Lucretius, 54 B.C., Roman poet and philosopher, destroyed himself in his forty-fourth year.
Ptolemy, 50 B.C., King of Cyprus, killed himself by poison.
Cato, Marcus, 46 B.C., having opposed Cæsar, unsuccessfully, retired to Utica, and feeling too proud to humiliate himself before a conqueror, stabbed himself, and died the same night, after spending his last hours in reading Plato’s Phædon, a dialogue on the Immortality of the Soul.
Brutus, 42 B.C., Roman statesman, slew himself with his sword after defeat at the battle of Philippi.
Portia, his wife, killed herself by swallowing red-hot coals on hearing of her husband’s death.
Cassius, 42 B.C., Roman general, being defeated at the battle of Philippi by Antony and Octavian, threw himself on his sword.
Pomponius Atticus, 33 B.C., man of letters, starved himself, because he became afflicted with some intestinal disease.
Mark Antony, 30 B.C., Roman Consul, general, and statesman, being defeated at the battle of Actium, and deserted as he thought by Cleopatra, cut open his bowels and died in terrible agony.
Cleopatra, 30 B.C., Queen of Egypt, the beloved of Antony, on hearing of his death, killed herself. The only mark of injury on her body was a small puncture on the arm; it is doubtful whether this was caused by the bite of an asp, or by a poisoned bodkin.
Cocceius Nerva, A.D. 20, an eminent lawyer and favourite of the Emperor Tiberius, starved himself as a protest against the extravagance of the Court.