NERO: ROME'S DEADLIEST TYRANT

He slaughtered Christians, murdered his loved ones and possibly set Rome ablaze, but who was the real man behind the myth of the monstrous Emperor Nero?

Emperor Nero was going to die. The senate had ordered his death, and the last remnant of control he had was to claim his death himself. Nero paced back and forth muttering the same words over and over again: "What an artist dies in me."

All his friends had abandoned him, and his own dark acts had led him to this spot, to this moment, but still he refused to acknowledge it. He wasn't a ruthless killer, he was just misunderstood - an artist. What a pity for the world to lose such a remarkable artist. In the distance, he heard the rumble of hooves: they were coming for his blood, but he would not give it to them. They had called him greedy, frivolous, self indulgent and now he would be - his blood was his own, not the senate's or the usurpers, and blood was all Emperor Nero had left.

When Nero was born on 15 December 37 CE, the Julio-Claudian dynasty had been ruling the Roman Empire for more than 50 years. This line, through adoption, could be traced back to the famed and celebrated Julius Caesar himself. Since his death, the man had taken on an almost godlike status, and those 'descended' from him were the only ones deemed worthy to rule the kingdom he had forged. Originally born as Lucius Domitius Ahenbarbus, some believe that Nero was doomed to his later barbaric nature due to his parentage. His father, Gnaeus, was known as a dangerous and violent man, who had been charged with treason, adultery and incest. It is said that when he was congratulated on the birth of his son, he proclaimed that anything born to he and his wife would be a "disaster".

Gnaeus was dead before Nero would even remember him. Instead, it would be his mother who would play the most influential role in his life, and Gnaeus was right to doubt the purity of his wife. Agrippina was a woman forged in fire - she had lived to see her mother, Agrippina the Elder, and two of her brothers arrested, exiled and starved to death; she had been forced to marry a detestable man she loathed and she had been exiled by her own brother, Caligula. It is no wonder that Agrippina had been forced to turn herself into steel to survive, she was done being passed around like a chess piece - she wanted control, and it started with marrying the emperor Claudius. Agrippina was a sly woman, well versed in the subtleties of the Roman court, and by using her web of political alliances, she was married to Claudius - despite the fact he was her uncle.

Although Claudius had his own son, Britannicus, he was still young in a society with high mortality rates, so 13-year-old Nero was swiftly made his heir. Agrippina couldn't be emperor herself; she was, after all, a woman. But she could control it so that her own son sat on the throne, and he was just an inexperienced youth who would easily bend to her will. To further solidify her son's position, she had him married to Octavia, Claudius's daughter. However, it wasn't long after this that Claudius began to waver; he seemed to regret marrying Nero to his daughter and started to focus more on his own son, preparing him for the throne. To regain control, Agrippina needed to act quickly.

Ancient sources state that she poisoned her husband with a plate of mushrooms, others suspect that Agrippina had nothing to do with Claudius's death. However, considering the timing of the emperor's demise, a natural death seems an all-too-convenient explanation.

In 54 CE, before he could officially re-instate his own son as heir, Claudius passed away and the position of emperor fell to Nero. It is unknown if Nero played a part in the poisoning, or even if he was privy to the details, but it is peculiar that from then on, Nero proclaimed mushrooms, "the food of the gods."

To the public, Nero was a welcome change. In fact, the early part of his reign was hailed as a 'golden age'. Nero was obsessed with personal popularity - more than anything he wanted to be liked. In his early years he abolished capital punishment, lowered taxes, gave more rights to slaves and gave aid to other cities. He loved the arts and he put on lavish games, concerts, chariot races and tournaments. To the people, it seemed that he was genuinely interested in being a good ruler, but it is likely he was still worried about the ever-looming threat of Claudius's true son claiming the throne. If the people liked him, then it was less likely they would support his rival. To Nero, popularity meant power.

However, things at home were less than stable. Nero was only 17 when he became emperor, making him the youngest ever to assume the throne up until that point. Nero's ascension not only transformed him into an emperor, but also into a man. While his mother's scheming and influence had been useful in the struggle for succession, now he was ruler he had his own ambitions, many of which did not involve her. Having a mother figure so strong and domineering was plainly frustrating to the ambitious young man, and, much to his mother's annoyance, he began to rely more on the advice of his advisers. His adviser's opinions were clear - Agrippina wasn't to be trusted.

