The Lives of the Twelve Caesars, Complete
while, as if he would deliver it to somebody; but put it again upon his
finger, and lay for some time, with his left hand clenched, and without
stirring; when suddenly summoning his attendants, (238) and no one
answering the call, he rose; but his strength failing him, he fell down
at a short distance from his bed.”
LXXIV. Upon his last birth-day, he had brought a full-sized statue of
the Timenian Apollo from Syracuse, a work of exquisite art, intending to
place it in the library of the new temple [374]; but he dreamt that the
god appeared to him in the night, and assured him “that his statue could
not be erected by him.” A few days before he died, the Pharos at Capri
was thrown down by an earthquake. And at Misenum, some embers and live
coals, which were brought in to warm his apartment, went out, and after
being quite cold, burst out into a flame again towards evening, and
continued burning very brightly for several hours.
LXXV. The people were so much elated at his death, that when they first
heard the news, they ran up and down the city, some crying out, “Away
with Tiberius to the Tiber;” others exclaiming, “May the earth, the
common mother of mankind, and the infernal gods, allow him no abode in
death, but amongst the wicked.” Others threatened his body with the hook
and the Gemonian stairs, their indignation at his former cruelty being
increased by a recent atrocity. It had been provided by an act of the
senate, that the execution of condemned criminals should always be
deferred until the tenth day after the sentence. Now this fell on the
very day when the news of Tiberius’s death arrived, and in consequence of
which the unhappy men implored a reprieve, for mercy’s sake; but, as
Caius had not yet arrived, and there was no one else to whom application
could be made on their behalf, their guards, apprehensive of violating
the law, strangled them, and threw them down the Gemonian stairs. This
roused the people to a still greater abhorrence of the tyrant’s memory,
since his cruelty continued in use even after he was dead. As soon as
his corpse was begun to be moved from Misenum, many cried out for its
being carried to Atella [375], and being half burnt there (239) in the
amphitheatre. It was, however, brought to Rome, and burnt with the usual
ceremony.
LXXVI. He had made about two years before, duplicates of his will, one
written by his own hand, and the other by that of one of his freedmen;
and both were witnessed by some persons of very mean rank. He appointed
his two grandsons, Caius by Germanicus, and Tiberius by Drusus, joint
heirs to his estate; and upon the death of one of them, the other was to
inherit the whole. He gave likewise many legacies; amongst which were
bequests to the Vestal Virgins, to all the soldiers, and each one of the
people of Rome, and to the magistrates of the several quarters of the
city.
* * * * * *
At the death of Augustus, there had elapsed so long a period from the
overthrow of the republic by Julius Caesar, that few were now living who
had been born under the ancient constitution of the Romans; and the mild
and prosperous administration of Augustus, during forty-four years, had
by this time reconciled the minds of the people to a despotic government.
Tiberius, the adopted son of the former sovereign, was of mature age; and
though he had hitherto lived, for the most part, abstracted from any
concern with public affairs, yet, having been brought up in the family of
Augustus, he was acquainted with his method of government, which, there
was reason to expect, he would render the model of his own. Livia, too,
his mother, and the relict of the late emperor, was still living, a woman
venerable by years, who had long been familiar with the councils of
Augustus, and from her high rank, as well as uncommon affability,
possessed an extensive influence amongst all classes of the people.
Such were the circumstances in favour of Tiberius’s succession at the
demise of Augustus; but there were others of a tendency disadvantageous
to his views. His temper was haughty and reserved: Augustus had often
apologised for the ungraciousness of his manners. He was disobedient to
his mother; and though he had not openly discovered any propensity to
vice, he enjoyed none of those qualities which usually conciliate
popularity. To these considerations it is to be added, that Postumus
Agrippa, the grandson of Augustus by Julia, was living; and if
consanguinity was to be the rule of succession, his right was
indisputably preferable to that of an adopted son. Augustus had sent
this youth into exile a few years before; but, towards the close (240) of
his life, had expressed a design of recalling him, with the view, as was
supposed, of appointing him his successor. The father of young Agrippa
had been greatly beloved by the Romans; and the fate of his mother,
Julia, though she was notorious for her profligacy, had ever been
regarded by them with peculiar sympathy and tenderness. Many, therefore,
attached to the son the partiality entertained for his parents; which was
increased not only by a strong suspicion, but a general surmise, that his
elder brothers, Caius and Lucius, had been violently taken off, to make
way for the succession of Tiberius. That an obstruction was apprehended
to Tiberius’s succession from this quarter, is put beyond all doubt, when
we find that the death of Augustus was industriously kept secret, until
young Agrippa should be removed; who, it is generally agreed, was
dispatched by an order from Livia and Tiberius conjointly, or at least
from the former. Though, by this act, there remained no rival to
Tiberius, yet the consciousness of his own want of pretensions to the
Roman throne, seems to have still rendered him distrustful of the
succession; and that he should have quietly obtained it, without the
voice of the people, the real inclination of the senate, or the support
of the army, can be imputed only to the influence of his mother, and his
own dissimulation. Ardently solicitous to attain the object, yet
affecting a total indifference; artfully prompting the senate to give him
the charge of the government, at the time that he intimated an invincible
reluctance to accept it; his absolutely declining it in perpetuity, but
fixing no time for an abdication; his deceitful insinuation of bodily
infirmities, with hints likewise of approaching old age, that he might
allay in the senate all apprehensions of any great duration of his power,
and repress in his adopted son, Germanicus, the emotions of ambition to
displace him; form altogether a scene of the most insidious policy,
inconsistency, and dissimulation.
