Early months of his rule. The early months of his rule seemed the dawn of a new era. The pardoning of political offenders, the banishment of informers, the reduction of taxes, coupled with lavishness in public entertainments and donations, all made Gaius popular with the Senate, the army and the city plebs. However, he was a [pg 230]weakling in body and in mind, and a serious illness, brought on by his excesses, seems to have left him mentally deranged.
Absolutism his ideal. Reared in the house of Antonia, daughter of Antony and Octavia, in company with eastern princes of the stamp of Herod Agrippa, he naturally came to look upon the principate as an autocracy of the Hellenistic type. In his attempt to carry this conception into effect, the vein of madness in his character led him to ridiculous extremes. Not content with claiming deification for himself and his sisters, he built a lofty bridge connecting the Palatine Hill with the Capitoline, so that he might communicate with Jupiter, his brother god. He prescribed the sacrifices to be offered to himself, and was accused of seeking to imitate the Ptolemaic custom of sister marriage. Thoroughly consistent with absolutism was his scorn of republican magistracies and disregard of the rights of the Senate; likewise his attempt to have himself saluted as dominus or “lord.”
The conflict with the Jews. His demand for the acknowledgment of his deification by all inhabitants of the empire brought Caius into conflict with the Jews, who had been exempted from this formal expression of loyalty. In Alexandria there was a large Jewish colony, which enjoyed exceptional privileges and was consequently hated by the other Alexandrians. Their refusal to worship the images of Caius furnished the mob with a pretext for sacking the Jewish quarters and forcibly installing statues of the princeps in some of their synagogues. The Jews sent a delegation to plead their case before Caius but could obtain no redress. In the meantime Caius had ordered Petronius, the legate of Syria, to set up his statue in the temple at Jerusalem, by force, if need be. However, the prudent Petronius, seeing that this would bring about a national revolt among the Jews delayed obeying the order, and the death of Caius relieved him of the necessity of executing it at all.
Tyranny. In less than a year the reckless extravagance of Caius had exhausted the immense surplus Tiberius had left in the treasury. To secure new funds he resorted to openly tyrannical measures, extraordinary taxes, judicial murders, confiscations, and forced legacies. By these means money was extorted not only from Romans of all classes but provincials also. Ptolemy, king of Mauretania, was executed for the sake of his treasure and his kingdom made a province.
Assassination. Caius contemplated invasions of Germany and of [pg 231]Britain, but the former ended with a military parade across the Rhine and the latter with a march to the shores of the Straits of Dover. The fear awakened by his rule of capricious violence soon resulted in conspiracies against his life. In January, 41 A. D., he was assassinated by a tribune of the imperial guards.
III. Claudius, 41–54 a. d.
Nominated by the Praetorians. In the choice of a successor to Caius the power of the praetorian guard was first clearly demonstrated. Caius was the last male representative of the Julian gens, and at his death the Senate debated the question of restoring the republic. However, the decision was made for them by the praetorians, who dragged from his hiding place and saluted as Imperator the surviving brother of Germanicus, Tiberius Claudius Germanicus. The Senate had to acquiesce in his nomination and grant him the powers of the princeps.
Character. Claudius was already fifty-one years old, but because of his ungainly figure and limited mentality had never been seriously considered for the principate. He was learned and pedantic, but lacking in energy and resolution. His greatest weakness was that he was completely under the influence of his wives, of whom he had in succession four, and his favorite freedmen.
Policy. In general the policy of Claudius followed that of Augustus and Tiberius. But in 47 A. D. he assumed the censorship for five years, an office which Augustus had avoided because it set its holder directly above the Senate.