NE'RO, Roman emperor from 54 A.D. to 68 A.D., was b. at Antium, on the coast of Latium, Dec. 15, 37 A.D., and was the son of Cn. Domitius Ahenobarbus and of Agrip pina, the daughter of Germanicus Ctesar, and sister of Caligula. His mother, becoming the wife of the emperor Claudius, Claudius adopted him (50 A.D.)„and his name, origi nal ly L. Domitius Ahenobarbus, was changed to Nero Claudius Ciesar Drnsus Germanicus. After the death of Claudius (54 A.D.), the Pretorian guards, at the instigation of Afrauius Burrhus, their prefect, declared him emperor, instead of Claudius's son Bri taitnicus, and their choice was acknowledged both by the senate and the provinces. His reign began with the semblance of moderation and good promise, under the guidance of Burrhus and his tutor Seneca the philosopher; but the baleful influence of his mother, together with his own moral weakness and sensuality, frustrated their eifort•t, and he soon longed headlong into debauchery, extravagance, and tyranny. He caused Britan nicus, the son of Claudius, to be treacherously poisoned at the age of 14, because he dreaded him as a rival, and afterwards (59 A.D.) caused his own mother Agrippina (with whom he was latterly on had terms) to be assassinated, to please his 'Distress Poppma Sabina (the wife of his principal boon-companion Otho, afterwards emperor), is order to marry whom he also divorced and afterwards put to death Ids wife Octavia (aged 20), the sister of Britannicus. The low servility into which the Roman senate had stink at this time, may be estimated from the fact that it actually issued an address con gratulating the hateful matricide on the death of Agrippina. Nero himself, on the other hand, confessed that he was ever haunted by the ghost of his murdered mother, The affairs of the empire were at this time far from tranquil. In 61 A.D. an insurrection broke out in Britain under queen Boadicea, which was, however, suppressed by Sue tonius PauTimis. The following year saw an unsuccessful war against the Parthians in Armenia. At home, matters were not much better. The emperor was lampooned in verse; the senate and priesthood, alike venal, were also satirized by audacious malcon tents; Burrhus, a valuable friend, died; and even Seneca, though not a great moralist,' out of his books, thought it only decent to remove from court.. In July, 64, occurred a
great conflagration in Rome, by which two-thirds of the city were reduced to ashes. Nero himself is usually believed to have been the incendiary. It is said that he admired the spectacle from a distance, reciting verses about the burning of Troy, but many scholars are doubtful whether he really had any hand in it. At all events he laid the blame on the Christians—that mysterious sect, who, like the Jews in the middle ages, were the cause of all otherwise inexplicable calamities, and persecuted them with great fury. Moreover, he rebuilt the city with great magnificence, and reared for himself on the Palatine hill a splendid palace, called, from the immense profusion of its golden ornaments, the Anna Domus, or Golden House; and in order to provide for this expend iture, and for the gratification of the Roman populace by spectacles and distributions of corn, Italy and the provinces were unsparingly plundered. A conspiracy against hint failed in the year 65, and Seneca and the poet Lucan fell victims to his vengeance. In a fit of passion he murdered his wife Popptea, 1)37 kicking her when she was pregnant. He then proposed to Antonia, the daughter of Claudius, but was refused, whereupon he caused the too fastidious lady to be put to death, and married Statilia Messallina, after killing her husband. He also executed or banished many persons highly dis tinguished for integrity and virtue. His vanity led him to seek distinction as a poet, a philosopher, an actor, a musician, and a charioteer, and he, received sycophantic applauses, not only in Italy, but in Greece, to which, upon invitation of the Greek cities, he made a visit in 67. But in 68, the Gallic and Spanish legions, and after them the Pretorian guards, rose against him to make Galba emperor, and Nero fled from Rome to the house of a freedman, Phaon, about four miles distant. The senate, which had hitherto been most subservient, declared him an enemy of his country, and the tyrant ended Ids life by suicide, June 11, 68. One is sorry to learn that such a wretch had a taste for poetry, and was skilled in painting and modeling.