Who Were The Greatest Caesars Of Ancient Rome? | Romans with Tony Robinson | Odyssey

this channel is part of the history hit network stay to find out more the stabbing occurred a few meters from here it was a frantic attack 23 stab wounds inflicted by the same number of murderers it is one of the most notorious murders in history and determined the course of the western civilization and although it occurred over 2,000 years ago we still know the exact date it occurred, it was the 15th or as it was known then on the Ides of March and the victim of the murder was, of course, Julius Caesar Caesar It has been Called the

greatest

man who ever lived a truly superhuman figure, he was a brilliant general, a great writer and a man of the people, after his death thousands mourned him, so how did he end up on the wrong side of the assassin's dagger?

It made people hate him so much that I have come here to Rome to try to find the real Caesar, the man behind the myth, one of the most complex motivated people in all of human history, to follow in Caesar's footsteps is to embark on an epic journey. from

ancient

egypt to the unexplored island of britain i became brutal and brilliant changed the map of europe most importantly yet transformed

rome

itself from a republic to an empire above all he was the man who terminally destroyed the old system julius caesar celebrates how many The people who kill celebrate in triumph He killed a million people He was truly one of Europe's great geniuses but he was facially flawed and look at the cost to everyone else Rome was the center of Caesar's universe when he was born here in 100 BC.

No one could have predicted that one day it would reign supreme among the elegant temples and colonnades, while in that address known as Sabura it was immersed in dirty crime with its multi-story dwelling lost that Julius Caesar saw the light of day for the first time, but He wasn't exactly one of the street kids that roamed the slums, the aristocratic Caesars had their roots in the founding fathers of Rome, they lost a lot of money, but the baby's three names tell us that he is of noble birth, his name He was Gaius Julius and Caesar were both surnames, but the name Caesar, meaning court, has led to the first fiction about him in

ancient

times, great men had notable births and the legend grew that he had been cut from his mother's womb. , the myth gives us the name by which the operation is still known, the cesarean section is a good story, but in fact, Caesar was born quite normally.

They did the operation in those days, but only to save the child's life. The mother never survived and we know that Caesar's mother was still alive when he was. she was 40 years old. in the year 100 BC. The most special thing about the young man was his aunt Julia. She had recently increased the family fortune by marrying a charismatic politician named Mario. That marriage determined Caesar's political colors for life. Caesar's noble roots made him eligible later in life. sit in the senate here in the forum where his fellow aristocrats ran

rome

like a private club, but in the first century the senate had split into bitter factions that sided with marius put the entire caesar family firmly on the side of the political division of julius caesar The first years of his life are dominated by a civil war that is between two army commanders and he almost gets ahead of what he is going to do and he is not in the group that basically won, so he is again in the aristocracy, but there is a possibility that he will die at any moment.

In that moment, when the struggle for power descended into anarchy, the 17-year-old Caesar got a terrifying taste of the reality of Roman politics. A powerful general from the other factions stormed Rome and appointed himself as emergency dictator to resolve the unrest. His name was to deal with political issues. opponents invented the diabolical prescription system it works something like this instead of wasting energy arresting and killing people himself sila put up lists of names in public places these people were then easy prey anyone who killed them received a reward sixteen hundred prominent citizens were purged in the first wave of murders and in the following ones, some people were simply dragged from their homes and kicked to death in the streets and one of the names on these sinister public lists was Julius Caesar, he changed houses clandestinely almost daily trusting In a network of discreet family friends in the fetid swampy alleys he contracted malaria while sweating favors The neutrals broke a deal with Sila They obtained a pardon on the condition that the teenager came out of hiding to confront the dictator Sulla was a large man and threatening with a reddened face he turned towards the teenager who challenged him what he saw was a tall, thin young man with piercing black eyes who even when looking at the most powerful man in Rome was not going to make any concessions to tradition instead of to normal. short-sleeved tunic, he had long fringed sleeves and wore his belt hanging hipster style if he couldn't dress properly, what other customs could he try to break?

Sulla must have wished he had never left him, he turned to those he negotiated forgiveness and made a telling prediction, okay, he said, do it as you wish, but I warn you that this young man you are so desperate to protect will one day bring down the very system. that we want to preserve in history. Hit is like Netflix just for history fans with exclusive historical documentaries covering some of the most famous people and events in history just for you. hit history has unrivaled access to some of the world's best historians with familiar faces like mary barba and tristan hughes uncovering the stories of alexander the great buddhica hannibal and much more we are committed to bringing history fans award-winning documentaries and podcasts that You won't be able to find anywhere else Sign up now for a 14-day free trial and Odyssey fans will get 50 off your first three months Just be sure to use the code Odyssey at checkout Much of what we know about Caesar was written much later by people who already knew what he had achieved.

Sulla's prophetic statement was probably invented with the benefit of hindsight in 83 BC. There were much bigger problems threatening Rome than a scandalously dressed teenager and the main problem was the system itself for 600 years. Rome had been governed as a republic governed by aristocratic senators who were all volunteers and changed jobs every year. It had worked well, but then Rome expanded. from a simple city-state to controlling an empire stretching across the Mediterranean, the structure designed for local government could not cope with managing a global superpower as it expanded Rome had moved from voluntary national service to having a professional army to protect and direct their domains but after enriching Rome these soldiers retired with nothing the already crowded city was overflowing with a large number of angry veterans who lived in poverty and demanded a pension the so-called complacent like uncle mario of Caesar were reformers who wanted to redistribute the land to provide for soldiers, the others saw any change as an assault on tradition, during approximately the last century of the republic there was a continuous conflict between what we can call conservatives and reformers, but they have no political parties, there is no such thing as reform. party there is no clear understanding of this is the path that the reformist party wants to follow and this is the path in which the conservatives are trying to stop it what there is is a clash of systems of authority Caesar's own clash with authority meant Because Rome was still not safe for him, his family sent him abroad to do junior jobs and further his education.

This trip abroad was meant to give him a low profile, but it led to one of the most extraordinary events of his entire career. He was still only 25 years old and had a small entourage. of servants was sailing to Rhodes to receive a course in the art of rhetoric or oratory with a Greek teacher on the coast of Greece he was boarded by pirates and Caesar was kidnapped the pirates must have thought they had hit the jackpot when you demanded a ransom , you don't expect your victim to start trying to negotiate upwards, but when they told him they wanted 20 talents of silver, Caesar treated the amount with disdain. 20 said I'm worth more than that, make it 50. 50 talents is almost a ton of silver that would take almost a month to collect.

His men set sail to try to raise some money from the local banks while Caesar stayed on board he didn't want to lose the time so he practiced public speaking about the pirates who thought this was a joke and quartered him and when he swore he would see them hanged they laughed and laughed when the money arrived the pirates let Caesar sail to the nearby port of Miletus and Miletus hired a squadron of ships and men. out of his own pocket he returned and found the pirates still anchored, captured them, demanded ransom, and took them back to the provincial capital when he discovered that the governor seemed more interested in accepting a bribe to set them free than in punishing them.

Caesar took justice into his own hands, fulfilled his promise of justice and had each and every pirate crucified. He had spent a month in their company laughing and joking with them as an act of mercy and for old times' sake. They cut their throats first, this savage punishment and they played with their own lives. It was Caesar's way of making headlines in Rome. The Romans are always competing for what they call farmer fame. Gloria dignitas and just think about what Roman life is like. Here we are. In the Roman forum and the Roman ruling class they get there by being voted by the people and it is an even more direct relationship than with modern politicians.

I mean, maybe the media exposes modern politicians in some ways, but they constantly have to watch these people clash. to face and they have to make an impact on them, so they are all in the business of raising applause by doing their own pr absolutely they are as worried about the spin as any modern politician, but Caesar had strong competitors, Julius Caesar's attention had begun. He lives as a boy's own hero fleeing death squads, one minute fighting pirates, the next and in 73 BC. C. was recruited to fight another epic figure, Spartacus, the gladiator who was at the center of a slave rebellion, Julius Caesar was a junior officer in the campaign against Spartacus as the rebels retreated south across the countryside, The Romans moved to isolate them, regardless of what the movies make it sound like, there was never any hope that Spartacus would succeed, the sad reality is that the real life Spartacus was not a noble revolutionary but a desperate fugitive. who ended up being little more than a bandit, thousands joined his rebellion, but they were rats in a trap.

Caesar joined the Roman military machine as it advanced across the country, forcing the disorganized rebels to be defeated and captured. There was absolutely no mercy for this assault on the order established along the Appian Way six thousand prisoners of the Spartan revolt were crucified anyone traveling north from Naples to Rome would travel the last few kilometers to the accompaniment of screams and the stench of The tortured and the dying for Caesar were no less than them. The deserved Caesar was one of those who wanted reforms in Rome, but he was not a revolutionary because he had already shown that he could be as ruthless as any of his fellow aristocrats in defending the rule of law and the status quo, but Spartacus's campaign was going to be vital to caesar's career otherwise when he was 32 years old caesar took his place in the senate at the lowest rung of the roman official career within the senate there was an ascending order of ranks to which one could be elected, each with his own qualification age caesar Like most of his contemporaries he wanted to rise to the top and become consul, but Roman political life was risky and expensive.

The aristocrats had to borrow enormous amounts of money to finance their electoral campaign given the possibility of obtaining a province where they would extort everything. They have paid but of course not everyone can be elected so at every stage of the pyramid there are people who fall and go into debt so you have desperate and desperate men. Caesar's commanding officer in the Spartacus campaign had been Marcus. Lucinius Crassus Crassus was immensely influential mainly because he was the richest man in Rome, he had made millions as a corrupt real estate tycoon and was only too happy to make large loans to an ambitious young man like Caesar.

Finances were vital to Caesar because he had to play to catch up. a day he started on the bottom rung two years later than he could have done at the age of 32. He was a motivated man and hungry for success. He was disgusted when he saw a statue of Alexander the Great in Cádiz. He realized that at his age.Alexander had conquered half of the known world to compensate Caesar wanted to speed up as he climbed the ladder he did everything possible to gain access unlike today's politicians senators paid for their policies out of their own pocket when he was in charge of public entertainment his games They were bigger and better when he had a job maintaining the Appian Way, he spent a fortune on repairs on a personal level, he had to follow the path, he was generous with gifts of entertainment and bribes, Caesar had the best of everything, wine clothes, antiques , jewelry and women, especially women, he had never married. stopped Caesar from making other conquests in Rome Caesar was famous for being one of the most prolific adulterers of all time slept with his enemies' wives to gain information slept with his friends' wives for fun and sometimes slept with his friends friends was so famous that the famous poet Catullus wrote a poem about the varied and energetic sex life he shared with his chief of staff, Mumura.

Perverted bedfellows César and Mumura compete with each other in serial adultery and attracting teenagers, but their private lives and politics needed funding in addition to legitimate ones. Caesar's expenses also had to buy votes. Each election for each position meant a new advancement of Crassus. A lifetime position of Pontifex Maximus. The high priest was at stake. It was an honorary position but enormously influential. Caesar was a ranking outsider, but it was too good an opportunity for him. be lost. Caesar risked everything to be elected. He fell into so much debt that when he left his house in Sabura he told his mother: "Either I return as pontifex maximus or I." I'll be in exile forever was a typical high-risk bet and he did it.

He got the job and the benefits that came with it, including a house right in the middle of the forum. Today Caesar is the moral guardian of Rome's city hall, but no political scandal can match him. the cruel corruption of the senate in the time of caesar as a leading advocate of reform caesar was obliged to provoke the aristocratic opposition who despised the populist approach of caesar cato has his own political ambitions he wants to make a name for himself and he makes a name for himself as a lord virtue and chooses to identify Caesar as lord vice now Caesar is an incredibly controversial character from the beginning and I think one has to assume that Caesar actually as a personality enjoyed controversy, he was never going to go out and engage with the people he just did his best This was not the kind of friendly rivalry you sometimes see with professional politicians but a bitter personal dislike both use dirty tactics after a meeting here Caesar narrowly avoided being assassinated by one of Cato's bodyguards in turn Caesar used to the crowd to disrupt meetings he had organized, the so-called spontaneous protests, when he did not get his way, then he calmed the crowd and told them that he did not want to make any fuss, thus gaining the support of the Senate by his dignified behavior he approached at 40.

