NERO (37-68 A.D.)
This essay reviews the transl
This is an excerpt from the paper...
This essay reviews the translation of Robert Graves, as revised by Michael Grant, of Suetonius' chapter on Nero, the last Caesarean Emperor. It portrays Nero as a man and a ruler who is so beset and eventually overcome by his personal insecurities and his vices that he became a bloodthirsty, paranoid and ineffective tyrant whose downfall after a short reign of 14 years between the ages of 17 and 31 came about because he was universally detested. The author's narrative style is compelling and revealing of stark reality. His treatment of his subject was advanced for his times because most contemporary historians tended to eulogize their rulers or deal with them superficially. However, the book may fall short of being a comprehensive and accurate analysis of Nero and his times in that it fails to offer a comprehensive explanation for the bizarre behavior and other events Suetonius recounts. Genetic origins. Nero's ancestors in composite seemed to exemplify the tendencies which were later manifest in him. They were described in order of their remoteness in time from Nero, respectively, as having "an iron face and a heart of lead," "an indecisive man, though he had a furious temper," "without doubt the best member of the family," who nonetheless betrayed his patron Mark Antony to Octavius Caesar out of private erotic motives, "notorious for his arrogance, extravagance and cruelty," and last, Nero's father "a wholly despica
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ppea, by kicking her to death while she was pregnant and ill (233). Suetonius says that "Nero was no less cruel to strangers than to members of his family" (233). After one "wholesale massacre of the nobility, no considerations of selection or moderation restrained Nero from murdering anyone he pleased, on whatever pretext" (234-235).
Downfall
If Nero's lack of self-restraint contributed to his downfall, as his vices became self-destructively obsessive, Suetonius suggests that the difference between the early and latter phases of Nero's rule was more the result of circumstances than of any changes in Nero's basically corrupt nature:
Claudius was the first victim of his murderous career: because, though Nero may not have been actually responsible for the poisoning of his adoptive father, he knew all about it, as he later admitted (230).
In Suetonius' view, Nero's earlier moderation was the result of Nero's cunning, his devious flattery and generosity the actions of someone not yet secure in his power base. In thus going into Nero's motives, often on the basis of apochryphal evidence, Suetonius ventures on dangerous ground for any historian when he engages in amateur psychiatry, which the scientific knowledge of his times c
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Approximate Word count = 2030
Approximate Pages = 8 (250 words per page)
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