Emperor Nero
| “ | What an artist is perishing with me! | „ |
| ~ Nero's famous last words |
| “ | When Nero became emperor in 54 AD, Rome was at the zenith of its power. The Imperial Legions had carved out an empire which stretched from the banks of the Rhine to the deserts of the Sahara. Over 60 million people, a fifth of the world's population, were born, lived, and died under the Roman eagle. But Nero's tyrannical 14-year reign would bring an end to Rome's golden age. He was a perverse, cross-dressing exhibitionist who had an incestuous relationship with his mother and married his step-sister. He murdered members of his own family in fits of jealous rage. His cruelty, violence, and grotesque appetite for self-indulgence brought the Roman Empire to the brink of financial and political ruin. And he viciously persecuted the Christians. They would remember him as the ultimate embodiment of evil: the Antichrist. | „ |
| ~ Introduction to a Discovery Channel documentary about Nero |
| “ | Evil men you're not. I'm the worsest of the lot. My rule was full of fear. People called me a fighting hero or I would have them slain. Change the Olympic season. So the medals went to me son. Burned Christians for no reason. Just a fun game I played you know. Poisoned my stepbrother. Ordered men to kill my mother. Tried to drown her but she fled. So I had her stabbed instead. Wait. There's more. With my first dear Octavia. I showed truly bad behaviour. Chopped her head off gave it too. My girlfriend who I then killed too. I'M BAD. So baddy. Of badness I'm the daddy. Come on I want to see a more evil man than me | „ |
| ~ Nero on Horrible Histories |
Nero Claudius Caesar Augustus (b. December 15, 37 d. June 9, 68), birth name Lucius Domitrius Ahenobarbus or most commonly known as Emperor Nero, was a Roman Emperor who reigned from 54-68 AD. He is well-known for burning Rome in 64 AD and framing the fire on the growing number of Roman Christians, and began to have them persecuted by burning them, feeding them to animals, and crucifying them. He also made people sit through his performances, in which he would sing and perform for hours on end, behaving lewdly and disgracefully.
According to legend, he "played the fiddle while Rome was burning." In actuality, he played a lyre, and some modern historians believed he was lamenting the destruction of the city rather than basking in the fire's "beauty." He murdered his own mother, whose ambitions had facilitated his rise to power in the first place (and whom, according to some, he had an incestuous relationship with) and two wives, though the murder of his second wife was admittedly an act he came to regret. Christians had to practice their religion secretly, until he was finally deposed in 68 AD. Fleeing the city, Nero committed suicide on June 9, 68 AD when he was informed that the Senate had declared him a criminal and had planned an excrutiatingly painful method of execution for him. He was the last of the Augustan Dynasty, as he had systematically murdered all of his relatives prior to his death.
To this day, he is considered by many Christians to be the Antichrist, and the fabled passage in the Book of Revelations that discussed "the Number of the Beast" has been believed to be attributed to him. There are also suggestions that he may have been the bastard son of his maternal uncle, the psychotic emperor Caligula, which may have been true, since Caligula did rape his sisters a number of times, one of whom was Nero's mother, Agrippina the Younger.
In culture
Nero also appears as the main antagonist in the film Quo Vadis played by Peter Ustinov