees. Her situation was not such that she was fighting for her marriage, she said, although that meant more than her life to her. No, she said, that very life had been put in extreme jeopardy by Octavia’s clients and slaves, who called themselves “the plebs” and had the audacity to commit in peace acts that scarcely took place in war. 3. That armed insurrection had been directed against the emperor; all it had lacked was a leader, and one would easily be found once things got under way!45 That woman, at whose nod, even in her absence, rioting was set in motion, now had only to quit Campania and come to the city in person! 4. And what had been Poppaea’s wrongdoing, anyway? What offense had she caused anyone? Could it be because she was going to give the house of the Caesars legitimate offspring? Did the Roman people prefer the scion of an Egyptian flute player to be brought to the empire’s highest post?46 In short, if it was in his interests, he should bring home the woman who controlled him, but of his own will rather than under duress—or else he should take thought for his own safety. The initial disturbances had been settled through fair retribution and gentle correctives, she said, but if the people lost hope of Octavia being Nero’s wife, they would give her another husband!
62.1. Her address, with its varying tone, and adapted to stir up both fear and anger, both terrified and incensed her listener. But suspicion was too weak in the case of the slave and had been undermined by the interrogation of the maidservants. It was accordingly decided that a confession should be obtained from someone on whom a charge of subversion could also be pinned. 2. And for that, a good choice seemed to be Anicetus, the perpetrator of his mother’s murder. He was, as I noted, prefect of the fleet at Misenum, and while he had enjoyed some slight favor after committing the crime, he had then become the object of a deepening hatred, for the agents of our nefarious acts are viewed as a standing reproach.
3. Summoning Anicetus, Nero reminded him of his earlier service. He alone had taken measures for his safety against a scheming mother, the emperor told him, and now he had the opportunity to do no less a favor by clearing away a hateful wife. No violence, no weapon was required—he need only admit adultery with Octavia. Though these would remain secret for the moment, Nero promised him great rewards and a delightful retirement property, threatening him with death if he refused. 4. With his deranged viciousness and a facility he demonstrated in his earlier crimes, Anicetus fabricated even more than he had been ordered to and made a confession before friends whom the emperor had brought together as though for an advisory council. He was then banished to Sardinia, where he endured an exile that was far from impoverished, and died a natural death.
63.1. Nero issued an edict in which he declared that the prefect had been seduced by Octavia, who had hoped thereby to enlist the support of the fleet. Then, forgetting the barrenness of which she had been accused shortly before, he added that she had undergone an abortion through guilt over her sexual excesses, and this had become known to him.47 He then shut her away on the island of Pandateria.48 2. No woman in exile ever inspired more pity in those who saw her. Some could still recall Agrippina’s banishment by Tiberius, and there was also the more recent memory of Julia, banished by Claudius. But those women had with them the strength of age; they had seen some happy days and could find comfort for the brutality of the present in the recollection of better fortunes in the past.49 3. For Octavia, her wedding day was, first of all, tantamount to a funeral, when she was escorted to a home in which she would encounter only grief, her father being snatched from her by poison, and her brother, too, immediately after. Then came the maidservant who was more powerful than her mistress;50 then Poppaea, whose marriage served only to destroy the wife; and finally the accusation more agonizing than any death.
64.1. So, in her twentieth year, the girl, surrounded by centurions and soldiers, had been removed from the living by the presentiment of her doom, but not yet could she enjoy the tranquility of death.51 After a few days’ interval, the order for her death was given.52 She declared that she was now a widow and merely a sister,53 and she appealed to Nero by calling on their common kinsmen the Germanici and, finally, on the name of Agrippina, in whose lifetime she had endured a marriage that, while unhappy, had not carried a death sentence.54
2. She was chained up, and the veins were cut in all her limbs; and because the blood, arrested by her fear, flowed too slowly, her life was terminated by the steam of an overheated bath. An act of even more atrocious savagery followed: her head was cut off and taken to Rome, where Poppaea viewed it.
