Under Cæsars' Shadow

by Henry Francis Colby

Chærea, emboldened by his public honors, gave orders to a military tribune, who hastened to put to death Caligula’s wife and only child. It was properly a question for the Senate to decide,—who should be the successor to the imperial throne. While that body was deliberating, the matter was summarily settled by the action of the Prætorian Guards. In the general confusion some of them had begun plundering the imperial palace. There they had found, half-hidden behind a curtain in an obscure corner, a man about fifty-five years old, whom they recognized as Claudius, the son of Drusus and the uncle of Caligula. He sank at their feet probably expecting nothing but death. But they dared not do otherwise than respect the blood of the Cæsars. They were more loyal than the great body of the Senators to the royal family. So they hailed Claudius as emperor and carried him, astonished and protesting, to their camp. When in the morning it was found that the Senate had come to no conclusion, Claudius found courage to allow the soldiers to have their way and to swear allegiance to him. In return for their devotion he promised them a large donation in money.

Herod Agrippa I, who had been such a friend of Caligula and who was still in Rome, advised the Senators that the wisest thing that they could do would be to yield to the wishes of the soldiers. This was an act for which, as we shall see, he was afterward generously rewarded by Claudius. In spite of some determined opposition, therefore, he was proclaimed the successor to the throne, the first of many Roman emperors who owed their elevation to the military power of the prætorian guard.

Claudius was born at Lugdunum, or Lyons, in Gaul, August first, in the year 9, or 10, before Christ. From his childhood he seems to have been weak in body and retiring in spirit. He had been neglected, if not despised, by the great Augustus. His own parents had been ashamed of him as a feeble invalid. He had not been thought of as worthy to fill any high office at the imperial court. He had once asked the emperor Tiberius for larger responsibilities, but had received scarcely more than empty honors. He is said to have had some form of paralysis, to have trembled in his hands and to have had an imperfect utterance. Caligula had elevated him to the consulship and had given him an honorable seat at public spectacles; but in private he had been made the butt of coarse jokes and of much ridicule. He had resigned himself, therefore, to quiet pursuits, had settled down to the opinion that there were no great things for him in life, and had turned his attention to literary studies. He was the author, with some assistance, of several historical volumes and of a life of Cicero. He may have been, for that period, a fair sort of citizen, and when he was made emperor it was certainly an agreeable change for the people from the outrageous extravagancies of Caligula.

At the outset of his reign he modified some of the harsh enactments of his predecessors; returned to their owners several private estates, which had been confiscated; gave back to various cities the statues of heroes, which had been removed from them, and restored the temples, which Caligula had desecrated, to their original uses. He also executed the murderer of Caligula. Fearing violence, he caused his own person to be guarded. He respected the dignity of the Senate, made the Senators responsible for the discharge of their duties, and increased their number by promoting to that honor men from the equestrian rank.

In this matter he did not confine his view to Italy but extended it to Gaul, the province in which he had been born. He made a speech in the Senate defending the measure. This speech was copied on brazen tablets and preserved by the people of Lugdunum (Lyons). One of these was discovered three centuries ago and is now to be seen, well preserved and clearly legible, in the museum of that city. He discontinued all encouragement to spies and informers. He ordained that sick slaves abandoned in the temple of Esculapius should be free if they recovered. He provided also for the amusements of the people, keeping up the popular gladiatorial shows and sometimes going as far as to bandy jokes with the bystanders about the performers. His responsibilities developed in him unexpected independence and force; and all these labors were not unfavorable to the improvement of his health.

The Roman army was active at this time on the frontiers of Gaul and Germany. Claudius determined to carry out the plan that Augustus had formed of invading Britain. He even entered that country in person, crossing the channel and joining the Roman general, Aulus Plautius, in his campaign against the natives. He was absent from Rome six months and achieved such military success that on his return a public triumph was accorded to him by the Senate. On this occasion he added to his name the title Britannicus, which afterwards became also the special designation of his son.

A little later in the reign of Claudius, Caractacus, a British chief, who had resisted the Roman forces, was captured and brought to Rome, with his wife and daughter. All at the imperial court were impressed with the noble bearing of this prisoner as he pleaded eloquently for his life. Claudius, let it be said to his credit, extended to him the imperial clemency. I shall have occasion to refer to the invasion of Britain by Claudius when I come to speak, in a later chapter, of Paul’s friends at Rome and among them of the woman Claudia and her possible British origin and relations.

Claudius was generous and tactful with the princes who were subject to the Roman empire. He established Antiochus in Comagene, Mithridates on the Bosphorus, for the favor I have mentioned, and Herod Agrippa I in Galilee with Judea and Samaria added to his domain. It was during the reign of Claudius that this Herod Agrippa I “stretched forth his hands to vex certain of the church,” as Luke records for us in the twelfth chapter of the Acts. “And he killed James, the brother of John, with the sword. And because he saw it pleased the Jews, he proceeded further to take Peter also.” Peter was wonderfully delivered from prison. But Herod was soon after smitten with a dreadful disease. It was when he had made a proud demonstration before the people, as is described to us in the same chapter as follows:

Herod was highly displeased with them of Tyre and Sidon: but they came with one accord to him, and, having made Blastus the king’s chamberlain their friend, desired peace; because their country was nourished by the king’s country. And upon a set day Herod, arrayed in royal apparel, sat upon his throne and made an oration unto them. And the people gave a shout, saying, “It is the voice of a god and not of a man.” And immediately the angel of the Lord smote him, because he gave not God the glory; and he was eaten of worms and gave up the ghost. But the word of God grew and multiplied.