Notoriously vain, he wore a laurel wreath to cover his thinning hair and had all his body hair pulled out and was still out of money for his next promotion. He was appointed governor for a year in southern Spain with the task of combating the bandits who had been plaguing the province before he left. His cars were confiscated by the bailiffs. He had to contact Crassus to ask for more money to bail them out, but for a senator in trouble, a position abroad was revenge in the provinces, he is like a mini king, he is the king of that area, he can make decisions whatever he really wants. and there is almost an expectation of extortion when you go you will always make money caesar fought a brilliant campaign against bandits and if he also accidentally attacked and plundered some innocent cities, rome was willing to turn a blind eye he liked a good victory with success the loot of the The war was enough to pay his debts and reward his men well enough to ensure their future loyalty.

He was supposed to stay in Spain until the end of the year, but he wanted to be where the action was. He canceled his contract and returned to Rome. He had been granted a triumph there but the most important thing was that elections were approaching, he was about to mount the final step on the Roman ladder of success, the consulate Caesar returned from Spain to run for election as consul, so he needed something from this fabric candidate white in Latin to be a candidate, he had to come to the center of Rome dressed in white and apply in person, but at that time this was a big problem for him because he had also just received a triumph that was an official celebration for the conquering generals who It involved a huge procession here to the temple of Jupiter in the middle of Rome and Caesar.

The problem was that the rules said that a general could not return to Rome until after the triumph had taken place. The problem was a clash of dates. The deadline for applications was before the victory. Caesar hated to give up the chance for glory but political power. It was what he desired most, he renounced his triumph and was duly elected consul, but his conservative opponents did not let his archenemy get his way, there were two consoles each year and they were supposed to work together, but Cato's other enemies and caesar made sure that their fellow consul that year was one of their own men who would act as an anchor to their ambitions.

They cast Cato's son-in-law, bibulus, which was a bit like pairing Ken Livingston with Norman Tebbett and expecting them to work. Together, this kind of pettiness caused Caesar to promise that he would never engage with his opponents again; from now on he would ignore them. He did so by making a semi-official alliance with the two most influential figures in Rome, his money man Crassus and Pompey. the great at that time pompey was the true superstar he was only six years older than caesar but he had had a brilliant military career and had already been comforted through crassus and pompey caesar mobilized a network of support and votes this alliance was known as the triumvirate Of all three had something to gain and Pompey can ensure that all his veterans turn out to vote, for example, in a way as simple as saying: well, it is in your best interest to do this to support this man and thus be able to mobilize the support of many People , he also receives support from Marcus Crassus in part because Marcus Crassus wants to have a new deal for the tax collectors of Asia.

He represents them here in the Senate. There was an established order for speaking, but Caesar always invited his friends Pompey and Crassus to speak. He first had his archenemy Cato arrested for speaking for too long and intimidated the opposition with hired thugs, but number one on his hit list was his fellow consul Bibulus when he tried to interrupt while Caesar was speaking, the hired thugs burst in and attacked him. They tipped a bucket of manure on his head Caesar had a positive reform agenda, but sleaze and his bully tactics overshadowed everything he did. Bibulus feared for his life, tried to have a state of emergency declared and when this failed, he simply went home locked up. and he tried a novel method of blocking all political matters.

Bibulus looked out the door of his house every morning and no matter the weather, even on a nice day like today, he would say that he had seen lightning, which meant that the gods were displeased. This may seem silly, but it was actually a stroke of genius because it meant that by simply showing up for work in the Senate that morning, Caesar was breaking the law; If he tried to pass any legislation, it was illegal because he was going against the will. of the gods, just like a diplomat today, could not accuse him while he was still in office, but the moment he returned to Rome as a private citizen they could accuse him.

Both sides are cheating, of course, they are cheating according to Roman rules. because it is appropriate to use religious obstruction but bibulus is overusing it, he is using it in an absurd way and similarly, Caesar and many others used violence in a way that quite alarmed the Romans. The Romans jokingly called this year the joint consulship of Julius and Caesar as it came to an end. Caesar had to make sure his next job kept him away from Rome and the threat of being prosecuted. The tradition was that consuls were rewarded with an excellent job in the provinces after his year in office with many opportunities to earn money.

The fact that Caesar was a wanted man did not matter to the Romans, observing ancient traditions and defending the honor of the consulship was paramount. His enemies voted for him as a minor position. Caesar ignored them and got the job he wanted. He took over as governor of Alpine Gaul. a lucrative province that also allowed her to stay in close contact with his interests in Rome. He could have ended up as just another corrupt Roman politician. A footnote in history. Then fate intervened. The province he had been assigned was south of the Alps, in what is now northern Italy.

North of the Alps. It was the Roman province of Transalpine Gaul the current provost and Longadoc which was the limit of the empire beyond the Gallic tribes were causing problems a new Roman governor had already been appointed for Transalpine Gaul but fortunately for Caesar he died on the journey north, so it now made perfect sense that Caesar would be given that additional province in addition to command of his troops and it was that decision that turned Caesar the politician into Caesar the general. The Asterisk stories are probably most people's closest contact with Gawlish culture. general feeling of cheerful meat swelling targets works because there are elements of truth especially but, ironically, we wouldn't know much about the way of life of the balls if it weren't for the July season, the Gauls left no written record of how they saw In fact , the only way we know anything about the world Asterix lived in is because of the person who destroyed it.

Caesar wrote in detail about macabre customs, religion, and habits even as he did his best to replace them with what he himself thought of a civilization. What the comic strips fail to convey is the brutality of that campaign in 60 AD. There were 12 million Gauls. Caesar boasted that he had killed a million of them and enslaved a million more. It all started with a small problem. The Romans grouped everyone beyond the empire as barbarians. In fact, there were hundreds of Gauls. different tribes, each competing for position with the others. Contemporary coins show how the Gallic tribes each had their own identity.

The Parisians who lived where Paris is today. The Arverni who give their name. to the overn and the tribe that caused the problem the helvetii what caesar had to face was a major immigration problem the helvetii lived in what is now switzerland but when they were attacked by german tribes they began to migrate to southwest france the most easy took them south cross a bridge over the road in geneva down the road valley and then cut west through the roman territory of transalpine gall to stop the invasion caesar moved north at lightning speed here it is where the Rhône leaves Lake Geneva the bridge the Helvetii were flooding over was somewhere around Here, where that island is, Caesar simply destroyed the bridge and left the Helvetii stranded on the north shore.

The problem was solved. His brief campaign was over, but as governments have since discovered, you can't stop desperate and determined migrants by blocking an entry route after that. The Helvetii found a route further north that completely avoided the Roman Empire, so they were no longer Caesar's responsibility, but to their delight they began to invade the lands of another tribe called I, Us, who asked Rome for help against this As a new invader, Caesar immediately set out for his territory in what is now Burgundy, the Idoi headquarters were manning the vast hill fort at North Bergen while members of the migrant tribe camped in the valley.

César arrived to fight his first battle in goal. The battle took place not far from here. Caesar moved away. Three lines of troops advanced in classic formation against the Helvetii. The members of the tribe who were accustomed to fighting man to man retreated before the double shower of javelins towards that mountain there. Caesar continued to advance, fifteen thousand members of the tribe who until that moment had been standing on the The side lines on that hill moved forward to attack Caesar's army calmly, he ordered his third line to turn and attack the new threat as he continued to advance toward the Helvetii.

The result was victory on both sides, a triumph for Roman organization for the next few years. Caesar bloodied his way with each conquest, pushing deeper into foreign territory in 57 BC. C. he conquered the Belgian peoples in the north, they were threatened by theplace here in what is now the saren of ali a thousand years ago you would have seen the great walls of elysia a huge gallic hill Fort Versum Ghetrix had failed in an attack on Caesar's cavalry and was forced to retreat here with his eighty thousand men when Caesar closed the net and sent out a desperate call for reinforcements versus Gatorics and his men were crammed into the fort at the top of the hill. there along with the men, women and children who lived there and when their reinforcements arrived they settled on that hill there up to a quarter of a million of them, so Caesar's 70,000 legionaries in the valley were hopelessly outnumbered and managed to two problems that needed to be held versus meetings and keeping relief forces out the solution another great feat of engineering they completely surrounded the city with two immense lines of fortifications first an inner wall to prevent anyone from leaving and then another wall on the outside to defend themselves External attack In these infrared photographs you can still clearly see the two lines, but that meant that the Romans were terribly dispersed, it was not clear who was besieging, who was Elysia, who was success or failure, there were no half measures with Caesar and there was no mercy for the Gauls. trapped in the hill fort, the food ran out, one of the verses and Getarich's lieutenants suggested that they kill the old men and eat them, versus Getariks overruled it and sent all the civilians, men, women and children, down the hill to avoid the final conflict.

Caesar refused to leave them. They pass and starve here in no man's land, Alice is a terrible danger, it must be said, um, it is a very large force inside the hill, and there is an even larger force coming to help, there is a very large army in both sides, César is going to have to fight on both sides at the same time, yes, it is a tremendous risk, but there is also a lot to gain because if he can win this one, it will be clear that he is the master of the goal. The Romans, spread over more than ten miles of defenses, were almost outnumbered. five to one for four full days the dawns over the Romans slide could have gone either way then Caesar himself led a surprise assault and the gates collapsed after the surrender versus were taken to Rome in chains to await their fate, all the Romans who had survived were given a prisoner to keep or sell as a slave there was still to be cleared but elysia broke the resistance all the nerve was now roman territory caesar had rewritten the map of rome's dominions the great gaelic forts like elysia were replaced by roman settlements miniature vagabonds with their own forum and temple nice and orderly thanks to Caesar the French have a Latin language and Europe is a classical culture, not Celtic Caesar had surpassed the achievements of Rome's

greatest

living general his ally Pompey but Pompey did not like it that they were heading for a showdown when he conquered Gaul Caesar was around 40 years old after years of hard campaigning he was tough, slim and fit although he suffered from mild epilepsy he was also lazy he was so embarrassed by his thinning black hair that he had begun to combing it forward from behind to cover the bald head like a Roman co-mother, but the great crisis of his midlife was all too real in Rome things had not gone so well, Caesar had survived this far due to his alliance with the millionaire Crassus and the great general Pompey, but now relations had become strained and broken, Crassus had been killed in a campaign in Asia while another death had shattered Caesar's alliance with Pompey.

Pompey had married Caesar's only daughter. The two men were united. for his devotion to her, but she died in childbirth, the grieving Pompey became distant, he was jealous of Caesar's success and threatened by his military power, he had been happy to help Caesar's career, but not at the expense of the interests of Rome, the rivalry soon degenerated into gangs. the war was caught in the streets by hired thugs the senate was divided into factions aligned behind two enormous egos, each with his own army at his disposal in 50 BC. The crisis came when Caesar's ball was over.

The consuls demanded that he return to Rome, lay down his position and face the charges that had been hanging over his head for 10 years. Rome waited to see how Caesar would react. He was a disturbing presence waiting with his forces standing. On the northern border of Italy, if he gave up everything, he would be a private citizen and open to attack for all of his actions, just as he could be attacked for the actions of him in 59 BC. C. as a consul because they were illegal and all of his actions in waging war in The ghoul doesn't quite get the seal of approval from the Senate and the people who wrote that they aren't completely legal, he could also be tried for extortion, so in In a way he really has a choice: if he is going to remain in command of this vast army he actually had to take it with him to Rome.