3. In thanks for this, offerings were decreed at the temples—but how long shall I go on relating such events? Any who learn about the tribulations of those times from me, or from other authors, can take it for granted that, whenever the emperor authorized exile or assassination, prayers were always offered to the gods, and that the former indicators of success had now become those of public disaster. And yet I shall not keep silent about any senatorial decree that marked new stages of obsequiousness or extremes of servility.
Poppaea marries Nero and bears him a daughter, who dies, and Poppaea herself dies two years later.
Tac. Ann. 15.23.1. In the consulship of Memmius Regulus and Verginius Rufus, a daughter was born to Nero by Poppaea, and he welcomed her with a joy transcending that of a mortal, naming her Augusta and conferring the same title on Poppaea.55 Her birth-place was the colony of Antium, where Nero himself had been born.56 2. The Senate had earlier commended Poppaea’s pregnancy to the protection of the gods and had undertaken vows in the name of the state, which were now multiplied and discharged. There was also a period of thanksgiving, with decrees issued authorizing a temple to Fertility and a contest modeled on the rite of Actium.57 Statues in gold of the goddesses of Fortune were also to be set on the throne of Capitoline Jupiter, and circus entertainments were to be held at Antium in honor of the Claudian and Domitian families,58 like those for the Julian at Bovillae.59
3. But these were all transitory: the baby was dead within four months. And then came more sycophancy, as they voted the child divine honors, complete with couch, temple, and priest. And Nero himself was as immoderate in grief as he had been in joy.60
FIGURE 9. RIC2 Nero 44, Gold Aureus. Obverse: NERO CAESAR AVGVSTVS, “Nero Caesar Augustus.” Reverse: AVGVSTVS AVGVSTA, “Augustus Augusta.” From the collection of Andreas Pangerl ∕ romancoins.info.
At some point after the Great Fire of 64, Nero reformed his coinage, and the aureus illustrated in Figure 9, on the basis of its weight, confirmed by the mature portrait, belongs to that postreform period. The reverse depicts the emperor in a toga, wearing a radiate crown (with sun’s rays) and holding a scepter in his left hand. On the right side stands his consort, veiled and draped. She holds a dish (patera) in her right hand and a cornucopia in her left. She is usually taken to be Poppaea, but an identification with Statilia is not to be ruled out.
Note that the SC legend, found on earlier precious metal coinage of Nero and possibly suggesting respect for the Senate, has been dropped.
Tac. Ann. 16.6.1. After the end of the games, Poppaea died, the victim of a chance outburst of anger in her husband, from whom she received a kick during pregnancy. Though some authorities record it—more from animosity than belief—I would not give credit to poison.61 Nero wanted children, and was captivated by love for his wife. 2. Her body was not cremated, the normal Roman practice.62 It was embalmed, after the fashion of foreign royalty, by being filled with aromatic spices, and then taken into the mausoleum of the Julii.63 There was, however, a state funeral, and Nero himself, on the rostrum, eulogized Poppaea for her beauty, for having been the mother of a now deified child, and for other gifts of fortune, which he represented as virtues.64
7. Poppaea’s death brought sadness in public but joy to those with a memory of the past, because of her promiscuity and ruthlessness.65
Suet. Ner. 35.3. Poppaea, whom he married eleven days after his divorce from Octavia, he loved as no other. And yet he killed her, too, by kicking her to death while she was pregnant and ill for having reprimanded him when he came back late from his chariot racing.66 By Poppaea he had his daughter Claudia Augusta, but lost her while she was still an infant.
