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The Historians' History of the World 06 [The Early Roman Empire]
- Автор: Gutenberg
- Год: 1905
- Язык: английский
- Жанр: История
Электронная книга - «The Historians' History of the World 06 [The Early Roman Empire]». Краткое содержание книги:
But his greatest delight was to combat as a gladiator. He appeared in the character of a secutor: he caused to be recorded 735 victories which he had gained, and he received each time an immense stipend out of the gladiatorial fund. Instead of Hercules he now styled himself Paulus, after a celebrated secutor, and caused it to be inscribed on his statues. He also took up his abode in the residence of the gladiators.
At length the tyrant met the fate he merited. It was his design to put to death the two consuls-elect for the year 193, and on New Year’s Day to proceed from the gladiators’ school in his gladiatorial habit and enter on the consulate. On the preceding day he communicated his design to Marcia, who tried in vain to dissuade him from it. Q. Æmilius Lætus, the prætorian prefect, and the chamberlain, Eclectus, also reasoned with him, but to as little purpose. He testified much wrath, and uttered some menaces. Knowing that the threats of the tyrant were the sure precursors of death, they saw their only hopes of safety lay in anticipation; they took their resolution on the moment;[41] and when Commodus came from the bath, Marcia, as was her usual practice, handed him a bowl (in which she had now infused a strong poison), to quench his thirst.
He drank the liquor off, and then laid himself down to sleep. The attendants were all sent away. The conspirators were expecting the effect of the poison when the emperor began to vomit profusely. Fearing now that the poison would not take effect, they brought in a vigorous wrestler named Narcissus; and induced by the promise of a large reward, he laid hold on and strangled the emperor.[42]
Pertinax (P. Helvius Pertinax), 193 A.D.
[193 A.D.]
The conspirators had, it is probable, already fixed on the person who should succeed to the empire, and their choice was one calculated to do them credit. It was P. Helvius Pertinax, the prefect of the city, a man now advanced in years, who had with an unblemished character, though born in a humble rank, passed through all the civil and military gradations of the state. Pertinax was the son of a freedman who was engaged in the manufacture of charcoal at Alba Pompeia in the Apennines. He commenced life as a man of letters, but finding the literary profession unprofitable, he entered the army as a centurion, and his career of advancement was rapid.
It was yet night when Lætus and Eclectus proceeded with some soldiers to the house of Pertinax. When informed of their arrival he ordered them to be brought to his chamber, and then, without rising, told them that he had long expected every night to be his last, and bade them execute their office; for he was certain that Commodus had sent them to put him to death. But they informed him that the tyrant himself was no more, and that they were come to offer him the empire. He hesitated to give credit to them, but having sent one on whom he could depend, and ascertained that Commodus was dead, he consented to accept the proffered dignity. Though it was not yet day they all repaired to the prætorian camp, and Lætus, having assembled the soldiers, told them that Commodus was suddenly dead of apoplexy, and that he had brought them his successor, a man whose merits were known to them all. Pertinax then addressed them, promising a large donative. The soldiers swore fidelity to the emperor.
Before dawn the senate was summoned to the temple of Concord, whither Pertinax had proceeded from the camp. He told them what had occurred, and, noticing his age and his humble extraction, pointed out divers senators as more worthy of the empire than himself. But they would not listen to his excuses, and they decreed him all the imperial titles. Then giving loose to their rage against the fallen tyrant, they termed him parricide, gladiator, the enemy of the gods and of his country, and decreed that his statues should be cast down, his titles be erased, and his body dragged with the hook through the streets. But Pertinax respected too much the memory of Marcus to suffer the remains of his son to be thus treated, and they were by his order placed in the tomb of Hadrian.
Pertinax was cheerfully acknowledged by all the armies. Like Vespasian, he was simple and modest in his dress and mode of life, and he lived on terms of intimacy with the respectable members of the senate. He resigned his private property to his wife and son, but would not suffer the senate to bestow on them any titles. He regulated the finances with the greatest care, remitting oppressive taxes and cancelling unjust claims. He sold by auction all the late tyrant’s instruments of luxury, and obliged his favourites to disgorge a portion of their plunder. He granted the waste lands in Italy and elsewhere for a term of years rent free to those who would undertake to improve them.
The reforming hand of the emperor was extended to all departments of the state; and men looked for a return of the age of the Antonines. But the soldiers dreaded the restoration of the ancient discipline; and Lætus, who found that he did not enjoy the power he had expected, secretly fomented their discontent. So early as the 3d of January they had seized a senator named Triarius Maternus, intending to make him emperor, but he escaped from them and fled to Pertinax for protection. Some time after, while the emperor was on the sea coast attending to the supply of corn, they prepared to raise Sosius Falco, then consul, to the empire; but Pertinax came suddenly to Rome, and having complained of Falco to the senate, they were about to proclaim him a public enemy, when the emperor cried that no senator should suffer death while he reigned; and Falco was thus suffered to escape punishment.
Some expressions which Pertinax used on this occasion irritated the soldiers; and Lætus, to exasperate them still more, put several of them to death, as if by his orders. Accordingly on the twenty-eighth of March a general mutiny broke out in the camp, and two or three hundred of the most desperate proceeded with drawn swords to the palace. No one opposed their entrance. Pertinax, when informed of their approach, advanced to meet them. He addressed them, reminding them of his own innocence and of the obligation of their oath. They were silent for a few moments; at length a Tungrian soldier struck him with his sword, crying, “The soldiers send thee this.” They all then fell on him, and cutting off his head set it on a lance and carried it to the camp. Eclectus, faithful to the last, perished with the emperor; Lætus had fled in disguise at the approach of the mutineers. The reign of the virtuous Pertinax had lasted only eighty-six days; he was in the sixty-seventh year of his age.
Julianus (M. Didius Severus Julianus), 193 A.D.