The boundary between Caesar's province and Roman soil where no troops were allowed was the Rubicon River if he stayed north of the river. Caesar retained the power base of his army as soon as he crossed south he would automatically become a private citizen and if he brought his troops with him he would be committing treason against the Roman people by crossing the Rubicon Caesar would give us not one but two sentences that They mean there is no turning back. Caesar could have run away from the fight, he could have obeyed the law, he could have prevented the death of many Roman citizens who fought each other for the next six years, but he didn't.

His sense of his own destiny prevailed on January 11, 49 BC. He arrived at this small bridge just before dawn in a closed carriage, the rest of his men had gone ahead even now he could have avoided the conflict, he thought for a moment and then said aliyah yaktar est, the die is cast, he crossed the bridge and when he arrived here he was at war, the bitter conflict would last five years and cover thousands of miles, but Caesar started as the second favourite, he had his own troops, but Pompey, with the blessing of the Senate, had most of the Roman army and the navy, but the sudden ferocity of Caesar's mood frightened his enemies as he stormed south toward Rome.

His reputation alone was enough to cause panic. Pompey evacuated his troops and fled to the port of Bryndision to escape to Greece while Caesar returned home. He hadn't been. He was in Rome for nine years, but neither he nor the senator changed much during that time. As a matter of form, he requested funds to continue his war against Pompey and when they refused, he broke into the treasury and simply helped himself. Pompey had gone to Greece. Caesar advanced 600 miles in the opposite direction to Spain trying to ensure that he was not outflanked by Pompey's legion station there, once he had quelled Pompey's troops there he made the grueling return and ignoring advice crossed into Greece during the winter storms to make an stomach ulcer caesar came close to defeat in a series of engagements on the west coast but pompey let him escape to the central plains caesar told his men you have survived because you are fighting a man who does not know how to achieve victory here in the outskirts of the city of farsalis pompey the great and julius caesar had their confrontation pompey's forces were arranged under the hills to the west caesar faced him with his back to farsalis and with the corn fields of greece pompey was severely beaten and fled leaving 6 000 dead and 24,000 prisoners emerged victorious but Caesar knew the real battle was for the hearts and minds of the Roman people at the beginning of the civil war.

Pompey declared that all those who are not with me are against me Caesar, on the other hand he is said to have said that all those who are not actively against me are with me and that is a good example of Caesar's political consciousness because what he did there was opening a path to forgiveness. Caesar took most of those captured into his own ranks. He did not know it yet, but this policy of mercy proved fatal among the captured officers. What he saved was Marcus Junius Gross, the son of Caesar's favorite lover and the man who wanted to kill him, but Pompey himself had escaped during the week of the season, the sensible thing would have been to consolidate his position and return home, but The fight with Pompey had turned into a Vendetta, he undertook an intense chase against his enemy and both ended up here in Alexandria.

Pompey came seeking asylum, but the Egyptians knew who had won and stabbed him in front of his wife as they rowed him ashore a few days later, Caesar arrived. and he was presented with the embalmed head of his enemy and his signet ring Caesar might have thought the matter was over, in fact it had just begun, he had entered into a political mind because the royal family were thought to be living gods, the rulers were always a brother and sister who married and moved in together although each kept a separate pass incest did not make them become attached there was fear fights to get the upper hand Caesar arrived in 47 BC.

The boy king Ptolemy ally a few days later Caesar had an unusual visitor an attendant came in with a laundry bag on his shoulder he dropped it to the floor he opened it and out came the queen she had come to get Caesar's help against the king her brother a man with a wandering eye like Caesar's this was The big problem in front of him was exotic and available, Cleopatra. It has been said that if Cleopatra's nose had been shorter, the face of the world might have been different two hundred years after her time, she was the most beautiful woman alive, people say, but the statues we have and the coins What we have suggests that what Plutarch says about her is closer to the truth.

What Plutarch says was not so much that she was beautiful, it was simply that she charmed her, it was the way she spoke to people, that's what made her. so captivating, that's what really attracted man after man she spoke to in her spell, the way she looked good, love stories always tend to make the woman the most beautiful woman in the world, she didn't need to be The most beautiful woman in the world to achieve what she achieved. She was 20. He was 52. There was no real reason for him to stay in Egypt, but he fell in love with Cleopatra's seductive charms and decided to support her instead. his brother caesar found himself besieged by cleopatra in his palace the war if you could call it that, it was a desperate fight that everyone fought around this port area of ​​​​alexandria, with both sides trying to take possession of the causeway that led to the lighthouse after to send reinforcements.

Caesar tried to set fire to the Egyptian fleet but ended up burning the city. ancient library in another confrontation had to jump into the sea to save his life taking off his heavy clothing swam back to safety apparently still holding some important documents above the water to keep them dry he almost lost caesar risked his reputation and his life for cleopatra the The seas have changed since Caesar's time and the palace where he stayed is submerged in the harbor. Now archaeologists have begun to recover some of the treasures that Caesar must have seen every day. Once the reinforcements arrived, there was a decisive confrontation.

Cleopatra's enemies were defeated Caesar installed her as The Queen, the new king and Cleopatra's official husband, was her 11-year-old brother, but the baby Cleopatra had later that year was named Caesarea in honor of her father, proof of what appears to have been been a genuine love story because even after politics ended, Caesar couldn't. endure leaving egypt joined cleopatra on a romantic evening cruise caesar's affair with the egyptian queen has fascinated people throughout the centuries, but she gave him a dangerous taste of what it was really like to be a king As they relaxed on their two-month honeymoon on a Nile cruise, he must have felt invincible, he had conquered the world, he had won over Cleopatra, it was a cold, hard politics that would kill him when he returned to his wife. and the affairs of state in Rome, I had no idea about that.

Three years later he would face the murderer's knife. Caesar returned home triumphantly along the Appian Way, but he had not come directly from Egypt. Normally, when he left the arms of Cleopatra, he detoured to northern Turkey, where he waged a lightning and devastating campaign against a king who had been trying to invade the empire in a life crowned by military success that had surpassed himself. to celebrate it he wrote one of the most famous sayings of all time vani vidi vici came vi conquered a brilliant epigram ofa brilliant man but unfortunately it is not his that form of expression is not at all unusual we can find parallels in roman comedy we came we saw we left again the greek philosopher democritus said something about the totality of life how we came we lived we lived He left new The new thing about what Caesar does is that instead of coming, seeing and leaving, I came, I saw and I conquered, this was early.

Caesar was not content with mere achievement, he wanted to create his own myth at the same time. Rome. There is more and more of a political scene where propaganda or imagery, the construction of images of one kind or another, becomes more and more important and the idea of ​​Caesar, the beloved of his army, the man who is always so fast, guys, ariana claritas on the battlefield, the one who carries everything before him uh the man who just had the winner printed in the middle of his forehead uh that's very much a creation of Caesar as soon as he returned to Rome he wrote his own account of the civil war playing on his mercy and his will to unite the people of Rome and organized the party to end all parties.

A returning general was often given an official celebration called a triumph. Caesar had four at the same time parading the trophies of his many victories. Rome had never seen anything. Legions marched. in triumph singing vulgar songs about his excess of sex in general we bring our Romans bald whores home we lock up your wives all that foreign gold you gave him was his gaul to pay affectionate insults that you only get after years of affection and respect, no it was just a spectacle it was a cash prize for the troops a public festival with 22,000 tables full of food gladiators fought to the death athletes ran and fought actors performed as a special treat against getariks who had been spared for eight years paraded in chains before being taken and silently strangled in prison no roman had ever been as powerful and as popular as julius caesar the roman republic was a democracy but for years there had been a stalemate between charismatic individuals like caesar who wanted reforms and conservatives who wanted to maintain the status quo The scale of Caesar's military success and his public acclaim gave him a popular mandate for radical change in the senate he swept all before him he was still supposed to be first among equals in practice his power base allowed him to trample upon opposition, Caesar rubbed senators the wrong way by attaching their names to bills without their consent.

People were given credit for introducing measures when they hadn't even attended the Senate. Everyone is afraid of the future. Where will this take us and the United States? People who say that things must be changed cause great alarm to all vested interests and when one considers that those two centuries of conquest have created a huge accumulation of vested interests of people with land, property, money, etc., and Everyone They hope to pass them on to their children and do not want a new political order, so a man, one of them, rising to supreme power is a terrible threat.

Caesar was a one man revolution, his reforms solved the problems in Rome and made the empire a reality Rome was overpopulated and there were thousands of soldiers retired without pension Caesar simply moved 80,000 people out of the city and resettled them in new cities abroad where he also gave land to army veterans making the Romans settle in Gall o Spain began to convert them from conquered countries into a true part of the Roman system and reformed the Senate by expanding the number of senators to include people from the provinces so that They could also have a say in how things were handled.

What happened in Rome was that if you see a guy in pants, don't point him the way to the Senate because a guy in pants is going to be shameless and they say you know it's him, he's even naming these barbaric targets for our Senate. Now that's an exaggeration, but behind that lies if you've fought a huge campaign in Gaul and recruited part of your army from Gaul, you will actually promote successful officers in the system. It also drained swamps, imposed attacks on luxury goods, and reduced unemployment. and made the laws of religious tolerance throughout the empire sound and respectable civic things, but Caesar's most lasting achievement was achieved with the help of Cleopatra's astronomers who trained here in the great library of alexandria. he invented July before Caesar the Roman year was too short its 12 months followed the phases of the moon and only lasted 28 days occasionally they had to set aside an extra month to compensate but during the chaos of the civil war the day of Summer had fallen in September.

Caesar understood astronomy. He knew that the year should be 365 days. He divided the extra days among the 12 months to get things right. He stretched the time between November and December 46 BC. C. he put two additional months and then, on January 1, 45 BC. C., his new 365-day calendar began with minor modifications. This is what we have today to commemorate her achievement. The month that contained her birthday was called July. Then, in the midst of all this activity, Cleopatra herself arrived in Rome with her 12-year-old husband and Caesar's baby. Nothing shows the attitude more. Caesar's arrogant attitude, the way he handled his visit, he erected a statue of Cleopatra in the temple of Venus, the mother.

This was blasphemy. Having a girlfriend was one thing. Asking the Romans. Treating her like a goddess was another thing in 45 BC. Discontent was seeping around the Roman elite Caesar's military enemies still had power Civil war threatened to break out again in Spain He had already had to fight in North Africa the previous year A resurgence of pompous supporters there Now the sons of pompey who wanted to avenge his father were gathering an army near córdoba once again caesar gathered his troops for what was going to be his last campaign there are 2400 kilometers from rome to córdoba caesar did it in just 27 days in fact he got there before The final battle of the civil war was one of Caesar's most desperate fights.

It took place just to the northeast. The two groups of professional Roman soldiers were united in classical fashion when suddenly something happened. unthinkable Caesar's veterans began to give way and retreat, leaving a space between the two armies Caesar jumped from his horse threw his helmet he took a shield and marched up and down the line dodging enemy javelins and shouting yes I'm done You finished by two when his tribune He saw how exposed it was, they formed around him and then the legions gathered when the battle was won. Caesar admitted that he had thought about suicide when he saw his men begin to retreat.

I fought for victory before. he said but i have never fought for my own life the civil war ended at the age of 55 caesar had such power that the republic could barely fit it into the existing democracy the senate tried to adapt the system to the man who gave him the highest office of consul for not one but ten years caesar also obtained an honorary title that has immense meaning this is the emperor's room in the capitol museum everyone is here nero augustus caligula but they would not be called emperors if it had not been so It was not because Julius Caesar His soldiers loved him and gave him the unofficial title of imperator or emperor.

He hijacked the name and used it as a permanent title so that from then on the head of Rome and its dominions was known as the Emperor surely in a sense Caesar must be the first Emperor Imperator is just one of the many titles these people used and he was the first imperator kaiser. Do you think Caesar was aware that he was creating something new? yes, he must have been aware, especially since everyone was telling him at the time that you are destroying the old system that you don't want to do this, but he knows that the world has changed very significantly and that he has to establish a new model.