Dio 62.28.1. This Sabina was so given to extravagant luxury (as will be fully demonstrated in the briefest space) that she had the mules that drew her carriage shod with gilded shoes and 500 recently foaled asses milked every day so she could take baths in the milk. She was extremely concerned about her beauty and the radiant quality of her physical presence, and for this reason when she once saw herself not looking good in a mirror she prayed she would die before she grew old. 2. Nero so pined for her after her death that, when he discovered there was a woman who resembled her, he at first sent for her and kept her with him. Later, however, he castrated a freed slave boy (whom he called Sporus), 3. since he, too, bore a resemblance to Sabina,67 and treated him like a wife in every way. After some time had passed, he married the boy, although he [Nero] was already married to a freedman called Pythagoras, and he conferred a dowry on him by contract. And their marriage was generally celebrated, and especially so by the Romans.
63.26.3. In everything else, Nero’s actions were just as they usually were. He was happy with the reports because he was hoping to defeat Vindex, and most importantly because it seemed that he had gained a plausible excuse for raising money and committing murders. He also continued with his extravagances, and after the completion and beautification of the shrine of Sabina, he consecrated it in magnificent fashion, adding to it an inscription stating that it was the women who erected it to the deified Sabina-Aphrodite.68 4. And in this he told the truth, since it had been built with money that had been for the most part purloined from the women.
Sometime after the death of Poppaea, Nero marries his third wife, Statilia Messalina.
Suet. Ner. 35.1. Apart from Octavia, Nero took two other wives: Poppaea Sabina, who was the daughter of a former quaestor and had earlier been married to a Roman knight; and Statilia Messalina, a great-great-granddaughter of Taurus, a man who had twice been consul and had also celebrated a triumph.69 To procure Messalina, he put to death her husband, the consul Atticus Vestinus, while the man was still in office.70
1 Lucius Junius Silanus, born about AD 26/27, was the son of Marcus Junius Lepidus, consul in 19, and Aemilia Lepida, daughter of Julia the Younger. He was thus the great-great-grandson of Augustus and enjoyed a career that matched his family connections. He was briefly the prefect of the city. After his betrothal to Octavia (cf. also Dio 60.5.7, 31.7; Suet. Claud. 24.3, 29.1), he accompanied Claudius to Britain; when the campaign came to an end, he went ahead of Claudius to Rome to report the victory and was awarded triumphal honors (ornamenta triumphalia) (cf. also Suet. Claud. 24.3; Dio 60.23.1, 31.7). During the triumph, he climbed the steps of the Capitol at Claudius’s side. In 48, a year before his death, he held a praetorship, during which, with financial backing from Claudius, he put on a splendid gladiatorial show (cf. also Dio 60.5.8, 31.7).
2 The mechanics of bringing down Silanus were handled by Lucius Vitellius, father of the future emperor. He was Claudius’s strongest ally in the Senate. In AD 47–48, he was censor, and one of his duties was to scrutinize the Senate membership to weed out those guilty of moral turpitude.
3 Vitellius did not invent the rumors. The Apocolocyntosis says that Junia Calvina was a woman of great charm, called “Venus” by everyone else but “Juno” (sister and wife of Jupiter) by her brother (Sen. Apocol. 8.2). She had in fact been married to Vitellius’s son, Lucius Vitellius, brother of the later emperor.
4 Suetonius (Claud. 29.2) reports that Silanus was forced to step down on December 29. His place was taken by Eprius Marcellus, consul of AD 62 and 74, a notorious accuser who had amassed great wealth.
5 The wedding in question is that of Claudius and Agrippina. Suetonius (Claud. 29.1) confirms that Silanus died on the day of the ceremony. Dio (60.31.8) unambiguously characterizes the death as murder.
6 Calvina was recalled some ten years later, after the death of Agrippina, and lived into Vespasian’s reign.
7 Tullus Hostilius, Rome’s third king, prescribed expiatory rites for Horatius after he killed his sister.
8 This is the first reference in the extant books of the Annals to the famous writer and philosopher, who from then until his death in AD 65 would play a prominent role in Nero’s reign. He had been exiled to Corsica in 41 on the charge of being the lover of Caligula’s sister, Julia Livilla. On his earlier life, see Chapter I.