With the relationship souring, Nero purposely began to act out. He had long loathed the political marriage he had been forced into with Octavia and instead began an affair with a former slave. When his outraged mother found out and demanded he rid himself of her, Nero instead began living with her as his wife. It was a very unsubtle message - Nero wasn't a child anymore, and his mother didn't control him. Nero swiftly moved Agrippina out of the palace, denied her the protection of the Praetorian Guard and banned her from the gladiatorial contests.

Agrippina, however, wasn't one to go down quietly. Finally realising that she had completely lost grip on a son who had inherited her own ruthless ambition, she turned her attention elsewhere, to the one other person who could claim the throne and reinstate her power - Britannicus. He was still a minor, but suddenly, in 55 CE, the day before he was due to be declared an adult, Claudius's true son died while at a banquet. Agrippina had taught her son two things: how to succeed, and how to kill - and now he was a master of both.

In 58 CE, Nero finally decided he was finished with his loveless marriage and declared his wish to marry another - Poppaea Sabina. However, his mother refused to stay quiet and let her opposition to the divorce be heard clearly among the Roman population, who also did not wish Nero to divorce Octavia. Feeling his support waning and finally pushed to breaking point, Nero made a decision - it was time to rid himself of his interfering mother once and for all.

Nero's decision to kill his mother was not a sudden, rash one. It was thought out and planned down to the last detail. At first he had experts craft a device that could be affixed to her ceiling and would then crush her in her sleep. When that proved too complicated, he opted for a boat made to sink. However, Agrippina escaped by swimming to the shore. Finally, out of options, he returned to tradition and had her stabbed to death.

Shortly after Agrippina's murder, Nero began to change. Perhaps it was something to do with murdering his own mother that haunted his mind. Whether it was guilt or something animal within him being unleashed, the kind, fair ruler that the people loved seemed to vanish almost overnight. Nero had always been self-indulgent, but his hedonistic lifestyle became so over the top that it began to sicken the very people who had once loved him.

He spent an outrageous amount of money on himself and his artistic pursuits and began to give public performances, an action criticised as shameful by many ancient historians. He forbade anyone from leaving while he performed, and some likely inflated accounts write of women giving birth in the arena and men flinging themselves off the high walls to escape the boredom. If Nero had simply been a hedonistic ruler, that would not have been so terrible. He had always been lavish and craved the people's attention, but now he was cruel too. This cruelty was directed at the woman he likely viewed as the last thorn in his side - his wife.

With nobody to oppose him, Nero divorced the nation's darling, Octavia, and banished her on grounds of infertility. This left him free to marry Poppaea, by that point heavily pregnant. Eventually Nero bowed to public protests and let Octavia return, but not for long. Officially her death was deemed a suicide, but the truth was a badly kept secret: Nero had ordered her execution. Her popularity was turning the public against him, therefore she had to be eliminated. As the people wept, the emperor had her head sent to his new wife as a gift.

The people of Rome were not idiots, and the sudden death of Octavia and swift remarriage had made many people suspect Nero's hidden murderous ways. Accusations of treason against the emperor began to emerge, but rather than heed this warning and lay low, he instead became more vicious than ever. The same man who had abolished capital punishment began executing anyone who he suspected of conspiring against him. Eventually this cull extended to people who said any bad word about him; one commander was even executed for making a negative comment at a party. It is said that Nero was haunted by memories of his mother and wife, and the guilt transformed him into a bloodthirsty animal, killing without moderation or consideration. Although his murderous actions could be chalked up to rage and suspicion, it did mean one thing - Nero's rivals were eliminated.

Nero seemed to have decided that if he couldn't have power by popularity, then he would have power by dominance. Over this period, he slowly usurped authority from the Senate. Just ten year after promising them power equivalent to that they had held under the republic, Nero had all but stripped the Senate of their worth. To the emperor, this meant more power for him, but the Senate was also full of dangerous, ambitious men, and ignoring them would later prove his downfall.

In 64 CE, something even more devastating than Nero's rage distracted the Roman public. A great fire consumed the city, destroying three districts, damaging seven and leaving thousands of citizens homeless. Accidental fires were not uncommon at the time, but a rumour soon sprung up that it was Nero himself who had started it in order to clear space for his new luxury complex, the Domus Aurea. Although it is impossible to confirm who ignited the fire, the fact that his subjects all believed Nero capable of starting it to benefit himself is indicative of how far the beloved emperor had fallen. Nero was quick to shift the blame, pointing the fingers at Christians, and in doing so began years of torture and Across Rome, Christians were arrested, devoured by dogs, crucified and burned. There are even accounts of Nero using oil-soaked Christians as torches in his gardens.

