Nero / Makers of History Series

by Jacob Abbott

Nero recovers from his remorse.
His various crimes.

Nero gradually recovered from the remorse and horror with which the commission of these atrocities at first overwhelmed him; and in order to hasten his relief he plunged recklessly into every species of riot and excess, and in the end hardened himself so completely in crime, that during the remainder of his life he perpetrated the most abominable deeds without any apparent compunction whatever. He killed Poppæa herself at last with a kick, which he gave her in a fit of passion at a time when circumstances were such with her that the violence brought on a premature and unnatural sickness. He afterward ordered her son to be drowned in the sea, by his slaves, when he was a-fishing, because he understood that the boy, in playing with the other children, often acted the part of an emperor. His general Burrus he poisoned. He sent him the poison under pretense that it was a medical remedy for a swelling of the throat under which Burrus was suffering. Burrus drank the draught under that impression and died. He destroyed by similar means in the course of his life great numbers of his relatives and officers of state, so that there was scarcely a person who was brought into any degree of intimate connection with him that did not sooner or later come to a violent end.

Public affairs neglected.

During his whole reign Nero neglected the public affairs of the empire almost altogether,—apparently regarding the vast power, and the immense resources that were at his command, as only means for the more complete gratification of his own personal propensities and passions. The only ambition which ever appeared to animate him was a desire for fame as a singer and actor on the stage.

His performances on the stage.
Musical training.
Nero's success.
His trained applauders.
Rules and regulations at the theater.

At the time when he commenced his career it was considered wholly beneath the dignity of any Roman of rank to appear in any public performance of that nature; but Nero, having conceived in his youth a high idea of his merit as a singer, devoted himself with great assiduity to the cultivation of his voice, and, as he was encouraged in what he did by the flatterers that of course were always around him, his interest in the musical art became at length an extravagant passion. He submitted with the greatest patience to the rigorous training customary in those times for the development and improvement of the voice; such as lying for long periods upon his back, with a weight of lead upon his breast, in order to force the muscles of the chest to extraordinary exertion, for the purpose of strengthening them—and taking medicines of various kinds to clear the voice and reduce the system. He was so much pleased with the success of these efforts, that he began to feel a great desire to perform in public upon the stage. He accordingly began to make arrangements for doing this. He first appeared in private exhibitions, in the imperial palaces and gardens, where only the nobility of Rome and invited guests were present. He, however, gradually extended his audiences, and at length came out upon the public stage,—first, however, in order to prepare the public mind for what they would have otherwise considered a great degradation, inducing the sons of some of the principal nobility to come forward in similar entertainments. He was so pleased with the success which he imagined that he met with in this career that he devoted a large part of his time during his whole life to such performances. Of course, his love of applause in his theatrical career, increased much too fast to be satisfied with the natural and ordinary means of gratifying it, and he accordingly made arrangements, most absurdly, to create for his performances a fictitious and counterfeit celebrity. At one time he had a corps of five thousand men under pay to applaud him, in the immense circuses and amphitheaters where he performed. These men were regularly trained to the work of applauding, as if it were an art to be acquired by study and instruction. It was an art, in fact, as they practiced it,—different modes of applause being designated for different species of merit, and the utmost precision being required on the part of the performers, in the concert of their action, and in their obedience to the signals. He used also to require on the days when he was to perform, that the doors of the theater should be closed when the audience had assembled, and no egress allowed on any pretext whatever. Such regulations of course excited great complaint, and much ridicule; especially as the sessions at these spectacles were sometimes protracted and tiresome to the last degree. Even sudden sickness was not a sufficient reason for allowing a spectator to depart, and so it was said that the people used sometimes to feign death, in order to be carried out to their burial. In some cases, it was said, births took place in the theaters, the mothers having come incautiously with the crowd to witness the spectacles, without properly considering what might be the effect of the excitement, and then afterward not being permitted to retire.

Races and games.
Nero generally the victor.

Besides singing and acting on the stage, Nero took part in every other species of public amusement. He entered as a competitor for the prize in races and games of every kind. Of course he always came off victor. This end was accomplished sometimes by the secret connivance of the other competitors, and sometimes by open bribery of the judges. Nero's ridiculous vanity and self-conceit seemed to be fully gratified by receiving the prize, without any regard whatever to the question of deserving it. He used to come back sometimes from journeys to foreign cities, where he had been performing on the stage at great public festivals, and enter Rome in triumph, with the garlands, and crowns, and other decorations which he had won, paraded before him in the procession, in the manner in which distinguished commanders had been accustomed to display the trophies of their military victories, when returning from foreign campaigns.

His private conduct and character.
His midnight brawls.

In fact it was only in the perpetration of such miserable follies as these that Nero appeared before the public at all, and in his private conduct and character he sank very rapidly, after he came into power, to the very lowest degree of profligacy and vice. After having spent the evening in drinking and debauchery, he would sally forth into the streets at midnight, as has already been stated, to mingle there with the vilest men and women of the town in brawls and riots. On these excursions he would attack such peaceable parties as he chanced to meet in the streets, and if they made resistance, he and his companions would beat them down and throw them into canals or open sewers. Sometimes in these combats he was beaten himself, and on one occasion he came very near losing his life, having been almost killed by the blows dealt upon him by a certain Roman senator, whose wife he insulted as she was walking with her husband in the street. The senator, of course, did not know him. He used to go to the theater in disguise, in company with a gang of companions of similar character to himself, and watch for opportunities to excite or encourage riots or tumults there. Whenever he could succeed in urging these tumults on to actual violence he would mingle in the fray, and throw stones and fragments of broken benches and furniture among the people.