9 As consul designate, Mammius Pollio was called on first to give his opinion on a question, but was not obliged to limit his remarks to that question. His suffect consulship presumably fell later in that year (AD 49). Vitellius had stressed the political advantages that would come about if Claudius should marry Agrippina, and similar arguments were probably made on this occasion.
10 The betrothal took place in AD 49. Nero probably was born in AD 37, Octavia in about AD 40.
11 In January 53, Nero had in fact almost certainly just passed his fifteenth birthday and was in his sixteenth year. After Nero’s adoption by Claudius, Octavia became his sister, and Dio (60.33.22) reports that she had to be adopted by another family before she was legally allowed to marry him.
12 On Acte, see Chapter III.
13 Marcus Salvius Otho was born April 28, 32, into a family originated from Ferentium in Etruria. His immediate forebears were active and ambitious. His grandfather was the first member of the family to reach the Senate. His father, Lucius, who was thought by some to be Tiberius’s illegitimate son, was consul in AD 33, and after exposing a conspiracy against Claudius was enrolled by that emperor into the Patricians. About the career of the Otho of Tacitus’s narrative, we know only of his earlier quaestorship, which he must have held early in the Neronian period, and his acceptance into the Arval brotherhood. He reputedly acquired a taste for hedonism from his early years, despite his father’s efforts to flog it out of him. His self-indulgent lifestyle quickly endeared him to Nero (Suet. Otho 2; Tac. Hist. 1.13.3). Otho was now twenty-three years old. On the marriage between his former wife, Poppaea, and Nero, see later in this chapter.
14 Claudius Senecio will reappear in AD 65, when he becomes involved in the Pisonian conspiracy (see Chapter VIII).
15 Agrippina grew alarmed after what she saw as the murder of Britannicus (see Chapter III), and Nero’s attempts to win her over with extravagant gifts were to no avail.
16 This is a fairly explicit statement that Agrippina had intended to mount serious political opposition to Nero. She supposedly saw Octavia as a popular figurehead around whom support might be rallied (perhaps Agrippina realized that she could not play that role herself). She also appears to have attempted to strengthen her position in the Senate and, perhaps more significantly, among members of the praetorian guard. She had recognized the importance of this institution from an early stage and had gradually replaced officers with candidates of her choice, a policy that bore fruit (albeit not of great benefit in the end) when Burrus informed Nero that the guard would not participate in her assassination in AD 59 (see Chapter III).
17 Tacitus dates the beginning of the affair between Nero and Poppaea to AD 58. His portrayal of Poppaea is thought to owe much to Sallust’s portrayal of Sempronia (Cat. 25), one of the followers of Catiline. She, too, was well-read and witty, but also lacking in restraint and decency.
18 Poppaeus Sabinus was a novus homo, consul in AD 9. In about 11, he was sent to Moesia, and was probably responsible for organizing the region as a separate province. In 15, Achaea and Macedonia were added to his command. He won the ornamenta triumphalia for his campaigns against Thrace. He died on service in 35.
19 None of the accounts of Sejanus mentions friendship with Titus Ollius. Suetonius (Ner. 35.1) reveals that Titus had held the quaestorship.
20 Suetonius (Ner. 35.5) claims that Nero ordered the slaves of Poppaea’s son to murder him while he was fishing; he had supposedly entertained hopes of becoming emperor (not unreasonably, his relationship to Nero being that of Tiberius to Augustus). There is also a tradition that Nero stabbed him (Octavia 744–47).
21 Tacitus in the earlier Histories (1.13) follows a different version, found also in Suetonius (Otho 3), Plutarch (Galb. 19.106), and Dio (61.11.2), that Nero had already begun his affair while Poppaea was married to her first husband, Crispinus, and that her relationship with Otho was merely a front to facilitate Nero’s meeting with her, a situation complicated when Otho fell in love with her, as a consequence of which he was exiled. Tacitus seems here to be correcting his earlier view with a more plausible scenario.