The public had been right about one thing: Nero did want to build his huge villa, and the newly cleared land made the perfect spot. However, after excessively spending on his own artistic pursuits, the emperor was running low on funds. In order to pay for his ambitious building project, he sold senior positions in public office to the highest bidders, raised taxes and took money from temples. Nero's frivolous spending had caused the currency to devalue for the first time in the empire's history, and to try to rebuild his funds, he reinstated a policy that allowed him to confiscate property from those suspected of treason.

For many people, this was the final straw. In 65 CE, a plot was hatched to assassinate Nero and place Piso, an aristocrat, in his place. However, the plot was discovered before it could be carried out Many of the men involved were Nero's previous advisers and close friends, but Nero showed no restraint in having them all executed. Killing his enemies had worked very well for Nero so far, but that was when he only had a few rivals. Now almost all of Rome hated him, and he couldn't kill everyone.

Three years later, Gaius Julius Vindex, a governor, publicly rebelled against Nero's harsh tax policies. He was swiftly joined by another governor, Servius Sulpicius Galba. Although Gaius's forces were squashed and Gaius executed, Galba still lived, and as the main living force against Nero, he quickly gained support. Nero declared him a public enemy, but this seemed only to increase his follower numbers. Even the prefect of Nero's Praetorian Guard abandoned him and declared his allegiance to Galba. Many men who had likely been too scared to act alone saw this as their chance to finally raise their voices against the emperor and his greedy, ruthless ways, and Galba's support grew and grew.

Nero was self indulgent and tyrannical, but he wasn't stupid. He knew it was time to run. He decided to flee east to the provinces that were still loyal to him. However, even his own officers refused to help him, quoting a line from Vergil's Aeneid: "Is it so dreadful a thing then to die?" Escape was too good for Nero. Disgrace was too kind to the man who had slaughtered and destroyed the lives of his people. Death was what the people, and his own men, craved.

Nero had no option but to return home to his palace, his last place of sanctuary. However, he struggled to sleep, and when he awoke, he found that the palace guard had also abandoned him. Anxious and panic stricken, he sent hasty m essages to his friends' cham bers, but no replies came. Even th ey had forsaken him. Nero had lost everything - his safety, his kingdom and his cherished popularity. He called for anyone adept with a sword to com e and end his life, but nobody appeared, and his cries echoed in his empty palace: "Have I neither friend nor foe?"

The emperor managed to escape to a villa six kilometres outside the city with four loyal freedmen, where he ordered th em to dig a grave for him. Before it was finished, a m essage arrived - Nero had b een declared a public enemy and the  Senate were to execu te him by beating. It is unlikely that this would have occurred; there was, after all, still som e devotion to the Julio-Claudian family, of which Nero w as th e last in line. If there w as no loyalty to Nero, the bloodline at least would give him a ch an ce of survival.

Nero, however, did not see this. He had been abandoned by everyone, he had lost everything, and he was convinced his life was next. First he begged one of his companions to kill him, an act they refused to comply with, and then, upon hearing the horsemen approaching, he had no option but to take his own life. Even here he failed; consumed by fear, he forced his secretary to do the deed for him. Nero still lived as the horsemen entered, and he survived long enough to utter his last words as the men struggled to stop the bleeding: "Too late! This is fidelity!" On 9 June 68 CE, on the anniversary of Octavia's death, the last in the Julio-Claudian line was dead.

By the time he reached Rome, Galba had already been proclaimed emperor. As favoured as he was, Galba's reign would not be a peaceful one and he would be dead within a year. Nero had not been a good emperor, but with his ancient line dried up, chaos claimed the city and war waged. Nero's legacy, however, would live on. To Christians he became a figure so rooted in pain and anguish that he took on the form of the Antichrist. A rumour began that Nero had not died at all and instead would return. This became a legend almost Christ- like in its retelling, surviving hundreds of years after his death, even into the 5th century, and at least three imposters proclaiming to be Nero led rebellions in his name. Because of these things and the influence they had on historians, it is almost impossible to distinguish who Nero really was. Today he has taken on a super-villain status that increases with every retelling of his life. The real man behind the myth may be dead forever, but the spectre of Emperor Nero, and the pain he brought his people, flourishes to this day.

Written by Frances White in "All About History", UK, issue 41, July 2016, excerpts pp. 28-36. Digitized, adapted and illustrated to be posted by Leopoldo Costa.