Caesar was not the type of character who could play a diplomatic game. One day a deputation approached him to tell him about the latest batch of honors the Senate had awarded him. They were standing. He did not stand. This implied that he was superior in rank to his colleagues. fellow senators a great insult to his The excuse was that he had diarrhea and did not dare to move, but it was noted that he still managed to walk home. Then, in February 44 BC. C., Caesar was declared dictator. Dictators were generally one-man temporary rulers appointed to resolve emergencies.

It was given to Caesar. The life position was now officially a man more important than his fellow citizens. There had been dictators like Sulla before who predicted that Caesar would overthrow the entire system, but none had had the cult of personality associated with them until Caesar Looks This coin was minted in 44 BC. and that head is Caesar, this is the last year of Caesar's life and it was the first time that a Roman coin had the portrait of a living person, what arrogance and look at this, this was minted two years later and on it there is a pair of daggers and a cap that symbolizes freedom and these two words, three words, the Ides of March in 44 BC.

C. Julius Caesar was 56 years old after ignoring the niceties of Roman democracy, he was now king in all Romans except those in name, they hated the word king 600 years before there had been seven kings in Rome and the last Tarquin had been such tyrant who got rid of him and established the republic in his place. They never forgot what a disaster royalty would really be. When people tried to call Caesar king, he rejected the title, but he had already gone too far in establishing a personal rule. I'm pretty sure caesar didn't want to be king. Caesar knew Roman history very well and his first steps in Roman history.

The story is that we kill kings, we don't like kings, we had them once in the past, there were seven of them, seven is a nice round number and seven is enough and Roman history from then on is about every time someone threatens to be king. They are exceptionally allowed to kill him. The ringleaders of the assassination plot were two men named Brutus and Cassius. Brutus had been saved by Caesar after the Battle of Pharsalis. Cassius housed a personal bridge. Caesar had once snatched some lions from him for the public games they began. to sound out other people who thought Caesar was undermining the republic, more and more disgruntled senators joined in.

Most of Rome seemed to know there was something, but surprisingly Caesar made a move that was typical of his self-confidence, he fired to his bodyguard and watched him constantly. Your back was a sign of weakness and fear. On the other hand, he was not going to sit around waiting for something to happen. He announced that he was going to launch a new military campaign. He would leave Rome on March 18, which gave the conspirators a deadline of the 14th. he went out to dinner there was an argument about what was a good way to die sudden death caesar said one thing sir 24 hours after he made the comment that he was dead 2,000 years later you can trace each of his the moving on the 15th were the Ides of March and Caesar was due to attend a senate meeting but his wife had a premonition in a dream and urged him not to go.

Caesar was not normally superstitious but he got a second opinion from a fortune teller and decided not to tempt fate and stay in home, the conspirators almost panicked, but then they pulled off a masterstroke and sent for the man Caesar was least suspicious of to try to lure him to the place where they planned to cunningly kill him. Decimus did not try to persuade Caesar to attend the entire meeting only to go out and adjourn first and while he spoke he took Caesar by the hand and led him out into the street. Caesar was as always surrounded by people who asked him for favors and gave him parchments to read, which were usually passed directly to the slave secretary behind him, but a professor of Greek philosophy who knew everything about the plot handed him a piece of paper. and asked him to read it immediately.

It concerns you personally. He said Caesar took it. but he couldn't read it because of the pressure from the people around him, it was the last chance he had to meet with the senate and his death, but not here in the senate house in the forum, the senate building had been burned by the fire and they were in temporary accommodation waiting for a new one to be built the fateful meeting took place about half a mile in that direction at the theater of pompey it is shakespeare's play that has the murder taking place on the steps of the house of the Senate It is ironic that it actually happened in a theater built by the man who became Caesar's archenemy and although the assassination is world famous, the actual location is quite difficult to find.

The Theater of Pompey is shown on the tourist map but there is no sign on the street other than the intriguing shape of this building which reflects the shape of the original theater the only real remains around the corner as close as we can get of the assassination of Caesar the two brutes a moment is in the back of this curved building in the basement of this restaurant bonjour caesar was invited to the senate roomjust a few meters from here when he was going to sit down the conspirators beat a man named casker they stabbed him in the neck caesar turned and stabbed him in the arm with a metal pen but then someone else stabbed him in the side this was going to be the killing blow, but by then the 23 conspirators were hacking and stabbing with such a frenzy that some of them even stabbed each other.

Caesar never said in your brute that everything was too confusing, a lot of blood and Instead of screaming, he simply covered his face with his robe to mask the shame of a dying man when there were no Moors on the coast, three slaves carried the body home while the conspirators ran through the streets proclaiming freedom, but the people of Rome did not want the freedom they loved. caesar and thousands came to the forum to honor him when his body was cremated they wanted another emperor the republic was never restored and in his honor his successors were known as caesar after more years of civil war it was caesar's adopted son, augustus, who formalized, but Julius Caesar is the turning point before him, Rome was a democracy after him, it was an empire ruled by one man and all because of the indomitable strength of that personality, even following in Caesar's footsteps with the benefits of the Modern travel has been quite a grueling business. but at the end of my 2000 mile quest I can certainly say I salute Caesar, even if given his ruthless ambition I can't say I like him very much, however he was one of history's truly epic figures, he lived life with energy and a ferocity that is difficult to imagine in anyone today and his achievements were truly colossal, his conquests ensured that European culture was classical and not Celtic and perhaps most important of all he persuaded the Roman people that a person ruled could work and this new model of the roman caesar would change roman history forever little boots are sweet, the kind of thing that drives even the most macho man crazy Two thousand years ago, a group of burly centurions on the periphery of the roman empire he made a pair of tiny shoes for a little boy and they gave him the nickname little boots, the name stuck and 20 years later when the little boy became roman emperor they still called him little boots or as they say in latin caligula, Yes, that little boy became Caligula, the most evil and crazy emperor in Rome. famous for making his horse a member of the senate who sent his legions to the ends of the earth just to collect seashells and who believed himself to be a god, a 100 pure maniac capable of skinning his favorite singer alive while congratulating him on his melody. of his screams, but was it really like that?

If Caligula was so easy, why was there a public outcry when he was assassinated? And if he was crazy, why did they make him emperor in the first place? So how angry was he, deranged or just plain mortal? My attempt to analyze one of the most evil minds in human history by unearthing archaeological evidence from the past is quite difficult, but how do I begin to get into the mind of someone who lived 2000 years ago, especially given many of the records history of Caligula's rain? Much of what is believed or written about Caligula is anecdotal propaganda written after his time has been lost.

What I want to do is try to build a more balanced picture of him by sorting through the most reliable sources and looking at the different interpretations we can discover. another Caligula and to understand it we have to look at his family and his upbringing because even from the beginning he is surrounded by men. Caligula's passport to success was the fact that he was the son of a national war hero. In fact, there was a story floating around that he was actually born in a military camp while his father was fighting a battle, the reality is that he was born here in Antiem in southwestern Italy on August 31, 12 AD.

Antiem or Anzio as it is now known was the Roman equivalent of the Hamptons a summer playground for the super rich a little far from the city Caligula's real name was Gaius he was the third son of a rich family and if he didn't already have his nickname he had just In everything else, you can imagine that his father was the legendary Germanicus who won the hearts of Rome with his conquest in Germany, but he was much more than a child. The emperor Tiberius had adopted Germanicus because the entire life of his heir Caligula was influenced by the reflection. his father's glory his mother's side was no less auspicious she was the granddaughter of the emperor augustus whose charismatic leadership had made the concept of one-man rule popular in rome the future emperor and his wife, although caligula was his third son, he could never We have predicted that he himself would become emperor.

We know that Caligula was a sickly and very spoiled child, but he also seems to have been something of a prodigy. His father often traveled to the outposts of the empire, sometimes taking his entire life. The family with him clearly Caligula acquired his father's diplomatic skills because at the age of six in a place called Asos he gave his first public speech. He was loved and adored by everyone, so he must have made it even harder when the rug was pulled out from under him. Under his command, when he was only seven years old, everything began to go wrong in the campaign in Syria, his father Germanicus fell ill and died, the tragedy of his early death sealed his mythical character in the minds of the people, Caligula's father always would be the young and handsome emperor, Roe never had death. his reputation but condemned his family Caligula's mother hoped her eldest son would become heir but instead Emperor Tiberius chose his own grandson without game Caligula's mother was furious and by pushing her case she made herself and her family deeply unpopular with the emperor crossing tiberius was dangerous the first emperors had ruled through their own charisma, but tiberius was a bitter-faced bureaucrat who had no time to flatter the people under him the empire had become a dictatorship alienated the senate and made enemies;

In fact, he became so paranoid about the conspiracies that he moved his seat of power to Capri, but away from Rome, the remote emperor was even more terrifying. He ruled by proxy with his Praetorian Guards quickly dealing with perceived threats such as Caligula's family. The teenage Caligula witnessed a merciless purge, first his mother and elder brother were exiled and his second brother was imprisoned in Rome handed over to elderly relatives Caligula was politically and emotionally isolated all he had left in the world were his three sisters With them he formed an intensely close bond, so close that some people said the relationship was sexual as well.

Later, in the year 31 AD, when he was 19 years old, Caligula lost all family contact. Tiberius summoned him to his hiding place on the island here on Capri. When he arrived, he must have wondered what awaited him: will he be an honored guest or a politician? Victim, if there was ever a place that could literally push you over the edge, this is where Tiberius was famous for his treason trials that he used to hold secretly in his palace. The senators would be summoned here, they would be dragged before the court. and were never seen again, the rumor was that the sentence was carried out by throwing them off this cliff to their doom, so this was the kind of oppressive atmosphere that Caligula was raised in for 12 years, he had not lived with his father for The last four he had been practically an orphan raised by his great-grandmother and an elderly aunt and now he was going to have to live completely alone, but he seems to have devised a strategy to survive here, in the dark corridors of the palace of Tiberius Caligula learned to be a politician He turned from a threat into a protégé who cultivated Tiberium.

He enthusiastically joined him in his intellectual activities and hobbies. How much of this was pretense we will never know. He never gave the game away, although years later people would say of him that there never was a better servant or a worse master, the truth is that he must have been able to see the unlimited power that was potentially available to him, so no matter how upset he was by the destruction of his family, he was going to go. to keep his mouth shut his mother was exiled on an island about 20 miles in that direction but as far as caligula was concerned it could have been a million miles what added to the tension was that he never knew for sure if tiberius was for him or against him, whether the emperor had personally ordered the fate of his family or they were victims of conspirators in Rome trapped in Capri Caligula had no way of knowing, he could hardly ask Tiberius, but events unfolded that suggested that one day the emperor was not behind the plot, tiberius.

He received a surprise gift from an elderly cousin. It was marked for your eyes only and was not the kind of gift you expect from a respectable relative. It was Tiberius' favorite type of porn cane, but he got more than usual because inside it she had smuggled a message telling him the full extent of the plot against Caligula's family. Caligula may have hoped that this revelation would save his relatives, but although Tiberius purged the conspirators, he made no attempt to free Caligula's family, in fact, not at all, despite Tiberius's hand ringing the mother of Caligula was kept in exile his brother in prison until they both died and to make matters worse Tiberius publicly announced that Caligula's brother had died of starvation and when he died he had been found desperately clawing at the hay of his own wonderful mattress if we could get into it.

Caligula's mind while on Capri, he may well have blamed Tiberius for what was happening to his family, on the other hand, he may have been indifferent to what was happening to his family, we just don't know. and it is quite possible that he saw the disappearance of his brothers as an opportunity for himself and was therefore quite indifferent to his fate, but his silent strategy towards the man who murdered his family paid dividends. The family's problems had begun because Caligula's mother had pushed for one of her sons to be emperor by a twist of fate, it was Caligula who was named co-heir with Tiberius's grandson without game eighteen months later, in one of his brief visits to the continent, Tiberius died under mysterious circumstances a hundred years later, according to historians.

