Page:Dictionary of Greek and Roman Biography and Mythology (1870) - Volume 3.djvu/1132

Rh U2(f TIBERIUS. case of Sardes by a remission of all payment to the aerarium or fiscus for five years. It is just to com- memorate his refusal to take testamentary bequests, when not made by persons who were on terms of intimacy with him ; but the emperor did not want money, nor yet prudence ; and it was not prudent to be taking money from every body, even those of no character. In this year died Titus Livius, the historian, and Ovid in his exile at Tomi. • Germanicus restored quiet to Armenia (a. d. 1 8) by crowning with his own hands Artaxias as king in the city of Artaxata. His administration of the East was prudent and successful, but he died in Syria A. D. 1 9, and the dislike of Tiberius and the enmity of Cn. Piso, the governor of Syria, gave credibility to the report that Germanicus was poisoned. About this time Maroboduus, king of the Suevi, being driven from his states by Roman intrigues, crossed the Danube, came to Italy and settled at Ravenna. A Thracian king Rhescuporis, who had murdered his nephew Cotys, who was king of part of Thrace, wrote to Tiberius to inform him that Cotys had been punished for his treachery. Tiberius artfully got Rhescuporis into his power, and had him brought to Rome, where he was convicted by the senate, and Thrace was divided between the son of Rhescuporis and the children of Cotys. (Tacit. Ann. ii. 64.) A regard to external decency was one of the characteristics of the reign of Tiberius, and a decree of the senate was made against certain classes of women who professed the occupation of courtezans. (Sueton. Tiber, c. 35 ; Tacit. Ann. ii. 85.) But religious tolerance was not one of the merits of the time of Tiberius ; a senatus consultum imposed pe- nalties on those who practised the ceremonial of the Egyptian or Jewish worship, though this was not the first example of the kind of intolerance at Rome. (Tacit. Ann. ii. 85 ; compare Seneca, Ep. ] 08.) This year was memorable for the appearance of a new island above the sea near Delos. (Plin. Hist. Nat. ii. 87.) In the spring of A. D. 20 Agrippina landed at Brundisium with the ashes of her husband. The remains of Germanicus received a public interment, but Tiberius and Livia did not show themselves, for which Tacitus assigns a reason, which may be true or false. (Ann. iii. 3.) Piso, who came to Rome, was accused before the senate of having taken the life of Germanicus. There was strong suspicion, but little or no proof ; yet Piso, seeing that Tiberius gave him no support, released himself by a voluntary death, or was put to death by order of Tiberius. His wife Plancina, who was guilty if her husband was, escaped through the influence of Livia. There is certainly strong reason to believe that in this matter of the death of Germanicus as well as of Piso, Tiberius was guilty (Tacit. Ann. iii. 16), though Tacitus does not pronounce a positive opinion. Tiberius gave Julia, the daughter of his son Drusus, in marriage to Nero, the eldest son of Germanicus, which was a popular measure. He also moderated the penalties which the Lex Papia, passed in the time of Augustus, imposed on unmarried persons, with the double purpose of encouraging matrimony and filling the aerarium. (Tacit. Ann. iii. 25.) The year a. d. 21 was the fourth consulship of Tiberius, and the second of his son Drusus Caesar, but it was considered a bad omen for Drusus, be- cause all those who had been his father^s colleagues TIBERIUS. in the consulship had come to a violent death. A great revolt broke out this year headed by Julius Florus, at Treves on the Mosel, and by Julius Sacrovir, among the Aedui. The alleged grounds of the revolt were the heavy taxation, and the oppression of the Roman governors. Sacrovir mus- tered forty thousand men at Autun (Augusto- dunum), eight thousand of whom were furnished with the arms of the legionary soldiers, which had been secretly fabricated, and the rest had staves, knives, and other implements of the huntsman. The rising was not unlike the style of insurrection that has often shown itself in France since 1789. The rebellion was put down ; and Florus and Sacrovir only escaped from the Romans by dying by their own hands. (Tacit. Ann. iii. 40.) The principle of treason against the princeps (laesa majestas) was already established under Tiberius in its utmost extent, for C. Lutorius Prisons was condemned by the senate for having written a poem upon the death of Drusus, in anti- cipation of the event, Drusus being then very ill. The senate seem to have proceeded in the mode of a bill of parns and penalties, for there does not appear to have been any law applicable to such a case. Priscus was executed, and Tiberius, in his usual perplexed mode of expression, blamed the senate ; he praised their aifectionate zeal in avenging insults to the princeps, but he disapproved of such hasty penalties being inflicted for words only. (Tacit. Ann. iii. 49.) It was on this oc- casion that a senatus consultum was enacted, that no decree of the senate should be carried to the Aerarium before the tenth day, and thus a reprieve of so many days would be allowed to the con- demned (Tacit. Ann. iii. 51 ; Dion Cass. Ivii. 20). In the year a. d. 22 the senate conferred on Drusus, at the request of Tiberius, the Tribunitia Potestas, the highest title of dignity, and an intimation that Drusus was to be the successor of Tiberius. Though the senate had conferred the honour in terms of great adulation, Drusus, who appears to have been in Campania at the time, did not think it worth while to come to Rome to thank them, (Tacit. Ann. iii. 59.) Tacfarinas, an African chieftain, had long troubled the province of Africa, and Junius Blaesas was sent as proconsul, with orders to catch him ; but it was no easy thing to take this wandering robber, and Blaesus only seized his brother. Ti- berius allowed the soldiers to salute Blaesus with the title of Imperator, and he was the last Roman citizen, except the emperors, who enjoyed this ancient distinction. (Tacit. Ann. iii. 74.) In A. D. 23 Drusus, the son of Tiberius, died, being poisoned by the contrivance of Sejanus [Sejanus]. His death was no loss to the state, for he gave indications of a character in no respect better than that of his father ; yet he had lived on good terms with Germanicus, and after his death he had behaved well to his children, or at least had not displayed any hostility towards them. The emperor either did not feel much sorrow for the death of his son or he concealed it ; and when the people of Ilium some time after sent him a message of condolence, he returned the compliment by con- doling with them on the death of their fellow- citizen Hector (Sueton. Tiber, c. 52). It was re- marked that the influence of Sejanus over Tiberius increased after the death of Drusus, and Tiberius began to display the vices of his character more and more. The same was remarked also after the