The Historians' History of the World 06 [The Early Roman Empire]

OCTAVIA PUT TO DEATH

[62-64 A.D.]

Nero, having received the decree of the senate, and perceiving that all his villainies passed for acts of exemplary merit, rudely repudiated his wife, Octavia, alleging “that she was barren,” and then espoused Poppæa. This woman, who had been long the concubine of Nero, and, as her adulterer and her husband, exercising absolute sway over him, suborned one of Octavia’s domestics to accuse her of an amour with a slave. Eucerus, a native of Alexandria, a skilful flute-player, was marked out as the object of the charge; her maids were examined upon the rack, and though some of them, overcome by the intensity of the torture, made false admissions, the major part persisted in vindicating the purity of their mistress. She was however put away in the first instance under the specious formality of a legal divorce, and the house of Burrus, with the estate of Plautus, ill-omened gift, were assigned to her; soon after she was banished into Campania, and a guard of soldiers placed over her. This led to frequent and undisguised complaints among the populace, who are comparatively unrestrained by prudential motives, and from the mediocrity of their circumstances are exposed to fewer dangers. They had an effect upon Nero, who in consequence recalled Octavia from banishment, but without the slightest misgiving at his atrocious villainy.

Forthwith the people went up to the Capitol in transport, and at length poured forth unfeigned thanks to the gods. They threw down the statues of Poppæa, carried those of Octavia upon their shoulders, wreathed them with garlands, and placed them on the Forum and the temples. They even went to offer the tribute of their applause to the prince; the prince was made the object of their grateful adoration. And now they were filling the palace with their crowd and clamour, when parties of soldiers were sent out, who by beating them and threatening them with the sword, terrified and dispersed them. Whatever was overthrown during the tumult was restored, and the tokens of honour to Poppæa replaced. This woman, ever prone to atrocities from the impulse of hatred, and now stimulated by her fears also, lest either a more violent outbreak of popular violence should take place, or Nero should succumb to the inclination of the people, threw herself at his knees, and said therewith, “her circumstances were not in that state that she should contend about her marriage with him, though that object was dearer to her than life; but her very life was placed in imminent jeopardy by the dependents and slaves of Octavia, who calling themselves the people of Rome, had dared to commit acts in time of peace which were seldom produced by war. But those arms were taken up against the prince; they only wanted a leader, and a civil commotion once excited, they would soon find one. Octavia has only to leave Campania and come into the city; when at her nod, in her absence, such tumults were raised. But if this were not the object, what crime had she committed? Whom had she offended? Was it because she was about to give a genuine offspring to the family of the Cæsars, that the Roman people chose that the spawn of an Egyptian flute-player should be palmed upon the imperial eminence? To sum up all, if that step was essential to the public weal, he should call home his mistress voluntarily rather than by compulsion, or consult his safety by a righteous retribution. The first commotion had subsided under moderate applications, but if they should despair of Octavia’s being the wife of Nero, they would give her another husband.”