They reveled in the rumors They said that Caligula had been alone with Tiberius in his bedroom when he died They said that he had both the opportunity and the reason There were no marks on the body so the cause was poison or a pillow over the face and the The more They moved away from these events, the stories became wilder and the details became more complicated until finally these later accounts became the official version, but the only source we have from the time specifically clarifies Caligula, the philosopher Seneca, says that Tiberius He died of old age, but who was it going to be?

His successor Tiberius had kept everyone in suspense by naming Caligula and Gameless as co-heirs throughout his reign. Tiberius had terrorized the Roman senate and now they would have the chance to regain some of their power for themselves there was only one candidate there was really no competition between no game and caligula who would you choose no game the grandson of a ruthless tyrant or caligula the son of a National war hero who had the Praetorian Guard on his side stepped out of the shadows into the warm sunlight of power but would go into his main story has left us a portrait of Caligula as the archetype of the mad tyrant, but when he became Emperor at the age of 25 there was no sign that he was unstable backed by the Praetorian Guard and with the brilliance of his father's charisma he was still right, literally Rome gave him a tumultuous welcome.

The crowds lining the Appian Way leading to Roe were huge and wild with excitement. They seemed more like admirers than respectful subjects rather than bowing and cursing as he passed. Historians tell us that they shouted names like Polluelo. star and baby the army loved it germanic's family was back in power and the mafia had gotten the son of their former war hero as their new emperor and superstar despite his terrible reputation everyone agrees that the first six months of Caligula were a triumph and he could do no wrong, Tiberius had been a grim killjoy, a petty administrator in a gray suit who denied the mafia its fair share of entertainment, in contrast, after six years of silent terror on Capri, Caligula shared his enthusiasm for a little fun, his games and entertainments lasted.

From morning to night, lavish gifts and an ambitious building programme, money was no object and she did the right thing: his family brought his mother's ashes to Rome for a state funeral. People loved him and were happy to accept him as the sole heir, even if Tiberius had not been his will, you can certainly say that he was a talented young man, he had a lively sense of humor, he was very nice, very attached to his family and his youth, but he also had an irresponsible and reckless side and the great tragedy,Of course, there was no one who could control that reckless side.

Historians tell us that he was a fan of chariot racing and that he was not content to just be a spectator; he liked to ride himself. something no cultured Roman should do, but Caligula was empty, he could do it, it was here, under what is now the headquarters of the Roman Catholic church, that the impetuous side of his character was given full reign, believe it or not. , I'm standing on what was once a Roman racetrack and that obelisk was the midpoint of the Ben Hur style chariot races in 38 AD, when Christianity was still a minor sect of Judaism, Caligula built a stadium private right here, in front of what is now the Vatican, and brought that obelisk. 300 tons from Egypt, a great engineering feat for the empress's playground, the stadium track was like a huge dog track, long and skinny, with the top curve right in the middle of what is now the plaza, somewhere around where the obelisk is located. es and then the track itself was about 40 or 50 meters wide and extended about 500 meters in that direction, so the halfway point was just beyond where the front of San Pedro is now, large crowds used to turn up to watch the young emperor play and if the aristocrats frowned they were willing to overlook a little youthful enthusiasm where the Senate was concerned.

An inexperienced emperor with other things on his mind would be malleable enough to give them the control they sought in his book. He promised to return power to the Senate. Senate after the autocratic reign of Tiberius to abolish the feared treason trials and said he destroyed all secret files naming conspirators against him and his family for six months. The Senate and Caligula come to power and they are all wonderful to you, yes, yes. You are good, everyone else, absolutely everyone wants you on their side, you are still an unknown and he, he, he, nothing in this, he loves it and knows what to do, he knows that Tiberius was hated and that everything he can do to distance himself from what Tiberius was hated for will be good very soon he has to deal with the problems of actually being emperor and one should never underestimate how colossally difficult that is, so you think Caligula was incredibly irritated for the day.

Current Tasks I think Caligula was hugely insecure about his upbringing at Tiberius's imperial court is a real nightmare. People are murdering each other by plotting against each other. That must be true beyond a doubt, regardless of what exaggerations there may be in the historical story. sources is a horrible place he has no psychological basis to be a stable person to react to the real problems of being an emperor outwardly the young caligula put on a brave face but the public exterior disguised the complexity of his feelings behind the mask of the successful a young man aristocrat lurked a very different personality he was dark and melancholic he wandered the halls of the palace late at night his dreams were plagued by nightmares he was intelligent but very nervous and lurched from happiness to deep despair in an instant when he spoke he spoke quickly without stopping um very, very eloquently, but he would be carried away by the power of his uh, of his own rhetoric.

He seems to be very, very impatient with the people around him, very, very sarcastic, so I think he was a man who found it very difficult to relax. The last six months had been too much for Caligula the release from repression the emotion the emotion took its toll on the very strong emperor at the end of September he suffered some kind of nervous breakdown we do not know if the illness was mental or physical but we What I do not know It was taken out of circulation and marked a turning point for three months. The news filtered from his palace on the palatine.

The empire held its breath. People slept outdoors in the shadow of the palace waiting. For the press releases it was a bit like the death of a princess. The entire nation seemed consumed by depression because enthusiastic aristocrats made hasty promises to the gods that they would fight as gladiators or commit suicide if Caligula later recovered. They must have wanted to do it. They had kept their mouths shut early the following year, Caligula seemed to make a full recovery. There was joy and relief throughout the empire, but it was a very different Caligula who emerged from his forced isolation and the first victims of this were changed.

The flatterers had desired. It was so difficult for him to recover that the man who had volunteered to fight as a gladiator was forced to fight in the arena several times before he was finally freed. As for the willing victim of suicide, Caligula kept his word that he was prepared for sacrifice dressed in sacred clothes. The garlands were entrusted and paraded through the streets until the procession reached the banks of the Tiber before the victim was thrown into the waters as a gift to the gods except, of course, that Caligula had no intention of killing him, only he wanted to teach him a lesson for being such a scoundrel so at the last moment he let him go it was as if the illness had made scales fall from his eyes caligula saw that the tide of affection was superficial hypocrisy and it disgusted him while some had done it begged for his survival others had expected his death but to Caligula they both seemed very alike while he was ill the senate had planned who would take over if Caligula died the natural successor was the grandson of Tiberius no game it was a sensible contingency plan but Caligula found it suspicious If there was a plot or he was paranoid in any way in ancient Rome you didn't send soldiers to kill someone for their misdeeds, you sent them to make sure the culprit committed suicide, the soldiers were sent to tell him without game that he had been declared guilty of plotting a plot against Caligula, although it was clear from what followed that he was not up to the job. how to do it caligula's bubble had burst what did the adulation and praise add up to if they wanted to replace you just for being sick from now on i would take a cynical line if they don't care i don't care either no one would never be allowed to disappoint them again until now Caligula that we have found has not simply saved our interpretation of the anecdotes of has discovered a character much more complex and devious than the illness that ended his popularity for six months was followed by Another blow to his psyche, the death of the person Closest to him in the world, his sister Drusilla, he had always had an abnormally intense relationship with his sisters, especially Drusilla, and when she died in 3818, he was devastated; he was too distraught to attend the ceremony. funeral walks and instead he went to the countryside refusing to cut his beard and hair as a sign of mourning.

There are very few contemporary accounts to support later accusations of incest, but his sister's death broke something that had made him so popular. Public games and festivities were banned and Drusilla was declared a goddess. Her statue was placed in the temple of Venus. caligula that emerges from this period of mourning which gives us all the memorable anecdotes about her these are the stories that have given rise to the belief that He was completely angry, but you can learn more about Caligula by visiting putting them in context his parties were legendary with loaves of bread made of gold and pearls melted in a vinegar drink we know that this is true but luxury and excess were normal for a rich rose he said that Caligula would take any senator's wife who wanted to party away from the kingdom and then return and tell on the table a lurid account of what he had just done to her or he would strip his own wife in front of the others to show how lucky he was, but it seems to me that this only proves He had a brutally sadistic streak, it's not that he was angry despite that he loved his wife, often kissed her neck and whispered to her in a funny way.

He pops this very attractive head every time he chooses to say the word, but what's telling is how often he butts. of his sadistic humor the people he saw as his political enemies members of the senate in a story three obsequious senators are summoned to the imperial palace late at night it is not good news at best they are taken to the emperor's private theater and sit there not knowing if it's execution or exile when suddenly the curtain opens caligula cavorts on stage does a song and dance act and then disappears without comment into the night presumably very pleased with himself at the terrifying effect of his joke heavy that he was.

Not only was he interested in humiliating individuals when he came to power, he promised to work with the Senate, but after his collapse he saw them all as enemies and it was not just paranoia; he had grown up believing that it was Tiberius who had killed him. his parents, but when he searched the records he discovered the role the Senate had played in accepting him. He turned on them brutally. He entered the Senate here and launched a fierce and confrontational attack. He said that he actually still had the right. The documents he said he had destroyed told him that all the people Tiberius had tried and murdered were in fact guilty, not only that, but they named some of the co-conspirators who had done it for his family given these revelations.

Caligula said that he was going to reinstate the treason trials to find the rest of the culprits. He ended with the words hate me while fearing me for both charges. The senators did it. The Senate is filled precisely with the power brokers of the Roman Empire. If someone is going to be powerful, he will do something, he will be in the Senate and, of course, his friends and enemies will be in the Senate. A wise emperor minimizes enemies, ignores them, marginalizes them and plays games. Caligula does the one thing you should never do, which is to rant against the Senate as a body.

Caligula despised the farce of democracy in the Roman system. One of the most famous stories taken to demonstrate his folly was in fact a deliberate insult to the Senate. he said he wanted his favorite horse to comfort the highest office in the land but he never did it was an insulting joke even my horse could do a better job at the heart of caligula's story it's a conflict between two visions of what the emperor was about it was supposed to be the senate believed that the emperor was only there with his permission caligula saw himself as the heir of augustus a member of the imperial dynasty with divine right to rule and it is in this context that we should see the most spectacular example What his enemies saw as madness and what he saw as proof of his absolute power took place in the summer of 39 AD. and it all happened right here or rather there in the Bay of Naples, nothing would stand in the emperor's way, even if he wanted to. walking on water caligula proposed riding a horse three kilometers across the bay of naples once he decided to turn the sea into land this entire area became a huge shipyard he built many ships here in the bay and brought many others from external ports So he got about 200 of them, tied them in two long lines across the bay, then anchored them and put a big wooden bridge on top and then dressed himself in a long purple cloak inlaid with gold and jewels and wore the breastplate of his hero Alexander the Great He and the Praetorian Guard charged along the bridge but it was not yet finished He waited until dark and granted thousands and thousands of torches to light along the bay It was extravagant It was scandalous Caligula had turned water into land and today's night was rivaling the gods he was in charge.

The common Romans loved this excessive display but the people challenged by Caligula's absolute power that was vulgar and dangerous could command fear but not loyalty and In Rome, trouble was brewing with an increasingly excluded Senate, that same year a widespread plot was discovered. The reaction shows that he still had a firm grip on reality to act in a political crisis. The conspirators were killed or exiled and in response Caligula devised a brilliant plan to restore instability. An emperor with control of the army had control over sanity and there was nothing the legions liked more than a successful leader like Julius Caesar or himself. caligula's father, germanic, this is where caligula decided to make his presence felt here at the very edge of the empire on the banks of the rhine river, this natural barrier was supposed to separate roman civilization from the barbarians beyond, but for years a commander lax Roman had been totally unable to prevent the troops from making embarrassing raids on this side of the river.

Caligula replaced him with a strict disciplinarian and then, as soon as the troops were back in shape, Caligula headed north to join them. on the border. This was not an exercise to please the lunatic's vanity. Securing the German border was a strategic action. caligula hadplaces along the journey where troop movements were well planned and well organized, what he did was carry out brief raids across the river at the head of his troops, he probably didn't kill any Germans, but the fact that the The emperor went into battle personally not only restored the spirit of his men but also made them loyal to him in Rome and throughout the empire they honored Caligula's success with special games and celebrations.

