The Splendor Before the Dark

by Margaret George

  During these four years, the second chapter of his life, come the events forever associated with him. At age thirty, after a succession of unique and unforgettable performances, he exited the stage of life.

  But not completely. He is one of the few historical personages to have a busy posthumous existence. In the two decades following his death, there were at least three Nero impersonators who claimed to be the late emperor and gathered followers. Like Elvis, there were also numerous Nero “sightings” in various locations.

  Today his name is a household word, when most of the other fifty-five Roman emperors have been forgotten. His image is unmistakable, as he dared to allow himself to be pictured as he really was on coins, double chin and all. It is not quite the sort of fame he had hoped for, but to have achieved it at all against such long odds is remarkable.

  For the events of these four years of his life, we have the same main three ancient authorities: Tacitus, Suetonius, and Dio Cassius, with the crucial difference that Tacitus does not cover the last two years of his life, a lamentable gap. That makes it much harder to pinpoint the chronology of his sudden fall from power and to identify the details, which are murky. The other two, Dio Cassius and Suetonius, are much less interested in the context, which of course is what latter-day historians want to analyze.

  All three have a well-known bias against Nero, writing at a later time and during the reign of a different dynasty, when it was important to belittle the accomplishments of the predecessor as much as possible. As a result, he has been entirely defined by his enemies, having had the bad luck that none of the countering accounts by people favorable to him have survived. Bits and pieces of additional information about Nero and his times are found in the writings of Pliny the Elder, Plutarch, Josephus, Dio Chrysostom of Prusa, Pausanias, Flavius Philostratus, St. Jerome, Martial, and others.

  The modern historian Bernard Henderson says that with the reign of Vespasian (AD 69–79) “begins that systematic disparagement of Nero which consciously or unconsciously colors the whole of our extant records.” Archaeologist Elisabetta Segala, author of the Superintendent of Archaeology of Rome’s official guidebook to the Golden House, says, “The main sources for the history of Nero’s principate—Tacitus (AD 54/55–120), Suetonius (AD 70–140), and Dio Cassius (AD 155–235)—all derive, directly or indirectly, from the political opposition and seem to be unanimously hostile to the emperor. Literary testimony and the Christian tradition, which soon identified Nero with the Antichrist, have all contributed to the formation of the totally negative image of the emperor which has come down to us.”

  Michael Grant, another modern historian, notes, “But much the most serious problem we have to confront still has to be mentioned. It consists of the long time that elapsed between Nero’s death and the dates when these surviving accounts were written. Tacitus composed his Annals something like fifty years after Nero died, and Suetonius’ Life [of Nero] was later still; while yet another hundred years had passed before Dio Cassius wrote. It is extraordinarily difficult to see what someone like Nero was really like when you are relying on authorities as late as that.”

  But help has finally arrived, as modern historians, trained to scientifically analyze material, such as coinage and manuscript texts, rather than take them at face value, have much more stringent standards of judgment. And recent archaeological findings, such as the discovery of that engineering marvel, Nero’s rotating dining room, the coenatio rotunda, long thought to be just a legend, are altering our appreciation of, and opinion of, Nero and his reign in its setting. We can also judge him now in the context of performance art, in which he was a genius. In addition, our changing mind-set about subjects such as gender fluidity and identity and same-sex marriage make us see him in a new and more forgiving perspective. Such a simple shift in lighting can reveal new facets. The person I discovered was a truly visionary artist and far from the monster of cruelty his enemies had depicted. He didn’t deserve the calumny his opponents heaped on him, and hopefully in our day people will finally come to view him as the complex person he was—certainly with faults but also with redeeming qualities.

  It is always rewarding to return someone to his or her rightful place, and I hope that this volume helps to do that for Nero, or at least persuade people to stop and think about him a little differently.

