Hadrian Publius Aelius Hadrianus

HADRIAN (PUBLIUS AELIUS HADRIANUS), Roman emperor A.D. 117-138, was born on Jan. 24, A.D. 76, at Italica in Hispania Baetica, where his ancestors, originally from Hadria in Picenum, had been settled since the time of the Scipios. On his father's death in 85 or 86 he was placed under the guardianship of two fellow-countrymen, his kinsman Ulpius Trajanus (afterwards the emperor Trajan), and Caelius Attianus (afterwards prefect of the praetorian guard). He spent the next five years at Rome, but at the age of fifteen he returned to his native place and entered upon a military career. Trajan sent for him to Rome in 93, and after filling the usual minor civil posts he started serious military service as tribune to the Ilnd legion, stationed at Buda-Pesth (95)• He spent four years on that frontier, being sent to Trajan with the army's congratulations in 97, and returned to Rome with Trajan in 99. In ioo the Empress Plotina arranged a marriage between him and Vibia Sabina, Trajan's great-niece. In 1o1 Hadrian was quaestor, in 1o5 tribune of the people, in 1o6 praetor. He served with distinction in both Dacian campaigns; in the second Trajan presented him with a valuable ring which he him self had received from Nerva, a token of regard which seemed to designate Hadrian as his successor. In 107 Hadrian was legatus praetorius of lower Pannonia, in 1o8 consul suffectus, legatus in the Parthian campaign (113-117), in 117 consul designates for the following year, in 119 consul for the third and last time only for four months. When Trajan, owing to a severe illness, decided to return home from the East, he left Hadrian in command of the army and governor of Syria. On Aug. 9, 117, Hadrian, at Antioch, was informed of his adoption by Trajan, and, on the iith, of the death of the latter at Selinus in Cilicia. Whether he ever was formally adopted cannot be established. The army and the senate confirmed his succession, and he took office with danger threatening the empire on nearly every side.

Emperor.

Hadrian's first important act was to abandon as untenable the conquests of Trajan beyond the Euphrates (Assyria, Mesopotamia and Armenia), a recurrence to the traditional policy of Augustus. Mesopotamia and Assyria were given back to the Parthians, and the Armenians were allowed a king of their own. Some time after this there arose trouble in Dacia from the Roxo lani. Whether Hadrian set out from Antioch to suppress it, or whether he had by then already reached Rome, is disputed. In any case, while he was in Dacia occurred the conspiracy of the four consulars, generals of Trajan's, discontented at the abandon ment of the conquests of the last reign. The four were killed by order of the senate, and Hadrian left Turbo with a joint command of Dacia and Pannonia and hurried to Rome, where the affair had created an atmosphere of suspicion. He threw the responsibility for the executions upon the prefect of the praetorian guard, and swore that he would never punish a senator without the assent of the entire body, to which he expressed the utmost deference and consideration. Trajan's scheme for the "alimentation" of poor children was carried out upon a larger scale under a special official called praefectus alimentorum.

Travels Round the Empire.

The record of Hadrian's jour neys' through all parts of the empire forms the chief authority for the events of his life down to his final settlement in the capital during his last years. They can only be briefly touched upon here. His first great journey probably lasted from 121 to 126. After traversing Gaul he visited the Germanic provinces on the Rhine, and crossed over to Britain (spring, 122), where he built the great rampart from the Tyne to the Solway, which bears his name.

'The chronology of Hadrian's journeys—indeed, of the whole reign —is confused and obscure. In the above the article by von Rohden in Pauly-Wissowa's Realencyclopdidie has been followed. Weber's (see Bibliog.) is the most important discussion.