He had proven his worth as a soldier and tactician. Caligula had obtained power. army on his side and could do whatever he wanted since Julius Caesar had made a brief raid, the Romans had been talking about making a full scale invasion of the wet island at the edge of the world, securing the German border had only been the first part. from caligula's master plan he wanted to invade great britain with the subjugated german tribes caligula borrowed forces from the frontier and marched towards the end of the world what is now beloy and then his brilliant strategy became one of the most famous castles in history The troops were all lined up on the shore Caligula climbed aboard a trireme He set sail for England but then immediately turned around He returned He disembarked and climbed onto a high platform overlooking his men Then he gave the order I want everyone to walk along the beach collect as many shells as possible and put them in their helmets and in one fell swoop, the largest fighting force in the world was transformed into a legion of hikers, then all the shells were solemnly carried back to Rome as spoils of war, So what was happening again?

Scholars have proposed several plausible explanations for what appear to be Caligula's random actions. Some think that the very act of bringing soldiers to the seashore was enough to claim rebellion and the seashells are a purely symbolic beauty of war. Others think that Caligula was forced to leave. his plans because the soldiers refused to cross the channel for them this was the end of the world all that was there was practically another galaxy three years later when Claudius invaded England he faced a virtual mutiny if something similar happened to Caligula , then the seashell episode. It becomes a typically humiliating lesson for his mutinous centurions, humiliating a group of tough soldiers fits the sadistic side of Caligula's character, but he reserved his true cruelty for the Roman elite and when a delegation of senators arrived to request his return to Rome, he slapped his sword and said: I'm on my way and I'm going to bring this caligula was returning for a showdown he had been emperor for three years but he was still only 28. he came to absolute power with a mercurial temper and a sadistic humor that no one understood he was like a spoiled child who was given the power of life and death and he looked like a poor man with thin legs, a nervous face with sunken eyes and he made it worse by making scary faces in the mirror, he was so embarrassed about his blonde hair increasingly scarce, but he made it illegal to be on top of him so that no one would see his completely bald head.

An insecure and damaged human being. As soon as he returned from his failed invasion of Britain, he launched another scathing attack on the Senate demanding that they recognize him. his true status as a god he built a lodge here on the capitol hill near the temple of Jupiter because he wanted to be close to the god who was his role model and commissioned a life-size gold statue of himself as his favorite god, which was He dressed in different clothes every day, but not content with that, he used to stand in the forum between the statues of the different gods posing as Jupiter so he could receive a little worship.

It is difficult to say how seriously Caligula took all this. When a simple worker told Caligula that he was acting like an idiot, the emperor only laughed, but Caligula's demands that the Senate recognize him as a god were much less scandalous than one might think. The Romans had many gods after their great-grandfather Augustus had been deified. Death and for centuries eastern rulers such as the pharaohs had been seen as living gods. Caligula's claims were not deceptions but demands for additional status, but this further alienated the Roman elite who still believed that the emperor should essentially be just another citizen.

Caligula's demands to be recognized. as a god, his consequent disregard for other people's beliefs would spark a potentially deadly conflict in the farthest reaches of the empire in alexandria in egypt the

romans

and jews had lived together peacefully but under caligula antisemitism reared its ugly head and started here two A thousand years ago Alexandria was a Greek city but with a large population of Jews and they had never gotten along, so the Jews were herded into an area of ​​the city, the world's first ghetto and there were riots, anti-Semitic attacks and reprisals. The Emperor's job to act as a peacemaker A Jewish delegation was sent to present their case on the way When they arrived Caligula was busy putting the finishing touches on his newly redecorated palace He was clearly in a mischievous mood and the delegates were desperate to show their loyalty, so he encouraged them to chase him while he snuck from room to room dealing with his carpenters and interior decorators and finally he turned on them and said, "Why don't you eat pork?" and when they stuttered in his answers, he interrupted them.

With yes, he doesn't know very well, of course, his cronies fell in the year 40 AD. Caligula's anti-Semitism and his blind desire for immortal status came to a head, he demanded that the holiest site in Judaism, the Temple of Jerusalem, should be converted into an imperial shrine and in the holy of holies there would be a giant statue of Caligula. Like Jupiter, the announcement caused chaos, there were riots in Jerusalem, but the way Caligula reacts after the event shows that even if he was a self-promoting bully, he was. He's still sane enough to make a diplomatic turn.

Caligula's attitude toward the Jews softened considerably and he actually rescinded his order to erect the statue of him in the temple. He was convinced that it would cause a lot of distress and probably a lot of civil disorder, so in the end it is clear that Caligula could still behave rationally, strategically and sensibly, in fact, many people thought that Caligula was a good ruler; He may have fought with the senate, but he had done nothing to alienate the Roman man in the street and in terms of his administration, it was a real success. He kept the provinces peaceful and stable.

He improved the roads. He built new waterways to Rome to give the people clean water. Most importantly, he abolished the Roman sales tax, his equivalent to v18. Then, as now, people liked anyone. who kept the economy stable and taxes low and although his critics said he was wasteful there was still a healthy balance in the treasury after his death, if he had only taken the Senate with him he might have survived but Caligula was willing to compromise With everyone. apart from the people who really mattered, the people who could get rid of him, he couldn't stop the plots, he whipped the senators to death, had them tortured with fire on the rack, gagged their mouths with sponges so they couldn't scream.

He beheaded them and even executed them at night because he didn't want to have to wait until the next morning. He called the executions to clear his accounts and yet he was so moved by the destroyed body of an actress called Quintillia who had survived the torturers without revealing anything. who gave him eight hundred thousand sisters as compensation and yet the irony was that although many of his victims were innocent of the crimes for which they had been tried and tortured by Quintilia he was actually guilty of participating in a conspiracy to assassinate Caligula no matter how unpopular emperor caligula was, that fool the head of the praetorian guard was a tough soldier called kyrie but he had that thin, reedy voice and that's why the emperor used to make fun of him for being a bit of a girl, for example, if If Kyrie had to thank him for something, the Emperor would hold out his hands for him to kiss and then take them away at the last moment and make an obscene gesture or if Kyrie had to ask him what the password of the day is. caligula would say it was something obscene like venus or big willy let's hope caligula enjoyed the joke because he paid for it with his life the murder took place in a temporary theater here on the palatine caligula had come to see his favorite actor in a play he was in a very good mood there was that carnival atmosphere that had made it so popular that there were no reserved seats and the theater was in chaos gifts of fruit had been distributed to the crowd and this attracted the exotic birds placed for the amusement of the audience the show began with Caligula sacrificing a flamenco who splashed his toga with blood the conspirators waited for Caligula in one of the small alleys leading out of the theater, which was so narrow that his bodyguards could not protect him at lunchtime.

Caligula usually went home to take a bath and when he left the throne, the senators stopped the crowd showing due respect. for the emperor although in reality they were making sure that the bodyguards could not protect him when Caligula arrived at the alley he stopped to talk to some dancers who were rehearsing there and it was at that moment that the plot occurred to him, Kyrie stepped forward and asked. for the password caligula let out his usual taunts and kyrie cut him between the neck and shoulder moaning caligula tried to escape but was stopped by a barrage of blows from the other senators in the conspiracy he was stabbed no less than 30 times then the conspirators fled from scene and the bodyguards went crazy stabbing both the conspirators and innocent bystanders, while the conspirators also went haywire, they broke into the palace, they wanted to make sure Caligula had no air, so they stabbed his wife and then took his daughter by the feet. and he threw his brains out against the senate which met with great enthusiasm, it seemed that this was his chance to regain supreme power and restore the republic that had been destroyed by julius caesar, but just like the senators who had killed caesar , they had underestimated the people's affection for their emperor even the most hostile sources recalled that the theater crowds were stunned by the news of Caligula's assassination now appeared in the streets angry to demand a successor to Caligula even Claudius's stuttering uncle caligula who became the next emperor It was preferable that Caligula's assassination in the Senate proved that he was not a god, but the crowd's reaction is the final evidence that he was much more complex than a cardboard cutout lunatic, so that Caligula was crazy.

He certainly was calculating and cruel with a strong streak of sadism, although I doubt it. If some judge today were to dissect it, but in a way, isn't it worse? This brilliant, manipulative young man who thought he could get away with anything, but when her manipulation gave him ultimate power, it turned him into an even bigger monster. Caligula came from a long line of revered military men, but instead of glory on the battlefield, he chose to fight with everyone, even the Senate. If anyone was angry, it was the senators themselves for thinking that the son of a hero would also be a hero instead of the paranoid sadistic young man.

In reality it was, in the end it was they who paid the price for his short, sharp and brutal career. He has become one of the great symbols of the corruption of power. The maniac playing the violin while his city burns. The tyrant was Nero. The Roman city. plays the violin while rome burns is just one of the stories that has earned Nero a reputation as one of the most evil men in history, the psychopath who killed his wife and mother, who threw christians to the lions, that he was condemned to an early death, all these things are true, but the fact that he never played the violin should alert us to the fact that there is more to him than the monster that historians have thrown into the dustbin of the past because there was another Nero, a man who loved peace and not war, the world's first rock star applauded by his fanatical adoration, an enlightened lover of musical theater and the arts, and it is this Nero whom I want to try to rescue from the ashes of his terrible reputation. .

Nero's story unfolded here in Rome, in the imperial palaces on the Palatine Hill. These walls were all that remained. of the hallways and dark rooms where a drama unfolded that was half political thriller half domestic tragedy Nero's life has all the elements of a soap opera political intrigue bitter jealousy passionate loves this hostile image was constructed by propagandists after his death as Centuries passed. Historians exaggerated the myths of Nero. My job is to separate fact from fiction to balance subsequent propaganda with other sources and simple common sense. What we know for sureNero came to power when he was only 16 years old.

At an age when most children. They're deciding what topics to do for a level where he was named ruler of half the world and that's when his story as emperor began, but to understand Nero we have to go back further because it's what happened to him as a child that made him became the Emperor he became Nero was the name he later adopted but he was born Lucius Domitius Ahina Barbus on December 15, 37 here at Antion on the coast near Rome it was the playground of the Roman elite and these are the ruins from Nero's own palace.

The family had ties to emperors dating back to Julius Caesar. Family connections were everything to the Romans in terms of social standing. Nero had a large family, although in terms of healthy psychological background they were a disaster. First there was his father, a harsh and brutal alcoholic. called nias, this is a man who killed a former slave during a drunken binge, gouged out a fellow senator's eye when he criticized him on the forum, and deliberately killed a child in a traffic accident in a fit of road rage, but the true aristocratic blood came from his mother's side the story of Nero is about the women who influenced him and the center of that story is his mother Agrippina, the most insistent woman, she created him, she made him and in the end she almost destroyed him .

His father, the war hero Germanicus, had been heir. to the imperial throne but had died tragically young, she was fiercely ambitious and well aware that the only path to power for a woman was through a husband or, better yet, a son, she saw Nero as a passport to power Agrippina, like many mothers. in particular she has an ambition for herself she has a son who is going to become powerful or could become powerful Nero had rich and powerful parents but he also had an uncle who was emperor in the year Nero was born Agrippina's evil brother Caligula became In Emperor Caligula was paranoid he saw betrayal everywhere there were secret trials political assassinations and terror throughout Rome when Nero was only two years old Caligula sent Agrippina into exile under suspicion of being involved in a plot against him the child Nero was left in the care of his alcoholic father at the time alone while he was getting used to no mother suffering tragedy again, his father died Nero was abandoned raised by domestic slaves a dancer and a barber was not a good start for a future emperor, but in 41 AD.

