Tiberius

About the same time, when the praetor consulted him, whether it was his pleasure that the tribunals should take cognizance of accusations of treason, he replied, "The laws ought to be put in execution;" and he did put them in execution most severely. Some person had taken off the head of Augustus from one of his statues, and replaced it by another.[*](It mattered not that the head substituted was Tiberius's own. ) The matter was brought before the senate, and because the case was not clear, the witnesses were put to the torture. The party accused being found guilty, and condemned, this kind of proceeding was carried so far, that it became capital for a man to beat his slave, or change his clothes, near the statue of Augustus; to carry his head stamped upon the coin, or cut in the stone of a ring, into a necessary house, or the stews; or to reflect upon anything that had been either said or done by him. In fine, a person was condemned to death, for suffering some honours to be decreed to him in the colony where he lived, upon the same day on which they had formerly been decreed to Augustus.

He was besides guilty of many barbarous actions, under the pretence of strictness and reformation of manners, but more to gratify his own savage disposition. Some verses were published, which displayed the present calamities of his reign, and anticipated the future.[*](The verses were probably anonymous.)

1. Asper et immitis, breviter vis omnia dicam?
2. Dispeream si te mater amare potest.
3. Non es eques, quare? non sunt tibi millia centum?
4. Omnia si quaras, et Rhodos exsilium est.
5. Aurea mutasti Saturni saecula, Caesar:
6. Incolumi nam te, ferrea semper erunt.
7. Fastidit vinum, quia jam sitit iste cruorem:
8. Tam bibit hunc avide, quam bibit ante merum.
9. Adspice felicem sibi, non tibi, Romule, Sullam:
10. Et Marium, si vis, adspice, sed reducem.
11. Nec non Antoni civilia bella moventis
12. Nec semel infectas adspice cada manus,
13. Et dic, Roma perit: regnabit sanguine multo,
14. Ad regnum quisquis venit ab exsilio.

1. Obdurate wretch! too fierce, too fell to move
2. The least kind yearnings of a mother's love!
3. No knight thou art, as having no estate;
4. Long suffered'st thou in Rhodes an exile's fate,
5. No more the happy Golden Age we see;
6. The Iron's come, and sure to last with thee.
7. Instead of wine he thirsted for before,
8. He wallows now in floods of human gore.
9. Reflect, ye Romans, on the dreadful times,
10. Made such by Marius, and by Sylla's crimes.
11. Reflect how Antony's ambitious rage
12. Twice scar'd with horror a distracted age.
13. And say, Alas! Rome's blood in streams will flow,
14. When banish'd miscreants rule this world below.

A few days after his arrival at Capri, a fisherman coming up to him unexpectedly, when he was desirous of privacy, and presenting him with a large mullet, he ordered the man's face to be scrubbed with the fish; being terrified with the thought of his having been able to creep upon him from the back of the island, over such rugged and steep rocks. The man, while undergoing the punishment, expressing his joy that he had not likewise offered him a large crab which he had also taken, he ordered his face to be farther lacerated with its claws. He put to death one of the pretorian guards, for having stolen a peacock out of his orchard. In one of his journeys, his litter being obstructed by some bushes, he ordered the officer whose duty it was to ride on and examine the road, a centurion of the first cohorts, to be laid on his face upon the ground, and scourged almost to death.