(See BRITAIN : Roman.) This part of the journey was mainly occupied with military inspections.. He returned through Gaul into Spain, and then proceeded to Mauretania, where he sup pressed an insurrection. A war with the Parthians was averted by a personal interview with their king (123). From the Parthian frontier he travelled through Asia Minor and the islands of the Aegean to Athens (autumn, 125), where he introduced various political and commercial changes, was initiated at the Eleusinia, and presided at the celebration of the greater Dionysia. After visiting Central Greece and Peloponnesus, he returned by way of Sicily to Rome (end of 126). The next year was spent at Rome, and, after a visit to Africa, which produced measures for the encouragement of African agriculture, he set out on his second great journey (September 128). He travelled by way of Athens, where he completed and dedicated the buildings (see ATHENS) begun during his first visit, chief of which was the Olympieum. In the spring of 129 he visited Asia Minor and Syria, where he invited the kings and princes of the East to a meeting at Samo sata ; Chosroes of Parthia declined. Having passed the winter at Antioch, he set out for the south (spring, 13o). He ordered Jerusalem to be rebuilt (see JERUSALEM) under the name of Aelia Capitolina, and made his way through Arabia to Egypt, where he restored the tomb of Pompey at Pelusium with great magnificence. After a short stay at Alexandria he took an excursion up the Nile, during which he lost his favourite Antinous. From Egypt Hadrian returned through Syria to Europe (his movements are obscure), but was obliged to hurry back to Palestine (spring, 133) to deal with the Jewish revolt that broke out in 13 2. (See art. JEWS; also E. Scherer, Hist. of the Jewish People, Eng. tr., div. 1, vol. ii. p. 288; and S. Krauss in Jewish Encyc. s.v. "Hadrian.") For a while he probably commanded in the field himself, then in 134, leaving the conduct of affairs in the hands of Julius Severus, he returned to Rome. The remaining years of his life were spent partly in the capital, partly in his villa at Tibur. His health now began to fail, and it became necessary for him to choose a suc cessor. There were rumours that Servianus would be appointed, but he and his grandson Fuscus were put to death in 136. Why, is not known. Against the advice of his relatives and friends he adopted L. Ceionius Commodus under the name of L. Aelius Caesar, who was in a feeble state of health and died on Jan. 1, 138, before he had an opportunity of proving his capabilities. Hadrian then adopted Arrius Antoninus (see ANTONINUS Pius) on condition that he should adopt M. Annius Verus (afterwards the emperor Marcus Aurelius) and the son of L. Aelius Caesar, L. Verus (afterwards co-emperor). Hadrian died at Baiae on July lo, 138.

Work of the Reign.

He was without doubt one of the most capable emperors who ever occupied the throne, and devoted his great and varied talents to the interests of the state. One of his chief objects was the abolition of distinctions between the prov inces and the mother country, finally carried out by Caracalla, while at the same time he did not neglect reforms that were urgently called for in Italy. Provincial governors were kept under strict supervision; extortion was practically unheard of ; the ius Latii was bestowed upon several communities; special officials were instituted for the control of the finances ; and the emperor's interest in provincial affairs was shown by his personal assumption of various municipal offices. New towns were founded and old ones restored ; new streets were laid out, and aqueducts, temples and magnificent buildings constructed. In Italy itself the ad ministration of justice and the finances required special attention. Four iuridici of consular rank were appointed for Italy, who took over judicial functions formerly exercised by local magistrates. The judicial council (consiliarii Augusti, later called consistorium), composed of persons of the highest rank (especially jurists), be came a permanent body of advisers, although merely consultative. Roman law owes much to Hadrian, who instructed Salvius Julianus to draw up an edictum perpetuum, to a great extent the basis of Justinian's Corpus iuris. (See M. Schanz, Geschichte der rornischen Literatur, iii. p. 167.) In the administration of finance, in addition to the remission of arrears already mentioned, a re vision of claims was ordered to be made every fifteen years, thereby anticipating the "indictions." (See CALENDAR; CHRO NOLOGY.) Direct collection of taxes by imperial procurators was substituted for the system of farming, and a special official (advocates fisci) was instituted to look after the interests of the imperial treasury. The gift of "coronary gold" (aurum coro narium), presented to the emperor on certain occasions, was entirely remitted in the case of Italy, and partly in the case of the provinces. The administration of the postal service throughout the empire was taken over by the state, and municipal officials were relieved from the burden of maintaining the imperial posts. Humane regulations as to the treatment of slaves were strictly enforced; the master was forbidden to put his slave to death, but was obliged to bring him before a court of justice ; if he ill-treated him it was a penal offence. The custom of putting all the household to death when their master was murdered was modified. In military matters Hadrian was a strict disciplinarian, but his generosity and readiness to share their hardships endeared him to the soldiers. During his reign an advance was made in the direction of creating an organized body of servants at the dis posal of the emperor by the appointment of equites to important administrative posts, without their having performed the militiae equestres. (See EQUITES.) Among the magnificent buildings erected by Hadrian mention may be made of the following : In the capital, the temple of Venus and Roma ; his splendid mauso leum, which formed the groundwork of the castle of St. Angelo; the pantheon of Agrippa; the Basilica Neptuni ; at Tibur the great villa 8 m. in extent, a kind of epitome of the world, with miniatures of the most celebrated places in the provinces. Athens, however, was the favourite site of his architectural labours; here he built the temple of Olympian Zeus, the Panhellenion, the Pantheon, the library, a gymnasium and a temple of Hera.