22 The term that Tacitus uses for cohabitation is contubernium, a technical expression for the sharing of a military barracks and applied to the union of two slaves. Acte was in fact a freedwoman.
23 This province, in western Spain, was normally governed by a man of praetorian rank, but Otho had held nothing higher than the quaestorship and was at this time only twenty-six. Suetonius (Otho 3.1) suggests that Otho hosted the banquet that immediately preceded the murder of Agrippina and thus, by implication, did not go to Lusitania until after the murder. Plutarch (Galb. 20.1) suggests that Seneca advised sending him there.
24 Otho stayed in office for ten years (AD 58–68), governing well and effectively, and led the way in placing his support behind Galba.
25 The abrupt announcement of the plan to murder Agrippina comes as something of a surprise. She has been absent from the Annals since 13.21.
26 On the implausibility of the words put in Poppaea’s mouth here, see Chapter III. Syme (1958), 536–37, finds comic elements in her upbraiding of Nero.
27 In fact, only Poppaea’s maternal grandfather, Poppaeus Sabinus, had been granted triumphal insignia, for victories in Thrace under Tiberius.
28 Poppaea had borne a son to Rufrius Crispinus; Octavia was childless.
29 The logic seems to be that as long as Poppaea was in competition with Agrippina, Nero would regard her attacks against his mother as intended simply to undermine her position.
30 After the death of Britannicus, Agrippina was drawn much closer to Octavia (Tac. Ann. 13.18.2), so the charge of her supporting those “hating her son” would have struck home.
31 The implication is that Otho has already been sent out to Lusitania. According to Suetonius (Otho 3.1), however, he hosted the final banquet for Agrippina on the eve of her murder (see Chapter III).
32 Nero had seen Rubellius Plautus (see Chapter III) as a potential rival. Hence, he had felt obliged to execute him so as to feel safe to divorce the popular Octavia and be free (“this fear now removed”) to marry Poppaea.
33 Suetonius (Ner. 35.3) reports that the marriage to Poppaea took place on the twelfth day after the divorce from Octavia. Tacitus’s reference to speed is very surprising. The year is AD 62. At the very beginning of this book of the Annals, Tacitus tells us that Nero is under pressure in 59 to bring forward the marriage and to remove his mother, who is proving such an obstacle, yet this scenario is not borne out by the narrative that follows.
34 By this time, Nero had been married to Octavia for more than nine years. She was a Claudian by birth, and the suggestion may be that, as a Claudian by adoption, Nero resented the Claudian name, or perhaps she reminded him of what had been done to Claudius.
35 Adultery was not of course a capital crime, but the adultery of the emperor’s consort could be construed as maiestas. Hence, the grounds for the divorce were that she was barren. Tacitus and Suetonius (Ner. 35.2) agree on the legal basis of the divorce, and their accounts probably go back to a common source. Suetonius, however, does not in any way attribute the measure against Octavia to the efforts of Poppaea, and assigns responsibility for the death entirely to Nero.
36 Dio identifies the loyal servant as Pythias. Tacitus often expresses admiration for humble individuals, such as Clemens, who tried to rescue his master, Agrippa Postumus (Ann. 2.39.1); the freedman of Octavius Sagitta, who tried to assume the blame for his master’s crime (Ann. 13.44.4); and Epicharis, who showed such courage during the Pisonian conspiracy (Ann. 15.57).
37 Nero made a playful analogy with the insignia of triumphs, with which successful generals outside the imperial family had to content themselves.
38 There is no evidence for efforts to strangle her in any other literary source, and the claim is probably not to be taken too seriously.
39 Suetonius claims that all the servants supported her innocence. This is contradicted by Tacitus and Dio.
40 Octavia would have been entitled to a restitution of dowry after divorce, and the estates could have been part of that settlement. Nero may have inherited the house of Burrus after his death. We know that Rubellius Plautus had extensive estates in Asia (Tac. Ann. 14.22.5), which would have been confiscated after his death. His wife, Pollitta, had to return to the home of her father.