Soon afterwards, he abandoned himself to every species of cruelty, never wanting occasions of one kind or another, to serve as a pretext. He first fell upon the friends and acquaintances of his mother, then those of his grandsons, and his daughter-in-law, and lastly those of Sejanus; after whose death he became cruel in the extreme. From this it appeared, that he had not been so much instigated by Sejanus, as supplied with occasions of gratifying his savage temper, when he wanted them. Though in a short memoir which he composed of his own life, he had the effrontery to write, "I have punished Sejanus, because I found him bent upon the destruction of the children of my son Germanicus," one of these he put to death, when he began to suspect Sejanus; and another, after he was taken off. It would be tedious to relate all the numerous instances of his cruelty: suffice it to give a few examples, in their different kinds. Not a day passed without the punishment of some person or other, not excepting holidays, or those appropriated to the worship of the gods. Some were tried even on NewYear's-Day. Of many who were condemned, their wives and children shared the same fate; and for those who Were sentenced to death, the relations were forbid to put on mourning. Considerable rewards were voted for the prosecutors, and sometimes for the witnesses also. The information of any person, without exception, was taken; and all offences were capital, even speaking a few words, though without any ill intention. A poet was charged with abusing Agamemnon; and a historian,[*](A. U. C. 778. Tacit. Annal. iv. The historian's name was A. Cremutius Cordo. Dio has preserved the passage, xlvii. p. 6I9. Brutus had already called Cassius "The last of the Romans," in his lamentation over his dead body. ) for calling Brutus and Cassius " the last of the Romans." The two authors were immediately called to account, and their writings suppressed; though they had been well received some years before, and read in the hearing of Augustus. Some, who were thrown into prison, were not only denied the solace of study, but debarred from all company and conversation. Many persons, when summoned to trial, stabbed themselves at home, to avoid the distress and ignominy of a public condemnation, which they were certain would ensue. Others took poison in the senate-house. The wounds were bound up, and all who had not expired, were carried, half-dead, and panting for life, to prison. Those who were put to death, were thrown down the Gemonian stairs, and then dragged into the Tiber. In one day, twenty were treated in this manner; and amongst them women and boys. Because, according to an ancient custom, it was not lawful to strangle virgins, the young girls were first deflowered by the executioner, and afterwards strangled. Those who were desirous to die, were forced to live. For he thought death so slight a punishment, that upon hearing that Carnulius, one of the accused, who was under prosecution, had killed himself," he exclaimed, "Carnulius has escaped me." In calling over his prisoners, when one of them requested the favour of a speedy death, he replied, " You are not yet restored to favour." A man of consular rank writes in his annals, that at table, where he himself was present with a large company, he was suddenly asked aloud by a dwarf who stood by amongst the buffoons, why Paconius, who was under prosecution for treason, lived so long. Tiberius immediately reprimanded him for his pertness; but wrote to the senate a few days after, to proceed without delay to the punishment of Paconius.

Exasperated by information he received respect ing the death of his son Drusus, he carried his cruelty still farther. He imagined that he had died of a disease occasioned by his intemperance; but finding that he had been poisoned by the contrivance of his wife Livilla,[*](She was the sister of Germanicus, and Tacitus calls her Livia; but Suetonius is in the habit of giving a fondling or diminutive term to the names of women, as Claudilla, for Claudia, Plautilla, etc. ) and Sejanus, he spared no one from torture and death. He was so entirely occupied with the examination of this affair, for whole days together, that, upon being informed that the person in whose house he had lodged at Rhodes, and whom he had by a friendly letter invited to Rome, was arrived, he ordered him immediately to be put to the torture, as a party concerned in the enquiry. Upon finding his mistake, he commanded him to be put to death, that he might not publish the injury done him. The place of execution is still shown at Capri, where he ordered those who were condemned to die, after long and exquisite tortures, to be thrown, before his eyes, from a precipice into the sea. There a party of soldiers belonging to the fleet waited for them, and broke their bones with poles and oars, lest they should have any life left in them. [*](* * * Thomson omits material here * * *) Had not death prevented him, and Thrasyllus, designedly, as some say, prevailed with him to defer some of his cruelties, in hopes of longer life, it is believed that he would have destroyed many more; and not have spared even the rest of his grand-children: for he was jealous of Caius, and hated Tiberius as having been conceived in adultery. This conjecture is indeed highly probable; for he used often to say, "Happy Priam, who survived all his children!"[*](Priam is said to have had no less than fifty sons and daughters; some of the latter, however, survived him, as Hecuba, Helena, Polyxena, and others. )