The Lives of the Caesars, Suetonius [best book club books for discussion .TXT] 📗

24.2. ↩

Of course confiscating their property. ↩

According to Dio, 60.35 (at the end) the saying was original with Nero; but as Dio calls it “a remark not unworthy of record,” it perhaps became proverbial among the Greeks. ↩

But cf. Nero, 9. ↩

The pun on morari, “to linger, remain” and mōrari, “to play the fool,” seems untranslatable. ↩

Against assassination (De sicariis), including poisoning, passed by Sulla and renewed by Julius Caesar. ↩

For her past offences; see Tacitus Annals 12.66. ↩

See Juvenal I.71 f. ↩

The inventor was his freedman Anicetus; Tacitus Annals 14.3. ↩

See Augustus, 71.3. ↩

Given by the future emperor Otho; see Otho, 3. ↩

Tacitus tells us that some denied this; Annals 14.9. ↩

That is, “when I see you arrived at man’s estate.” The first shaving of the beard by a young Roman was a symbolic act, usually performed at the age of twenty-one with due ceremony; see Nero, 12.3, above. According to Tacitus Annals 14.15, and Dio, 61.19, Nero first shaved his beard in 59 AD at the age of twenty-one and commemorated the event by establishing the Juvenales ludi or Juvenalia (Nero, 11.1). ↩

A brutal pun. Just as the consular insignia or ornamenta were given in place of the regular office (See Claudius, 5), and the triumphal insignia in place of a triumph, so Octavia ought to be content with being the emperor’s wife in name only. ↩

Anicetus was at the time prefect of the praetorian fleet at Misenum; see Tacitus Annals 14.62. ↩

See Claudius, 27.1. ↩

Seneca’s speech and Nero’s reply are preserved by Tacitus (Annals 14.53⁠–⁠56). ↩

Pallas and Doryphorus; see Tacitus Annals 14.65. ↩

Tacitus mentions two comets, one in 60 and the other in 64; see Annals 14.22; 15.47. ↩

As Dio says (62.24) “they desired at the same time to be rid of these evils and to give Nero his release from them.” Death with the only remedy for one as far gone in wickedness; hence in attempting to apply this remedy, they were doing him a favour. Cf. also Tacitus Annals 15.68. ↩

The capsarii carried the children’s books and writing materials in a box (capsa). ↩

The Greek word means “a glutton,” or something stronger. ↩

Such a salutation was usual; see Pliny Panegyricus Traiani XXIII. ↩

A line put by Dio, 58.23, into the mouth of Tiberius. It is believed to be from the Bellerophon, a lost play of Euripides. ↩

But cf. Tacitus Annals 15.38. ↩

Insulae here refers to blocks of houses, or tenements, in which rooms were rented to the poorer classes; domus to detached houses or mansions. ↩

A tower connected with the house and gardens of Maecenas on the Esquiline; see Horace Odes, 3.29.10, molem propinquam nubibus arduis. It was probably connected with the Palatine by the domus transitoria; see Nero, 21.2 and Tacitus Annals 15.39, whose account, as well as that of Dio, 62.18, differs from that of Suetonius. ↩

Probably a composition of his own; cf. Juvenal 8.221 and Vitellius, 11.2. ↩

Venus Libitina, in whose temple funeral outfits and a register of deaths were kept; cf. Horace, Horatii Flacci Sermonum II.6, 19. ↩

Camulodunum (Meldon) and Verulamium (St. Albans); according to Xiphilinus (61.1) 80,000 perished. ↩

The numerical value of the Greek letters in Nero’s name (1005) is the same as that of the rest of the sentence; hence we have an equation, Nero = the slayer of one’s own mother. ↩

Referring to Nero’s design mentioned in Nero, 37.3. ↩

If the text is right, the remark must be of a general nature (“us” = mankind). Dio, 63.27, who reads διαθρέψει, says that Nero when planning to kill the senators, burn Rome, and sail to Alexandria, said: “Even though we be driven from our empire, yet this little artistic gift of ours shall support us there;” i.e. at Alexandria. ↩

Cf. Nero, 7.1. ↩

This and the following sentences show Nero’s utter failure to realize the real gravity of the situation and his fluctuation between panic fear and fatuous confidence. ↩

Implying that Nero would have been the centre of attraction, if he were not otherwise engaged. ↩

Since Nero commanded the army, the consul in question must be himself; hence the se of ς is unnecessary. ↩

Instead of to their landlords. These people had no rating on the census list and their contribution took this form. ↩

That is, tested by fire; see Pliny, Natural History 33.59. ↩

By using, for his own purposes, ships which would have otherwise been loaded with grain; but the text and the meaning are uncertain. ↩

Doubtless an allusion to the long hair which he wore during his Greek trip; see Nero, 51. ↩

In contrast with those of the stage. ↩

The one in which parricides were put; see Augustus, 33.1.