Tacitus: Annals: Book 4 [1]

The Works of Tacitus

tr. by Alfred John Church and William Jackson Brodribb

[1864-1877]

Tacitus: Annals Book 4 [1]

A.D. 23-28

1. THE year when Caius Asinius and Caius Antistius were consuls was the ninth
of Tiberius’s reign, a period of tranquillity for the State and prosperity for
his own house, for he counted Germanicus’s death a happy incident. Suddenly
fortune deranged everything; the emperor became a cruel tyrant, as well as an
abettor of cruelty in others. Of this the cause and origin was Aelius Sejanus,
commander of the praetorian cohorts, of whose influence I have already spoken.
I will now fully describe his extraction, his character, and the daring wickedness
by which he grasped at power. Born at Vulsinii, the son of Seius Strabo, a Roman
knight, he attached himself in his early youth to Caius Caesar, grandson of
the Divine Augustus, and the story went that he had sold his person to Apicius,
a rich debauchee. Soon afterwards he won the heart of Tiberius so effectually
by various artifices that the emperor, ever dark and mysterious towards others,
was with Sejanus alone careless and freespoken. It was not through his craft,
for it was by this very weapon that he was overthrown; it was rather from heaven’s
wrath against Rome, to whose welfare his elevation and his fall were alike disastrous.
He had a body which could endure hardships, and a daring spirit. He was one
who screened himself, while he was attacking others; he was as cringing as he
was imperious; before the world he affected humility; in his heart he lusted
after supremacy, for the sake of which he sometimes lavish and luxurious, but
oftener energetic and watchful, qualities quite as mischievous when hypocritically
assumed for the attainment of sovereignty.

2. He strengthened the hitherto moderate powers of his office by concentrating
the cohorts scattered throughout the capital into one camp, so that they might
all receive orders at the same moment, and that the sight of their numbers and
strength might give confidence to themselves, while it would strike terror into
the citizens. His pretexts were the demoralisation incident to a dispersed soldiery,
the greater effectiveness of simultaneous action in the event of a sudden peril,
and the stricter discipline which would be insured by the establishment of an
encampment at a distance from the temptations of the city. As soon as the camp
was completed, he crept gradually into the affections of the soldiers by mixing
with them and addressing them by name, himself selecting the centurions and
tribunes. With the Senate too he sought to ingratiate himself, distinguishing
his partisans with offices and provinces, Tiberius readily yielding, and being
so biassed that not only in private conversation but before the senators and
the people he spoke highly of him as the partner of his toils, and allowed his
statues to be honoured in theatres, in forums, and at the head-quarters of our
legions.

3. There were however obstacles to his ambition in the imperial house with
its many princes, a son in youthful manhood and grown-up grandsons. As it would
be unsafe to sweep off such a number at once by violence, while craft would
necessitate successive intervals in crime, he chose, on the whole, the stealthier
way and to begin with Drusus, against whom he had the stimulus of a recent resentment.
Drusus, who could not brook a rival and was somewhat irascible, had, in a casual
dispute, raised his fist at Sejanus, and, when he defended himself, had struck
him in the face. On considering every plan Sejanus thought his easiest revenge
was to turn his attention to Livia, Drusus’s wife. She was a sister of Germanicus,
and though she was not handsome as a girl, she became a woman of surpassing
beauty. Pretending an ardent passion for her, he seduced her, and having won
his first infamous triumph, and assured that a woman after having parted with
her virtue will hesitate at nothing, he lured her on to thoughts of marriage,
of a share in sovereignty, and of her husband’s destruction. And she, the niece
of Augustus, the daughter-in-law of Tiberius, the mother of children by Drusus,
for a provincial paramour, foully disgraced herself, her ancestors, and her
descendants, giving up honour and a sure position for prospects as base as they
were uncertain. They took into their confidence Eudemus, Livia’s friend and
physician, whose profession was a pretext for frequent secret interviews. Sejanus,
to avert his mistress’s jealousy, divorced his wife Apicata, by whom he had
had three children. Still the magnitude of the crime caused fear and delay,
and sometimes a conflict of plans.

4. Meanwhile, at the beginning of this year, Drusus, one of the children
of Germanicus, assumed the dress of manhood, with a repetition of the honours
decreed by the Senate to his brother Nero. The emperor added a speech with warm
praise of his son for sharing a father’s affection to his brother’s children.
Drusus indeed, difficult as it is for power and mutual harmony to exist side
by side, had the character of being kindly disposed or at least not unfriendly
towards the lads. And now the old plan, so often insincerely broached, of a
progress through the provinces, was again discussed. The emperor’s pretext was
the number of veterans on the eve of discharge and the necessity of fresh levies
for the army. Volunteers were not forthcoming, and even if they were sufficiently
numerous, they had not the same bravery and discipline, as it is chiefly the
needy and the homeless who adopt by their own choice a soldier’s life. Tiberius
also rapidly enumerated the legions and the provinces which they had to garrison.
I too ought, I think, to go through these details, and thus show what forces
Rome then had under arms, what kings were our allies, and how much narrower
then were the limits of our empire.