41 Tacitus’s chronology here is superficially confusing. The removal of Octavia from Rome to her new estates would have followed her divorce, which preceded the accusation of adultery and the subsequent investigations, which presumably resulted in her being banished to Campania.
42 Popular protests in Rome in support of the politically mistreated seem not to have had beneficial long-term results. Protesters on this occasion might usefully have recalled how in AD 29 people had encircled the Curia in support of the elder Agrippina and her son. Both of them died not long afterward (Tac. Ann. 5.4.2).
43 As transmitted in the manuscript, the text is inconsistent, since it states that Nero brought back Octavia, which is contradicted in the next section (14.61.3), where Octavia is still in Campania and Poppaea fears a change of heart on Nero’s part. The emendation making such information a rumor is accepted here. It provides a basis for Poppaea’s concern.
44 The reference is to the practice of strewing the roads with flowers during triumphs. See Ovid Tr. 4.2.50.
45 Poppaea’s logic is not persuasive; she seems to be attributing the popular protests to actions of the clients and slaves of Octavia. Also, by her logic, the movement directed against herself has been transferred to a movement against the emperor.
46 Tacitus seems to be suggesting here that Poppaea believed the story about Eucaerus.
47 Suetonius (Ner. 35.2) mentions only the charge of adultery. Certainly, during the republic it is known that abortion per se was not illegal, although the attendant circumstances might make it so (as in Cic. Clu. 11, where abortion is procured through bribery in order to prevent inheritance). There is no evidence that abortion itself was illegal in the imperial period before the time of Septimius Severus (Dig. 47.11.4).
48 The elder Agrippina, the wife of Germanicus, was similarly banished to Pandateria. According to Dio, Julia Livilla, daughter of Germanicus, was banished in AD 41 on suspicion of adultery with Seneca and put to death not long afterward (Dio 60.8.5), and the implication here is that she also went to Pandateria. It is to be noted that the banishment to Pandateria of Julia, daughter of Augustus (cf. Tac. Ann. 1.53.1), is not mentioned.
49 In fact, Julia Livilla was only twenty-three at the time of her banishment.
50 The maidservant is Acte; see the note on 13.12.
51 There is a mistake here. Octavia was older than Britannicus, who was born on February 13, 41, and she had been betrothed to Silanus in that same year (Dio 60.5.7). She had to be older than twenty in 62, the year of her death. Figures in manuscripts are very prone to error. It is also possible that Tacitus exaggerates her youth to increase the pathos (see Gallivan [1974]).
52 Suetonius (Ner. 57.1) states that her date of death was the same as Nero’s (generally accepted as June 9).
53 Octavia had been adopted by another family to make her marriage to Nero possible; thus she was not strictly his sister.
54 Octavia’s grandfather, the elder Drusus, had been posthumously awarded the title of Germanicus (Suet. Claud. 1.3). Nero’s link with Drusus came through his mother and her father, Germanicus, son of Drusus. Octavia’s link was through her father, Claudius, son of Drusus. Nero could also claim it through his adoption by Claudius.
55 The year is 63. The title of Augusta was first conferred on Livia, after the death of Augustus. Agrippina was the first wife of the emperor to receive it while her husband was still living. This case is the first time that the title of Augusta was granted to an infant. She was called Claudia Augusta (CIL VI.1.2043.11).
56 Antium was the site of an imperial villa (see Chapter I). It was also the birthplace of Caligula. The Arval record for this year shows vows fulfilled on January 12 for the safe delivery by Poppaea, which provides a general period for the birth (Smallwood 24.20).
57 To celebrate his victory at Actium, Augustus had founded Nicopolis and instituted quinqennial games there on the model of the Olympic Games. Nero may have been reviving an already established institution. It is possible that Augustus had established such games in Rome (Dio 53.1.4); Suetonius (Cal. 23.1) speaks of Caligula banning Actium celebrations.