Nero's luck changed for the better. Caligula was assassinated by senators determined to stop his reign of terror Nero's mother was brought back from exile Caligula was replaced by Nero's stuttering great-uncle Claudius, an amusing figure who had survived appearing harmless to anyone who read the book or watched the television series I Claudio. We will assume that Nero's problems were over, but Claudius was by no means much more than the wise, stuttering clown we are led to believe he was. He also shared the sadistic characteristics of his predecessor and kept the terror levels at court as high as before. secret trials in private chambers, suspects tortured in front of him just for fun.

Nero grew up knowing that anyone close to him could be killed at any time, but the main threat to his existence came not from Claudius but from his third wife Messalina. Seven-year-old Nero became the pawn in a power struggle. between two ruthlessly ambitious women. Messalina wanted her son to be emperor after Claudius Agrippina wanted Nero to be. Both women were willing to fight dirty around 44 AD, while the young and handsome Nero lay sleeping, an attempt was made on his life Messalina sent two assassins to his rooms in the dead of night and was saved by a miraculous event.

When they pulled back the sheets to finish him off, a snake slithered out of their bed and they fled in terror. It is a colorful way to dramatize this domestic dispute, but this episode only emerges a century later and has suspicious parallels with Roman folk tales of the time. , the only evidence of this is that he actually finds a snake skin in the bedroom that his mother made a bracelet for him, so it's one of those stories that are like Hercules and the snakes and Hercules kills the snakes. It's one of those stories you make up about childhood.

It's a charming story, but. probably not very true, it was my agrabah of Nero, she had begun a scandalous affair that was the talk of Rome. Agrippina made sure the news was linked to Claudius and Messalina was forced to commit suicide with her rival out of the way. Agrippina put her The next stage of her plan into effect and she married her uncle Claudius. Part of the deal was for her son to be adopted by Claudius, changing his name to Nero, which effectively made him heir to the imperial throne, but Agrippina strengthened the world with an arranged marriage to a wife.

She would also need political influence and Agrippina realized that she did not have to look far to find out that she arranged a marriage between 15-year-old Nero and Octavia, Claudius' 13-year-old daughter. Not surprisingly, she first had to change the law to avoid any charges of incest. The next stage in Agrippina's plan was to strengthen her hold on power by making strategic appointments. This is where emperors were appointed and the viminal gate was broken. A military camp in the outskirts of Rome which is still used by Italian forces today the legions were not allowed to enter Rome, so the emperor had his own elite force called the Praetorian Guard, which was based here.

Any claimant to the imperial throne who did not have his support stood no chance. They were usually under the command of two prefects created by Agrippina. Only one leader, a tough, outspoken soldier called Burus, knew that he and her fellow officers owed loyalty to her and her son. burus was to be one of the two pillars of support for the teenage emperor. His second appointment was a masterstroke. The most respected philosopher of his time, Seneca was employed as Nero's teacher and speechwriter under Burus and Seneca Agrippina groomed the teenage Nero for power, but Nero appears to have found his official role rather boring.

He hated the endless formal dinners with his stuttering, drooling Uncle Claudio. She ate gourmet food and became slowly but steadily drunk, but according to historians these dinners had a much more immediate consequence: they gave Agrippina the opportunity to murder her husband. Claudio loved mushrooms. Historians say Agrippina employed Rome's most famous poisoner to prepare a powerful potion. For her favorite dish, Claudius had a food taster to protect him from poisoning, but Agrippina had bought it. This man put the poisoned mushroom on the plate after she took her portion. Claudio swallowed the bait. Literally, the poison was designed to work slowly.

Claudio left drunk and with the first symptoms of stomach pain that worsened but then came the news that he had vomited shortly after dinner, if he survived then he would know that there had been an attempt on his life and both Nero and Agrippina would be finished because agrippina went into overdrive they brought in the poisoner again, this time they dipped a feather in a fast acting potion agrippina gave it to another of her puppets claudius's doctor told claudius if he tickled the back of his throat with the pen he would vomit again and he feels much better claudius followed the doctor's orders he sighed and lay down the historians who wrote later enjoyed telling the story of agrippina killing claudius but now we know that there was no poison that could act so quickly at the time claudio was 60 years old and in poor health and much more likely to have died from drinking, overindulging or even food poisoning.

What the stories really tell us is how people viewed Agrippina as a ruthless politician who was quite capable of murdering her own husband, whether by natural causes or foul play, the next day. A few hours followed the same course that imperial deaths have followed since Maoist China until the queen mother Agrippina did not immediately announce his death he needed to play to buy time prayers were offered for the emperor's recovery and musicians were invited to come in to encourage him even when his body was cooling, as a precaution, he called the Praetorian Guard from his barracks to surround the palace while he worked on the official announcement with Burus and Seneca, finally at noon the next day the pronouncement was made: the emperor died a long time ago. live the emperor nero the crowds love their glamorous 16 year old ruler the palace of claudius on the palatine had been a place of fear secretly run by the emperor's clique now nero announced a new regime the senate would be restored to power tyranny had finished it seemed like a new Era Agropina and Nero knew that he owed him everything when the Praetorian officer approached him that night to ask for the official password.

Nero told her that she would be optima mater, the perfect mother, but Agrapina thought that Nero was going to be his puppet. she was very wrong the perfect mother she didn't want praise she wanted power for herself thanks to her scheming mother Nero was emperor of Rome at the tender age of 16 but now Agrippina wanted revenge for her investment she craved power she had been the sister and wife of a emperor and now with his novice son in charge he tried to fix the system so he could have even more power. He managed to get the Senate to meet here in the palace instead of there in the forum so he could listen to the all-male assembly from behind a curtain, but the grip on power was about to loosen, no Roman woman could hold office. a political position, but from these coins minted at the beginning of Nero's reign it is clear that the important thing about these coins is that they are contemporary documents, they are not laser writings. and they give you the official imperial view, the imperial spin, if you like, there's no court gossip, but that's exactly what the emperors wanted you to see about them.

The Ashmolean Museum in Oxford is home to an extensive collection of ancient Roman coins that vividly tell the story. of Nero and his mother as soon as he becomes emperor, Agropina's power is absolutely evident: his mother, that is his mother, is in front of him and it is the first time an imperial woman is shown on the same side of the coin that the emperor and you. I can see that in some ways she has been given priority because her name and titles are on the obverse of the coin and his name is on the other side and they look at each other almost as equals, but, Of course, it doesn't last. and the next coin shows the next stage in that process because his mother andrepino is still there but nero is shown next to her but he is in front and she is relegated to being behind him so what caused the breakup was not the economics or foreign policy, but a discussion about a girlfriend Nero had fallen madly in love with a woman named Acte he had his official girlfriend Octavia but this was a real woman Aktay was older than Nero sexy mature but she was Greek and a former slave Nero wanted keep news of his mother's affair, but he wanted to get rid of Octavia and marry Acte and when you want to divorce your wife and make a slave empress of Rome, it's a little difficult to keep it a secret.

Agrippina went crazy to the point where she worried that Aktay would have to leave. Poor Nero was forced to run among several senators trying to persuade them that Aktay was actually an eastern princess and therefore eligible for the throne, but no one believed him. Nero had to give up love for her duty and it hurt him. Agrippina may have won, but she hurt her in the long run. Nero's intimidation increasingly forced him into the arms of his advisors, the philosopher Seneca, the head of the Praetorian Guard, Boris, and some elder statesmen who were quite willing to put up with Nero's weaknesses. but not his mother's, a year after assuming control, the balance of power had tilted in favor of 17-year-old Nero, who moved Agrippina to a separate palace for a time and barely spoke to the woman he once knew.

She had once been the perfect mother for him. and we began to undo the myth of the tyrant mirror because even historians like Tacitus, who destroyed Nero's reputation after his death, had to admit that the first five years of his reign were a great success. He returned power to the Senate. He administered the provinces fairly. and he cemented his popularity by giving each citizen a cash donation. When he was a fun-loving teenager, he seemed to have a natural connection with the man on the street. Bread and circuses have always kept the mafia happy, but now Nero came up with a new ploy: in the lottery, he threw small wooden balls with numbers on them over the crowd and if you have a winning number, then you can show up at the palace and claim a luxurious gift, horses, slaves, even a vacation home.I think Nero's popularity came from his In my youth, the fact that he really tried to be a good boy at first and did all the things he was supposed to do, but I think his relationship with the population was particularly strong because he was very generous, he spent a lot, he gave very good entertainment and they really loved Brennan Circus, as we know, and he was also quite approachable, I mean, we are told on several occasions that there are banquets or entertainments where Nero walks through the crowd and really They see it, and I think that means a lot.

For them, Nero started out well, but he found the limitations of being in charge, where he had a personality that he needed to break out like a typical teenager. Anywhere he loved to go out with his companions and get drunk, but preferably without anyone realizing that he was the emperor. if they went to a pub or a brothel he was in disguise, which had its disadvantage because after a particularly rowdy night he would return home with two black eyes although his beer and Seneca advisors gave Nero a long leash, a Roman emperor he was not. . He was supposed to act like Jack Ladd and his mother kept bugging him to behave.

The growing tension with Agrippina came to a head again over a new adventure. Nero was 22 years old. This time the object of his affections was not a slave but a member of the aristocracy called Pompeo. Nero was, of course, married to Octavia, the princess who had given him his passport to half the imperial line. Popeya began to pressure Nero to get a divorce and this became even more urgent when she discovered that she was pregnant and could provide Nero with an heir the only opponent to their relationship was his mother things disintegrate he begins to stop having public meetings or private even with his mother he will not be alone with his mother he does not trust his mother she kept up the pressure she made fun of Nero for being the son of a mummy told him that an emperor should be able to do whatever he wanted subtly she persuaded Nero to think the unthinkable, no one knows for sure when Nero decided to kill his mother, but we do know exactly how he did it and not.

Anyone but him could have come up with such an extravagant plot. He came up with the idea in the theater. He went to a show with some friends and part of the entertainment was a ship that collapsed and a whole series of wild animals came out of the holes. the collapsible boat idea must have gotten stuck he had one built especially to take his mother home after dinner the night of the murder he was waiting in the key sight manned by his loyal naval commander annie catus right at the nick of time halfway there across the bay to Agrippina At home, the ship began to sink, there was general panic, but Agrippina was a natural survivor.

She convinced her maid to impersonate her as she abandoned ship. The maid thought that this would save her life and cried: I am Agrippina, save me, but when the murderers found out about her. They hit her on the head and killed her, meanwhile Agrippina managed to swim until she was picked up by a fishing boat that took her home safely, but not to safety. It must not have been long before the truth dawned on the exhausted and fearful. The news reached Nero that Agrippina had survived in terror, he panicked, ordered Burris to call the Praetorian Guard to finish her off.

Boris refused, saying that his men would never agree to kill a member of the royal family, particularly the daughter of their Germanic hero. In the end, it was the sailor and Iketus who agreed to do it. Nero's thanks are revealing. You have given me my empire, the sailors said at dawn. They broke down the doors of Agrippina's villa when her servants burst in. They fled, leaving her alone to face her executioners. At first she stopped playing to buy time, saying thank you, please return to the palace and say that I have fully recovered, but when they approached, she shouted that her son never ordered her murder in response they hit her on the head with a club she fell to the ground she pointed to the womb that had given birth to Nero and said: hit me here they did what she asked and she died in Rome Boris and Seneca invented the story that Agrippina had committed suicide because her plan to assassinate Nero had been discovered, although they were prepared to cover up for the emperor, they gradually realized that they had lost control over him with this unforgivable act of murder, Nero had crossed the line of tyranny and there was no turning back Nero's reign as emperor had begun with great acclaim but at the age of 22 power had already corrupted him he had murdered his mother so he could divorce his wife Octavia and marry his lover Popeye but Octavia was still a woman of influence in Rome with all the influence of the royal family, so Popeye convinced Nero, for his own good, that he needed to get rid of his ex-wife permanently and there was no one left to tell him that I didn't do it.