5. Italy on both seas was guarded by fleets, at Misenum and at Ravenna, and
the contiguous coast of Gaul by ships of war captured in the victory of Actium,
and sent by Augustus powerfully manned to the town of Forojulium. But chief
strength was on the Rhine, as a defence alike against Germans and Gauls, and
numbered eight legions. Spain, lately subjugated, was held by three. Mauretania
was king Juba’s, who had received it as a gift from the Roman people. The rest
of Africa was garrisoned by two legions, and Egypt by the same number. Next,
beginning with Syria, all within the entire tract of country stretching as far
as the Euphrates, was kept in restraint by four legions, and on this frontier
were Iberian, Albanian, and other kings, to whom our greatness was a protection
against any foreign power. Thrace was held by Rhoemetalces and the children
of Cotys; the bank of the Danube by two legions in Pannonia, two in Moesia,
and two also were stationed in Dalmatia, which, from the situation of the country,
were in the rear of the other four, and, should Italy suddenly require aid,
not to distant to be summoned. But the capital was garrisoned by its own special
soldiery, three city, nine praetorian cohorts, levied for the most part in Etruria
and Umbria, or ancient Latium and the old Roman colonies. There were besides,
in commanding positions in the provinces, allied fleets, cavalry and light infantry,
of but little inferior strength. But any detailed account of them would be misleading,
since they moved from place to place as circumstances required, and had their
numbers increased and sometimes diminished.

6. It is however, I think, a convenient opportunity for me to review the
hitherto prevailing methods of administration in the other departments of the
State, inasmuch as that year brought with it the beginning of a change for the
worse in Tiberius’s policy. In the first place, public business and the most
important private matters were managed by the Senate: the leading men were allowed
freedom of discussion, and when they stooped to flattery, the emperor himself
checked them. He bestowed honours with regard to noble ancestry, military renown,
or brilliant accomplishments as a civilian, letting it be clearly seen that
there were no better men to choose. The consul and the praetor retained their
prestige; inferior magistrates exercised their authority; the laws too, with
the single exception of cases of treason, were properly enforced. As to the
duties on corn, the indirect taxes and other branches of the public revenue,
they were in the hands of companies of Roman knights. The emperor intrusted
his own property to men of the most tried integrity or to persons known only
by their general reputation, and once appointed they were retained without any
limitation, so that most of them grew old in the same employments. The city
populace indeed suffered much from high prices, but this was no fault of the
emperor, who actually endeavoured to counteract barren soils and stormy seas
with every resource of wealth and foresight. And he was also careful not to
distress the provinces by new burdens, and to see that in bearing the old they
were safe from any rapacity or oppression on the part of governors. Corporal
punishments and confiscations of property were unknown.

7. The emperor had only a few estates in Italy, slaves on a moderate scale,
and his household was confined to a few freedmen. If ever he had a dispute with
a private person, it was decided in the law courts. All this, not indeed with
any graciousness, but in a blunt fashion which often alarmed, he still kept
up, until the death of Drusus changed everything. While he lived, the system
continued, because Sejanus, as yet only in the beginning of his power, wished
to be known as an upright counsellor, and there was one whose vengeance he dreaded,
who did not conceal his hatred and incessantly complained “that a stranger was
invited to assist in the government while the emperor’s son was alive. How near
was the step of declaring the stranger a colleague! Ambition at first had a
steep path before it; when once the way had been entered, zealous adherents
were forthcoming. Already, at the pleasure of the commander of the guards, a
camp had been established; the soldiers given into his hands; his statues were
to be seen among the monuments of Cneius Pompeius; his grandsons would be of
the same blood as the family of the Drusi. Henceforth they must pray that he
might have self-control, and so be contented.” So would Drusus talk, not unfrequently,
or only in the hearing of a few persons. Even his confidences, now that his
wife had been corrupted, were betrayed.

8. Sejanus accordingly thought that he must be prompt, and chose a poison
the gradual working of which might be mistaken for a natural disorder. It was
given to Drusus by Lygdus, a eunuch, as was ascertained eight years later. As
for Tiberius, he went to the Senate house during the whole time of the prince’s
illness, either because he was not afraid, or to show his strength of mind,
and even in the interval between his death and funeral. Seeing the consuls,
in token of their grief, sitting on the ordinary benches, he reminded them of
their high office and of their proper place; and when the Senate burst into
tears, suppressing a groan, he revived their spirits with a fluent speech. “He
knew indeed that he might be reproached for thus encountering the gaze of the
Senate after so recent an affliction. Most mourners could hardly bear even the
soothing words of kinsfolk or to look on the light of day. And such were not
to be condemned as weak. But he had sought a more manly consolation in the bosom
of the commonwealth.” Then deploring the extreme age of Augusta, the childhood
of his grandsons, and his own declining years, he begged the Senate to summon
Germanicus’s children, the only comfort under their present misery. The consuls
went out, and having encouraged the young princes with kind words, brought them
in and presented them to the emperor. Taking them by the hand he said: “Senators,
when these boys lost their father, I committed them to their uncle, and begged
him, though he had children of his own, to cherish and rear them as his own
offspring, and train them for himself and for posterity. Drusus is now lost
to us, and I turn my prayers to you, and before heaven and your country I adjure
you to receive into your care and guidance the great-grandsons of Augustus,
descendants of a most noble ancestry. So fulfil your duty and mine. To you,
Nero and Drusus, these senators are as fathers. Such is your birth that your
prosperity and adversity must alike affect the State.”

9. There was great weeping at these words, and then many a benediction. Had
the emperor set bounds to his speech, he must have filled the hearts of his
hearers with sympathy and admiration. But he now fell back on those idle and
often ridiculed professions about restoring the republic, and the wish that
the consuls or some one else might undertake the government, and thus destroyed
belief even in what was genuine and noble. The same honours were decreed to
the memory of Drusus as to that of Germanicus, and many more were added. Such
is the way with flattery, when repeated. The funeral with its procession of
statues was singularly grand. Aeneas, the father of the Julian house, all the
Alban kings, Romulus, Rome’s founder, then the Sabine nobility, Attus Clausus,
and the busts of all the other Claudii were displayed in a long train.

Next: Book 4 [10]