Hadrian was fond of the society of learned men—poets, schol ars, rhetoricians and philosophers—whom he alternately humoured and ridiculed. His taste, however, was curious; he preferred Cato the elder, Ennius and Caelius Antipater to Cicero, Virgil and Sallust, the obscure poet Antimachus to Homer and Plato. As a writer he displayed great versatility. He composed an auto biography, published under the name of his freedman Phlegon; wrote speeches, fragments of two of which are preserved in in scriptions (a panegyric on his mother-in-law Matidia, and an address to the soldiers at Lambaesis in Africa) . In imitation of Antimachus he wrote a work called Catachannae, probably a kind of miscellanea. The Latin and Greek anthologies contain about a dozen epigrams under his name. The letter of Hadrian to the consul Servianus (in Vopiscus, Vita Saturnini, 8) is no longer con sidered genuine. Hadrian's celebrated dying address to his soul may here be quoted : Animula vagula, blandula Hospes comesque corporis, Quae nunc abibis in loca Pallidula, rigida, nudula; Nec, ut soles, dabis jocos? Character.—The character of Hadrian exhibits a mass of con tradictions, well summed up by Spartianus (14. 1 1). But it is doubtful whether a good deal of this was not rather due to the defeated imaginations of his contemporaries, whom his reserved nature entirely baffled. Whatever his real character was like, the Empire under him enjoyed its golden age. The permanent marks he left, in addition to his legal and administrative reforms, were the towns he built all over the empire, and his contribution to the frontier system.

The chief ancient authorities for the reign of Hadrian are: the life by Aelius Spartianis in the Scriptores historiae Augustae (see AUGUSTAN HISTORY and bibliography) ; the epitome of Dio Cassius (lxix.) by Xiphilinus; Aurelius Victor, Epit. 14, probably based on Marius Maximus ; Eutropius viii. 6; Zonaras xi. 23 ; Suidas, s.v. 'ASpcavin : and numerous inscriptions and coins, The autobiography was used by both Dio Cassius and Marius Maximus. Modern authorities: C. Merivale, Hist. of the Romans under the Empire, ch. lxvi.; H. Schiller, Geschichte der romischen Kaiserzeit, i. 2, p. 602 (1883) ; J. B. Bury, The Student's Roman Empire (1893), where a concise table of the journeys is given ; P. von Rohden, s.v. "Aelius" (No. 64) in Pauly-Wissowa's Realencyklopadie, i. i (1894) ; J. Derr, Die Reisen des Kaisers Hadrian (188r) ; F. Gregorovius, The: Em Pero! Hadrian (Eng. tr. by Mary E. Robinson, 1898) ; A. Hausrath, Neutestamentliche Zeitgeschichte, iii. (1874) ; W. Schurz, De muta tionibus in imperio ordinando ab imp. Hadr. factis, i. (Bonn, 1883) ; J. Plew, Quellenuntersuchungen zur Geschichte des Kaisers Hadrian (Strassburg, 189o) ; O. T. Schulz, "Leben des Kaisers Hadrian," Quellenanalysen [of Spartianus' Vita] (1904) ; E. Kornemann, Kaiser Hadrian and der letzte grosse Historiker von Rom (19o5) ; W. Weber, Untersuchungen zur Geschichte des Kaisers Hadrianus (19o8) ; H. F. Hitzig, Die Stellung Kaiser Hadrian in der romischen Rechtsgeschichte (1892) ; C. Schultess, Bauten des Kaisers Hadrian (1898) ; G. Doublet, Notes sur les oeuvres litteraires de l'empereur Hadrien (Toulouse, 1893) ; J. B. Lightfoot, Apostolic Fathers, ii. 1, 476 seq.; Sir W. M. Ramsay, Church in the Roman Empire, pp. 32o seq.; V. Schultze, in Herzog-Hauck's Realencyklopddie, vii. 315 ; histories of Roman litera ture by Teuffel-Schwabe and Schanz. On Aelius Caesar, see Class. Quart., 1908, i. See also B. W. Henderson, Life and Principate of the Emperor Hadrian (1923) ; M. I. Rostovtzev, Social and Economic History of the Roman Empire (1926).