Nero, the cruel coward under whom Rome for its sins was made to suffer, could scarcely devise follies and atrocities enough to please his profligate fancy. He offended the pride and sense of decorum of Rome by forcing senators and women of the highest rank to appear as gladiators in the arena. He exposed himself to ridicule by appearing as an actor in the theatre at Naples, which theatre, as soon as the audience dispersed, tumbled to pieces,—a little late so far as Nero himself was concerned. Returning to Rome, he indulged in every species of vice and folly, lavishing the wealth of the state with the utmost prodigality. On the lake of Agrippa he had a pavilion erected on a great floating platform, which was moved from point to point by the aid of boats superbly decorated with gold and ivory, while to furnish the banquet here given, animals of the chase were sought in the whole country round, and fish were brought from every sea and even from the distant ocean. When night descended a sudden illumination burst forth from all sides, and music resounded from every grove. These are the mentionable parts of the festival. Vile scenes were exhibited of which nothing can be said.
Finally, at a loss in what deeper excess of vice and ostentation to indulge, the crowned reprobate set fire to Rome that he might enjoy the spectacle of an unlimited conflagration. This wickedness, it is true, is doubted by some historians, but we are told that during the prevalence of the flames a crew of incendiaries threatened anyone with death who should seek to extinguish them, and flung flaming torches into the dwellings, crying that they acted under orders.
In all the history of Rome this fire was far the most violent and destructive. Breaking out in a number of shops stored with combustible goods, and driven by the winds, it raged with the utmost fury, neither the thick walls of the houses nor the enclosures of the temples sufficing to stay its frightful progress. The form of the streets, long, narrow, and winding, added to the mischief, and the flames swiftly sped alike through the humblest and the stateliest quarters of the mighty capital.
"The shrieks and lamentations of women, the infirmities of age, and the weakness of the young and tender," says Tacitus, "added misery to the dreadful scene. Some endeavored to provide for themselves, others to save their friends, in one part dragging along the lame and impotent, in another waiting to receive the tardy, or expecting relief themselves; they hurried, they lingered, they obstructed one another; they looked behind, and the fire broke out in front; they escaped from the flames, and in their place of refuge found no safety; the fire raged in every quarter; all were involved in one general conflagration.
"The unhappy wretches fled to places remote, and thought themselves secure, but soon perceived the flames raging round them. Which way to turn, what to avoid, or what to seek, no one could tell. They crowded the streets; they fell prostrate on the ground; they lay stretched in the fields, in consternation and dismay resigned to their fate. Numbers lost their whole substance, even the tools and implements by which they gained their livelihood, and, in that distress, did not wish to survive. Others, wild with affliction for their friends and relations whom they could not save, embraced voluntary death, and perished in the flames."
The story goes that, while the city was in its intensest blaze, Nero watched it with high enjoyment from a tower in the house of Mæcenas, and finally went to his own theatre, where in his scenic dress he mounted the stage, tuned his harp, and sang the destruction of Troy.
How far Nero was guilty and to what extent the stories told of him were true will never be known, but he was destined to feel the calamity himself, for in time the devouring flames reached the imperial palace, and laid it with all its treasures and surrounding buildings in ruins. For six days the fire raged uncontrolled, and then, when it seemed subdued, a new conflagration broke out and burned with all the old fury, spreading still more widely the area of ruin and devastation.
The number of buildings destroyed cannot be ascertained. Not only dwellings and shops, but temples, porticos, and other public buildings, were destroyed, among them the most venerable monuments of antiquity, which the worship of ages had rendered sacred; and with these the trophies of uncounted victories, the inimitable works of the great artists of Greece, and precious monuments of literature and ancient genius, were irrecoverably lost.