In this period died, in the eighty-sixth year of her age, Livia Drusilla,
mother of the emperor, and the relict of Augustus, whom she survived
fifteen years. She was the daughter of L. Drusus Calidianus and married
Tiberius Claudius Nero, by whom she had two sons, Tiberius and Drusus.
The conduct of this lady seems to justify the remark of Caligula, that
“she was an Ulysses in a woman’s dress.” Octavius first saw her as she
fled from the danger which threatened her husband, who had espoused the
cause of Antony; and though she was then pregnant, he resolved to marry
her; whether with her own inclination or not, is left by Tacitus
undetermined. To pave the way for this union, he divorced his wife
Scribonia, and with the approbation of the Augurs, which he could have no
difficulty in obtaining, celebrated (241) his nuptials with Livia. There
ensued from this marriage no issue, though much desired by both parties;
but Livia retained, without interruption, an unbounded ascendancy over
the emperor, whose confidence she abused, while the uxorious husband
little suspected that he was cherishing in his bosom a viper who was to
prove the destruction of his house. She appears to have entertained a
predominant ambition of giving an heir to the Roman empire; and since it
could not be done by any fruit of her marriage with Augustus, she
resolved on accomplishing that end in the person of Tiberius, the eldest
son by her former husband. The plan which she devised for this purpose,
was to exterminate all the male offspring of Augustus by his daughter
Julia, who was married to Agrippa; a stratagem which, when executed,
would procure for Tiberius, through the means of adoption, the eventual
succession to the empire. The cool yet sanguinary policy, and the
patient perseverance of resolution, with which she prosecuted her design,
have seldom been equalled. While the sons of Julia were yet young, and
while there was still a possibility that she herself might have issue by
Augustus, she suspended her project, in the hope, perhaps, that accident
or disease might operate in its favour; but when the natural term of her
constitution had put a period to her hopes of progeny, and when the
grandsons of the emperor were risen to the years of manhood, and had been
adopted by him, she began to carry into execution what she long had
meditated. The first object devoted to destruction was C. Caesar
Agrippa, the eldest of Augustus’s grandsons. This promising youth was
sent to Armenia, upon an expedition against the Persians; and Lollius,
who had been his governor, either accompanied him thither from Rome, or
met him in the East, where he had obtained some appointment. From the
hand of this traitor, perhaps under the pretext of exercising the
authority of a preceptor, but in reality instigated by Livia, the young
prince received a fatal blow, of which he died some time after.
The manner of Caius’s death seems to have been carefully kept from the
knowledge of Augustus, who promoted Lollius to the consulship, and made
him governor of a province; but, by his rapacity in this station, he
afterwards incurred the emperor’s displeasure. The true character of
this person had escaped the keen discernment of Horace, as well as the
sagacity of the emperor; for in two epistles addressed to Lollius, he
mentions him as great and accomplished in the superlative degree; maxime
Lolli, liberrime Lolli; so imposing had been the manners and address of
this deceitful courtier.
Lucius, the second son of Julia, was banished into Campania, (242) for
using, as it is said, so litious language against his grandfather. In
the seventh year of his exile Augustus proposed to recall him; but Livia
and Tiberius, dreading the consequences of his being restored to the
emperor’s favour, put in practice the expedient of having him immediately
assassinated. Postumus Agrippa, the third son, incurred the displeasure
of his grandfather in the same way as Lucius, and was confined at
Surrentum, where he remained a prisoner until he was put to death by the
order either of Livia alone, or in conjunction with Tiberius, as was
before observed.
Such was the catastrophe, through the means of Livia, of all the
grandsons of Augustus; and reason justifies the inference, that she who
scruple not to lay violent hands upon those young men, had formerly
practised every artifice that could operate towards rendering them
obnoxious to the emperor. We may even ascribe to her dark intrigues the
dissolute conduct of Julia for the woman who could secretly act as
procuress to her own husband, would feel little restraint upon her mind
against corrupting his daughter, when such an effect might contribute to
answer the purpose which she had in view. But in the ingratitude of
Tiberius, however undutiful and reprehensible in a son towards a parent,
she at last experienced a just retribution for the crimes in which she
had trained him to procure the succession to the empire. To the disgrace
of her sex, she introduced amongst the Romans the horrible practice of