She couldn't deal with Nero, the philosopher Seneca. He had retreated to the countryside and his military advisor Burris had died He was replaced by a ruthless man Tigolinus If Seneca and Burus had managed to keep Nero on the rails It was Tigulinas and Popeya who derailed him again They invented a plan for Nero to humiliate and discredit Octavia with a false accusation that she had slept with an Egyptian musician. Her maids were systematically tortured to provide evidence, but Octavia inspired such loyalty that they refused to budge even in death when one of them used her last ounce of strength to spit in Tigliness's face the words my lovers vaginas cleaner than your mouth.

But their plan to humiliate Octavia failed. Not only did they underestimate the loyalty of their servants, but they had also counted on without the affection of the Roman mafia who adored their former empress. They took to the streets in force, throwing Popeye's statues to the ground, reinstating Octavias. and covering them with flowers the people did not like that a descendant of the noble Augustus was treated like trash Nero knew that he would have to come up with a pretty convincing plan to discredit Octavia if he was going to have any chance of surviving, so he invited Agrippina's murderer , Anikatus, to the palace and offered him a stark choice: he could go to the Senate and say that he had slept with Octavia or he could be executed.

He went to the palace and gave a very convincing performance, he said that Octavia not only wanted his body but also wanted to have the navy on her side so she could stage a political coup, everything was going according to plan and Nero said goodbye to Anacatus while he set sail. towards a rich exile in Sardinia. Octavia was taken to an island prison near Naples, where she was quietly murdered after her arrival. Her severed head was sent to Popeye as a trophy. Somehow Nero weathered the storm that followed the crowd. He was pacified with more gifts. and entertainment and Nero stayed to enjoy life with Popeya here on the Palatine wrote poems studied singing and acting and organized evenings with poets and artists could have been remembered as a noble patron of the arts if it were not for Israel's greatest catastrophe , this is the maximum area 2000 years ago, this place would have been as crowded and as exciting as the Cheltenham Gold Cup.

In all the surroundings, here was the chariot racing track with free seating for 300,000 people every way in huge wooden structures with wooden slums behind it was the palace with Nero's royal box, from where he had a panoramic view not only of a day of racing but also of the first flames of the fire that devastated Rome in the oldest historical account, Tacitus writes the The great fire of Rome probably began as a simple accident. The brazier was kicked right outside the stadium. A strong wind was blowing and in moments the flames took over. It was a devastating fire that swept through narrow-platform slums and quickly spread to posh homes.

Nero's palace in Rome had a way: it was the worst fire in history until Hamburg caught the Second World War and it literally burned in people's memory as time passed, people began to tell stories about Nero himself seen on the palace balcony with a liar. maniacally reciting his own epic poem the fall of troy as flames licked the palatine and it is these stories recorded by later propagandists that sealed Nero's reputation, but Tacitus tells us that he was not even in Rome. Nero was actually miles away, here at his holiday villa in Anzio, when it happened immediately, he heard the news, jumped on his horse, returned to Rome and took charge of putting out fires and organizing shelter and food for homeless people day and night.

He could be seen running around the city completely without any of his bodyguards. who he told to go and help fight the fire until finally after nine long days and nights the flames gradually subsided and it didn't stop there when the fire was finally put out, Rome was devastated and there were thousands of homeless refugees . Nero acted quickly to solve the problems caused by the fire, he drastically reduced the price of grain and allowed people to camp in the forum temples while their houses were rebuilt. He also commissioned innovative plans to design a safer city, so why do we remember him as the villain of peace?

The answer is the simplest in history, all these good plans, a tax on fires, made him much more unpopular than killing his mother, he had done well in a crisis, but hitting people in the pocket afterwards was a unforgivable sin and despite his efforts he put out the fire when he began to rebuild his palace rumors began to spread that he had something to do with starting the fire he himself needed a scapegoat and his choice was to seal his reputation throughout of history he messed with a small religious sect that was already deeply unpopular they were called Christians the Romans already deeply distrusted them they refused to take the vow of loyalty to the emperor which was tantamount to treason so when Nero needed someone to blame We know that the persecution was completely unjustified and that the fire started by accident, but at that time the idea of ​​a conspiracy did not seem so far-fetched.

The Christians believed that the world was about to end in a massive conflagration. Their leader had said, "I will throw fire." On earth the punishment was harsh even for such a despised roof; Christians were crucified, fed to wild beasts in the arena, and used as burning torches in Nero's own gardens. These punishments were not invented for Christians. They were all standard Roman ways of dealing with common criminals, but Nero is remembered because he was the first emperor to create. a christian martyr peter's chief disciples who had come to rome to preach the gospel died in the first wave of neron's persecution a basilica of peter was built where peter was murdered a lasting monument to scapegoating neronchis in 64 ce. no one cared that a few Christians were massacred blaming them he could have avoided the blunder of his life Nero had done everything he could to squash rumors about his involvement in the burning of Rome with two architects he had redesigned the city to the public good and the people might have thanked him for it, but a key part of the plan had not included him fencing off a large portion of the devastated city for his own pet project.

Nero's palace on top of the hill looked quite striking before. the fire, but now he and his architects were conceiving a house that would make Louis XIV or John shine by removing the golden house it was a fantastic design villas and palaces gardens and green areas a vast lake and at its entrance the golden statue of Nero as a 120 foot tall god if you look at the plan of ancient rome the golden house took up about a quarter of the city most of it is destroyed but a section of this amazing architectural feat remains because it was used for the foundations of the public baths that were built after Nero's death in Nero's time, all of this would have been open to light, but now it is a vast underground labyrinth.

Rome had never seen anything like it. All the walls and ceilings were covered with great works of art fourteen centuries after Nero, Renaissance artists were still being climbed down the ceiling to study the paintings walking where he walked I began to get a real idea of ​​Nero's mind, He was obviously refined but far from political reality, he wanted popularity, but couldn't see how something so beautiful could convince people. There are things that seem really obvious to me about this building, firstly, it shows that Nero had very good artistic taste, but secondly, how offended the citizens of Rome who had just had their homes burned down must have felt when they saw this enormous Building under construction.

I don't think I ever realized until now that it still existed.In any part of the world a Roman house as big and magnificent as this one and what a house it was, there would have been huge, elaborate tapestries on these walls and the rest of the walls would have been encrusted with gold, precious stones and pearls and there were pipes coming out of them. the walls and ceiling to bathe visitors with aromas and flower petals and this room that was the centerpiece rotated, it was a rotunda and rotated day and night. night in sync with the stars was the largest, most luxurious and elegant Roman nightclub in the entire universe.

Nero invested public money in the construction of the golden house and that distanced him from the mafia that had always supported him before. Nero could have survived that unpopularity if he had not terminally offended the aristocracy, the ideal was a great military model like Julius one that promoted poetry, theater and peaceful games as the Greeks had done with the Roman elite, this It created a great division between them and Nero for them was all effeminate. foreign nonsense and what is even more inappropriate behavior for an emperor, worse still, Nero not only promoted these cultural activities, but actually participated in them.

It is a Roman-style singing practice. Weights usually made of lead placed on the chest to strengthen breathing. Nero embarked on a Greek-inspired style. all-consuming athletic and artistic career he wanted to be a lying gambler and professional singer other emperors like caligula had acted in private but this was really serious a strict diet and exercise regimen he detoxified for days drinking only chives preserved in oil and when they hurt the muscles from the rigor of the exercise, he rubbed them with dry manure. Everything was focused on getting him into top professional shape. Nero was leading an artistic crusade.

Rome could have conquered Greece, but the emperor. He was now giving prominence to Greek ideas and culture, but for Nero treading the boards was not just a cultural campaign, it was a way to increase his self-esteem. He had always acted like a liar and recited poetry to invited audiences. The applause gave. He gave him the illusion of instant affection and adulation, so in 65 AD, when he was rapidly losing political popularity, he naturally went on tour. Nero decided to go public and jumped into the limelight for a career as a professional actor. His first performance was in Naples, then a Greek speaker.

The city and the crowd went crazy, of course, his thin, reedy voice helped by the acoustics of the amphitheater. If you talk from here you sound pretty normal, but if you stay here your voice sounds like that of a god. The Greek population of Naples loved it, they cheered, they applauded. encore but like a rock star it went to his head the adulation he had always craved was finally within his reach and now nothing would stand in the way of his ambitions on a wave of popular acclaim he embarked on a crazy and wild artistic conquest In Greece itself it could not be said that it was a modest effect: two thousand carts of men with equipment, including five thousand paid applauders, to ensure that it received an enthusiastic reception at each concert that the four main Greek festivals attended annually to fit into Nero's calendar. everything took place during his visit and he entered everyone in front of the judges was the ruler of the known world this was a man who had made them change customs established for centuries and rescheduled entire competitions but he was sweating he wiped his forehead with his arm he was so nervous that On one occasion he dropped his scepter while performing a dramatic play and he really thought the judges would rate him for it, of course they didn't and when they solemnly awarded him the winner's laurels he was pleased flattered emotionally there were 1800 contests that year and Nero won first prize in 1800 from them in Greece.

Nero was really popular, especially because he declared the country tax-free, but in Rome they were horrified by Nero's antics and, to make matters worse, he rewarded them. he himself was a triumph the traditional celebration of the return of a military hero instead of the emblems of successful battles and captured prisoners he paraded his lorenzo before members of the senate was degrading to the name of rome it was not what a man should be doing Roman emperor Nero's grip on reality was loosening, the abandoned empire was falling apart, he had never bothered to visit military posts and this lack of interest was coming back to haunt him, but when rebellions broke out and his army began to desert, Nero seemed paralyzed, he simply sat down. at home unable to act then in June 68 AD.

The emperor woke up one night and found the palace deserted. This was not a good sign. His praetorian guards had gone to a secret meeting of the senate. The same senate he had given power to was now turning its back on the cold, hard reality, finally sunk. In Nero was alone, still in his nightclothes, he fled the palace looking for a place to hide. The wisest thing would have been to head to the port of Austria where he could have gone abroad to gather his loyal forces abroad, but he couldn't think clearly, He met three slaves who got horses and took him to a villa on the outskirts of the city.

When they arrived, they found the front door locked and had to crawl through the door. Among the weeds at the side entrance they were now hidden and there was nothing to do but wait. Finally a messenger arrived with the news that Nero had been declared an enemy of the State and had been sentenced to death in the old fashion. Nero had no idea what that meant and asked one of the slaves, who told him that they would strip him naked and parade him through the streets of Rome with his head held on a forked branch and then stone him to death.

The slave added politely that suicide might be best. option when it dawned he saw how they were digging his grave then some Roman soldiers approached and with the help of a slave he stabbed himself in the throat his last words were what an artist dies with me he was 30 years and 6 months old the last of Julius Claudius's line that Dating back to Augustus Nero marked the end of a dynasty and the end of an era. The first emperors Julius Caesar and Augustus had persuaded the Roman people that one person ruling was a good thing over the course of a century.

There had been six emperors, but the dynasty had degenerated into corruption and self-indulgent tyranny. Rome stuck with the idea of ​​an emperor, but after Caligula and Nero it became clear that simply being related to Caesar and Augustus was not enough after a year of chaotic civil war. war the next emperor vespasian was not related to anyone special but he was what the empire needed a leader with common sense in an attempt to erase the memory of Nero he tore down the golden house he drained the lake and where Nero's great colossus had been he built the public theater we call the coliseum, but Nero was too colorful a character to be forgotten.

Nero saw himself as an artist, his enemies considered him a tyrant and a buffoon, the truth is he was all three, he certainly wasn't very good at running an empire, but then what did Rome expect if you put a Broke 16 year old in charge of half the known world? You are looking for troubles. Rome learned the hard way from now on it abandoned Giulio Claudius's line of emperors in favor of skillful administrators, but Nero left his mark on history, whatever he was, he was a showman, he did everything big, from building his house until he killed his mother, he considered himself an actor, but no group performed on stage. he could match the drama, spectacle and sheer theatricality of his own life.