NOTE XIII.
The tragedy in the Vestal College, of which the Emperor Domitian in his character of Supreme Pontiff was the author, originated in causes unknown to the historians who have recorded it. Suetonius seems to consider the victims guilty; but Pliny the Younger was an eye-witness of the living interment of the Maxima (chief priestess) Cornelia Cossi, and recorded it in his bitter speeches on the illegality of the proceedings against her, the heroism of the Roman knight, Celer, and the cowardice of Valerius Licinianus, who purchased his life by slandering himself and the unfortunate priestess. He relates in another letter the poverty and degradation of this prætor. Pliny describes the conduct of Cornelia as dignified and courageous, notices the manner in which she repulsed the executioner, and her delicacy in arranging her drapery while descending into the cavern, but concludes his account with these words—for his epistle was written at the time when the tragedy occurred, and he did not forget that he was writing in Domitian’s reign,—“Whether she were innocent or guilty I know not, but she was treated as a criminal.” It is from this last immolation that Plutarch has doubtless described the lugubrious ceremony so exactly in his Life of Numa, for it appears to have been performed according to the ancient heathen ritual.