  In writing it, I had to make many choices of what to include, what to emphasize, and what to leave out, and I will explain them here for my readers. This volume covers many of the events that are integral to the legend of Nero. In the novel I follow the conviction of the historian Edward Champlin, who, in his book Nero, explains, “I have assumed that his actions were rational—that is, he was not crazy—and that much of what he did resonated far more with contemporary social attitudes than our hostile sources would have us believe.” He mentions that “for most of Nero’s actions, even the most notorious . . . we can find a purpose which may have nothing to do with the motives ascribed to him.” In the novel, I have ascribed only motives to him that, to me, seem explanatory and likely.

  * * *

  • • •

  With that in mind, let’s review the main events of Nero’s life covered in this novel.

  First, the Great Fire of Rome has given rise to the saying, “Nero fiddled while Rome burned.” Although Nero was not in Rome when it started, and he came rushing back and threw himself wholeheartedly into relief measures, a rumor started that he had stood and sung of the fall of Troy while watching the flames. He was known to have composed an epic on that subject and had performed it on stage, so it was a natural enough thought that the Fire was just too good a backdrop for him to pass up. There is no evidence that he did this, and the rumors have him performing in three different places.

  After the Fire was over, the fact that he set aside large areas in the center of Rome for his new sprawling palace complex made people accuse him of starting the Fire to clear the area for his own purposes. In vain could he note that his own recently finished palace, the Domus Transitoria, had been lost in the Fire; in vain could he point out that the Fire had started in an area far from the new palace complex.

  In truth, Rome was a firetrap and burned many times, always by accident. There is no reason to think this Fire was any different or set on purpose. And in spite of Nero’s measures to make the city safer and avoid future fires, only sixteen years later, in AD 80, there was another big fire; although not as big as the one in AD 64, it still lasted three days.

  Second, the first historical persecution of the Christians arose in the aftermath of the Great Fire of Rome. It is usually framed like this: Nero needed a scapegoat for the Fire, to shift the blame from himself, and he settled on the Christians. That is a simplistic version. The truth is that mysterious people were seen setting new fires and hindering the official firefighters during the height of the Fire. No one knew who they were; some even accused Nero of sending his agents out as arsonists. Others suspected the Christians, who were seen at that time as criminals, antisocial nuisances, and a mysterious, un-Roman cult. Their waiting for the apocryphal “end time” made it credible that they were trying to hurry it along by destroying the world around them.

  Nero probably genuinely believed that the Christians were involved, as did many others. The punishments meted out to them were in accord with Roman custom. Arsonists were burned. Criminals were crucified. Suetonius even lists the persecution of the Christians as one of the good things Nero did, illustrating the general contempt of them in Rome.

  We do not know how widespread the persecution was. Contrary to common belief, people were not condemned for being Christians but for being arsonists. It is curious that this persecution is not attested to in the early Church writings. Did they not know about it? Or were the numbers small enough that at the time of the first records, the Church fathers were unfamiliar with it? That Peter and Paul were executed during this time is a legend. We do not know when they were a
ctually executed or whether it was connected with this.

  Afterward, to the Christians, since the letters of his name added up to 666 in Hebrew, he became the Beast of the Book of Revelation, and the belief of some people that he would return linked him to the Antichrist. As late as the twelfth century, his evil ghost was thought to inhabit crows nesting in a walnut tree near his tomb, so Pope Paschal II (1099–1118) ordered the tree cut down and a church built on the spot.

  Third, Nero is accused of kicking his pregnant wife, Poppaea, to death. Dio Cassius says that he leapt upon her with his feet, either on purpose or accidentally. Suetonius says she was in ill health when he kicked her, angry that she scolded him for coming home late from the races. Tacitus says that he kicked her in anger but that some sources say he poisoned her, which Tacitus rebuts, saying, “this sounds malevolent rather than truthful, and I do not believe it—for Nero loved his wife and wanted children.”

  Modern historians tend to doubt any of this and think it is more likely she just died of a miscarriage, noting also that there is no record of Nero physically attacking anyone or being physically abusive to those around him.