58 At Antium, the worship of Fortuna was of two sister goddesses, the Fortunae Antiates, thought to represent the fortune of war and the fortune of peace. Oracles were given from the statues. Caligula was warned by them to beware of his assassin, Cassius Chaerea (Suet. Cal. 57.3); in the great tradition of such oracles, he got him mixed up with someone else.
59 Bovillae was a town in Latium south of Rome on the Appian Way. It was a colony of Alba Longa, which was the ancestral home of the Julian family (founded by Iulus, the son of Aeneas). In AD 16, Tiberius erected a monument at Bovillae to the gens Iulia, along with a statue of Augustus (Tac. Ann. 2.41.1).
60 Nero’s action had a precedent of sorts in that, after the death of his sister Drusilla, Caligula decreed divine honors with a personal shrine and a priesthood of twenty, both men and women (Dio 59.11.1–3).
61 The same story about the kick in the stomach is related by both Suetonius (Ner. 35.3) and Dio (62.27.4), neither of whom mentions the theory, rejected by Tacitus, that Nero poisoned her.
62 Pliny (HN 7.187) in fact states that cremation was not an old Roman custom but an expedient adopted to dispose of corpses after wars, and that it only later became the practice in Rome.
63 Pliny (HN 12.83) claims that more spices were burned at Poppaea’s funeral than Arabia produced in a year. Poppaea’s remains were deposited in the Mausoleum of Augustus, constructed by Augustus on the Campus Martius, the destination for members of the Julio-Claudian family who died in good grace. The physical shell of the structure has survived to today and has been in continuous use, serving in a variety of capacities, from concert hall to bullring.
64 It was customary for the eulogy of a departed woman to be delivered by a younger male member of the dynasty, a precedent perhaps established in 69 BC with Julius Caesar’s eulogy to his aunt Julia. The eulogy to Livia was delivered by Caligula.
65 Josephus (AJ 20.195) gives a different picture of Poppaea as a pious woman (theosebes), who interceded with Nero on behalf of a Jewish deputation from Jerusalem.
66 Suetonius is alone in suggesting that she provoked Nero to violence by her nagging.
67 Nero’s continued devotion to Poppaea is reflected also in Dio’s claim (63.9.5) that Nero would perform parts of a tragedy wearing masks and that all the female masks would have the likeness of Poppaea, so that, though dead, she could take part in the performance.
68 Tacitus reports (Ann. 16.21.2) that the Senate bestowed divine honors on Poppaea; she thus joined Livia, Caligula’s sister Drusilla, and Nero’s daughter Claudia as a deified woman. The context of Dio’s statement here is 68, at the time of the rebellion of Julius Vindex (see Chapter X). Poppaea had died in 65, and the shrine was presumably decreed at the same time as her deification. Its scale and splendor are indicated by the fact that it took three years to build. It is possible that it was located at Naples (see Kragelund [2010]).
69 Statilia was the daughter of Titus Statilius Taurus, consul in AD 44, and was a descendant of the great Augustan general Titus Statilius. Born sometime between AD 30 and 40, she was married four times before Nero, according to the Scholiast on Juvenal 6.434, but we know nothing about her first three husbands. In 63/64, she married her fourth husband, Marcus Iulius Vestinus Atticus, consul in 65, the year of the Pisonian conspiracy (see Chapter VIII). Tacitus (Ann. 15.68.2) records Vestinus’s death in the context of the conspiracy, asserting Vestinus’s innocence and alleging that Nero was motivated by personal animosity and rivalry over Statilia.
70 According to Tacitus, Nero was already Statilia’s lover when she married Vestinus (Ann. 15.68.3), although after Poppaea’s death Nero had supposedly sought marriage with Antonia, daughter of Claudius. Statilia outlived Nero, and she was sought as a wife by Otho (Suet. Otho 10.2).