  The fourth shocking Nero legend, that he castrated an ex-slave who looked like Poppaea, married him, and called him her name, grows out of the death of Poppaea. As with all the other legends, it is much more complex than that. The freedman Sporus had an uncanny resemblance to Poppaea. Nero’s grief over her death was almost pathological. He wore masks resembling her when he performed female parts on stage. But that, apparently, was not enough. In his grief for her, he attempted to re-create her, much as the James Stewart character does for the dead Madeleine in Alfred Hitchcock’s Vertigo. It was a refusal to let go of someone in death, and as in the movie, one might even say it bordered on obsession. He did keep Sporus with him for the rest of his life, and Sporus was one of the few with him at his death. What Sporus thought of this we can never know. One assumes he was at least complaisant about it, for after Nero’s death he committed suicide rather than go on with anyone else. It might also be noted that the “marriage” took place in Greece, where mythologizing and playacting was more routine, and people more tolerant, rather than in Rome, and seemed to be an act of theater.

  The fifth big event in Nero’s life, and his last spectacular, was his sixteen-month artistic and athletic tour of Greece, competing in all the major contests (Olympia, Delphi, Nemea, and Isthmia) as well as a host of minor ones. He competed in music (cithara), drama (classical tragedy), and sport (chariot racing). One might ask why in the world a Roman emperor would want to do this. One of his biographers, Michael Grant, says, “He was the first ruler in all recorded history, and indeed the only one of any real importance, to consider himself primarily as a singer and stage actor.” It seems that from the very beginning he needed to create an identity for himself that had nothing to do with being a Julio-Claudian or emperor. Art became his refuge and, as pressures of his office increased, his escape. He needed to perform, and he needed to compete, and in Greece he would be competing at the highest level.

  Unfortunately for him, it was impossible for him to have an impartial judgment on his talents, either in his own time or for posterity. People assume he must have been a poor singer or actor, and stories went around of his audience being held captive and feigning death to escape from the theater, women giving birth in the theater, and so on. They make amusing tales but are unlikely to be true. Being emperor did not mandate that he be untalented. It is more likely that he was quite good, or else he wouldn’t have pursued those avenues. Still he could never know how good, because he could not get honest feedback. We do know that after his death his music compositions were preserved in The Master’s Book and performed by others, which would indicate that they had merit, as there was no longer any need to flatter him.

  We must address the damnatio memoriae issue. It is commonly stated that Nero underwent this official “damnation of memory,” an erasure of his existence, as nearly as feasible. In truth this phrase is a modern one and not an official judgment enacted in ancient Rome; the term did not exist. It is true that when an emperor fell, his enemies did everything they could to blacken his name and desecrate his memorials, throwing over statues, chiseling his name out from monuments, and so on. This happened to Nero, although only a few months later, the statues reappeared in the Forum. This also happened to pagan statues vandalized by Christians. But these were spontaneous acts, not official ones.

  In addition to addressing these widespread myths about Nero and setting the record straight, I also made some choices for my depiction of Nero and his world that were more personal.

  As in the first book, I use feet and miles rather than kilometers, simply because the Romans did, although they vary slightly from our modern feet and miles. It seemed more in keeping with the time period. I also use modern place names, such as “Near Spain” rather than “Hispania Tarraconensis,” which I feel the modern reader would more easily understand. I also try to avoid “Asia” because to the Romans it meant what we call Turkey. Likewise I avoided using “Africa” because the Romans meant it for the part of that continent bordering the Mediterranean, whereas we think of sub-Saharan Africa when we see that word.

  For some very minor and entirely fictional characters, who exist only to present a letter or argue briefly in the Senate, then vanish from the narrative, I have used fictional names.

  You will look in vain for the exact date of the eclipse in AD 64, for it is fictional.

  In the novel I mention a bronze toy chariot that was given to Nero as a boy by the emperor Claudius. This chariot, the only replica model we have of an ancient Roman chariot, is in the British Museum and is often referred to as “Nero’s chariot” although of course there is no proof it belonged to him.

  The play Octavia is the only surviving historical play from ancient Rome. For a long time it was thought to have been written by Seneca, as it was found among his papers, and that played a part in its preservation. But it is now thought to belong to a later period—scholars are not agreed on exactly when—after the death of Nero, when it would have been safe to perform such a play, if indeed it was ever performed. Scholars are not sure of that, either. However, since it was important in the novel that Nero himself see what was being said about him, I left it with the old interpretation that Seneca had written it. We still don’t know who wrote it or when.

  The chronology of the Greek tour is very sketchy, as we are missing Tacitus, who was meticulous in compiling dates. Scholars have put together probable dates. We know Nero was in Corinth at the end of the tour because we have the date of his proclamation of the Liberation of Greece and that Helios arrived to bring him home shortly after that. It is interesting that the Corinthian Canal that was finally dug in the nineteenth century followed exactly the lines that Nero’s engineers had excavated, and traces of the excavation were still there, along with an image of Hercules that was carved on the rock wall at one end of the canal by the workers.

  A treasured survival from the Greek tour is a stela recording Nero’s “Liberation of Greece” speech, which I quote in the novel. Oddly, it is the only speech of his that we possess, and it captures his language and histrionic flair. The carved inscription from grateful citizens was found in the Greek town of Akraiphia in Boeotia.

  Likewise the chronology of the fall of Nero is murky. Much of the explanatory material of what went on is missing, with the result that it seems incomplete and puzzling to us. However, the description of the last day of Nero’s life, in Suetonius, is a masterpiece of dramatic writing, almost Shakespearean. The tiny details—a barefoot, hasty midnight ride; brambles in his cloak; tepid water; mumbling to himself in the first, second, and third person in Greek and Latin; and finally his famous last words—“What an artist the world is losing!”—are incomparable in dramatic intensity.

  I have chosen to omit mention of Statilia’s former husbands prior to Vestinus—we are not sure h
ow many there were or if Vestinus was her only one.

  I chose to have Acte tell us of the aftermath of Nero’s life, including the important information about the three false Neros and how he was regarded after some years had passed. Locusta as well provided a glimpse into the immediate aftermath. Unfortunately for her, her hopes of being freed were in vain, and she was executed, along with a number of other people from the Neronian regime, by Galba.

  I have been blessed with many outstanding books and sources for my work. First, of course, are the three histories I mentioned earlier: Tacitus, The Annals of Imperial Rome (London: Penguin Classics, 1985); Suetonius, The Twelve Caesars (London: Penguin Books, 1986); and Dio Cassius, Roman History, Books 61–70 (Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1925). For biographies, I found that the oldest (and still the longest one in English), Bernard W. Henderson’s Life and Principate of the Emperor Nero (Philadelphia: Lippincott, 1903), was very good in providing many small personal details that helped make the book intimate. Michael Grant’s Nero: Emperor in Revolt (New York: American Heritage Press, 1970) served as a basic go-to book for clear explanations and all pertinent facts. Miriam T. Griffin’s Nero: The End of a Dynasty (New Haven, CT: Yale University Press, 1985) proved to be a treasure chest of information and analysis on him and the period. Stephen Dando-Collins’s book The Great Fire of Rome: The Fall of the Emperor Nero and His City (Philadelphia: Da Capo Press, 2010) also has much more information than on just the fire, but it is excellent on that, and his Nero’s Killing Machine: The True Story of Rome’s Remarkable Fourteenth Legion (Hoboken, NJ: John Wiley & Sons, 2005) covers the war with Boudicca. Richard Holland’s Nero: The Man behind the Myth (Stroud, UK: Sutton, 2000) is good on the psychology of Nero, and Edward Champlin’s Nero (Cambridge, MA: Belknap Press of Harvard University Press, 2003) is superlative in analyzing the person inside the myth and the method in his madness—if indeed it was madness. Last, from editors Emma Buckley and Martin T. Dinter, A Companion to the Neronian Age (Chichester, UK: Wiley-Blackwell, 2013) provides invaluable information on a variety of facets of Nero, military, mythological, artistic, and psychological.