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Gundamor
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Topic: Worst Roman Emperors Posted: 12-Jul-2006 at 20:02 |
Commodus. He even renamed rome at one time to Colonia Commodiana. Most of his victories were marginal on the fronts and yet he had himself praised even renaming the calenders, senate and armies after him. With his lifestyle he would bankrupt the empires treasury and then accuse senators of treason to confiscate their lands rebuilding the treasury. He was also quite loony as he would star himself in the arena fighting lame animals or hapless gladiators to build his ego. He also ruled, somehow, for a lengthy time.
Nero and Caligula seem more comical type worst emperors. The nero against his mother story still makes me shake my head how demented it was. The whole line Caligula,Claudius and Nero were all loons.
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"An eye for an eye only ends up making the whole world blind"
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Gargoyle
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Posted: 13-Jul-2006 at 13:51 |
Gundamor,
Don't forget that these "stories" that you speak of were written by those who were against or enemies of the particular Emperor involved. So don't be too Gullible. Especially in Nero's case. People often forget that the Emperor Marcus Aurelius killed and persecuted more Christians than Nero ever did, but Aurelius is considered as one of the Good Emperors and Nero Bad. Nero in fact was probably one of the most Popular Roman Emperors Ever, but not with the Patricians of course.
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Gundamor
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Posted: 13-Jul-2006 at 14:16 |
Actually I never put nero above alot of other bad emperors. So the problems with Agrippina never exsisted? He even reported to the senate he had to act against her so I dont see how thats a story. Burrus and Seneca had more of hand in his success and during his last few years I doubt he had this most popular roman emperor image you portrait. Like i said i thought his and caligula's reigns seemed to be more comical.
I could say same thing about your opinion of Napoleon. These stories you hear are written by those against him.
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"An eye for an eye only ends up making the whole world blind"
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Aster Thrax Eupator
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Posted: 18-Jul-2006 at 19:23 |
Read about Nero in Suetonious or the section about the Madnes of Nero in the Annals of Imperial rome. Frankly, he seemed to be a foul man. Some of the stories are frankly disgusting. Caligula was plauged by a brain disease, so his behavior was not all his fault.
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Ildico
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Posted: 23-Jul-2006 at 00:00 |
The funny thing about Commodus is that he didn't start out bad(probably like most emperors), he remained innocent until there was a plot to kill him, that's when he turned and got paranoid. Didn't he get killed by a wrestler? I'll have to reread that part of Gibbon.
Valentinian III would definately be a good canidate for worst emperor, especially because of the fact that he murdered Flavius Aetius after all of his years of service to the empire. I always thought of Val. III as a weak man in general, very sneaky like a vermin.
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Beauty is in the eye of that guy behind the spontaneous diversions, set aside for a good explorer, telling a story about the world.
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Aster Thrax Eupator
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Posted: 24-Jul-2006 at 07:51 |
What are good books to read about (apart from Gibbon) for learning about these later Emperors? I have only really read about the 12 Caesars
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clement207
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Posted: 25-Jul-2006 at 20:49 |
To me Nero = Loony
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rider
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Posted: 28-Jul-2006 at 07:45 |
The first Year of the Four Emperors was filled with stupid men until Vespasian came. Not THE worst but bad they were.
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Penelope
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Posted: 05-Sep-2006 at 05:40 |
Elagabalus was definately one of the "weaker" emperors.
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Aster Thrax Eupator
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Posted: 19-Sep-2006 at 03:57 |
Tiberius was a terrible emperor, but he seems to me to have been sly and cunning. Like Stalin, he wanted dead anyone who got in his way and it is suspected that he organized (or at least played at part in) The death of Germanicus
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Guests
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Posted: 19-Sep-2006 at 05:48 |
I don't think so. The criteria for a bad emperor is fit mainly by most of the Severun dynasty. Except old Sepitimus of course.
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Aster Thrax Eupator
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Posted: 19-Sep-2006 at 10:35 |
I have not read much about the later dynasties of the Roman emperors. I have read Suetonius and Tacitus in relation to the emperors. What are some other good historians to read about the later dynasties?
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Posted: 19-Sep-2006 at 11:19 |
For the Severun dynasty the best is a recent book called, African Emperor.
Otherwise old Gibbon is a great resource for catching up on the history. If not the best analysis.
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Gargoyle
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Posted: 19-Sep-2006 at 13:02 |
Hello,
One happened to glance the Poll at the top of this thread and to my amazement discovered that 10 people have voted for Nero as the Worst Roman Emperor! This is particularly shocking to me because the Poll also includes the notorious Emperors Caligula and Commodus who have recieved considerably less votes! Now..... I fully respect the right of a person to vote for whoever they want to vote for..... but..... One is really very Curious to know how an intelligent person can come to the Conclusion that Nero was a Worse Emperor than both Caligula and Commodus!!!!!
Maybe I am just making the mistake of Assuming that the people who voted for Nero have some kind of Knowledge about or have done Research concerning this topic of the Roman Emperors! I am simply at a loss to understand it.
So..... if I may..... can I ask those who voted for Nero to explain to me the reasons, in their opinion, why Nero was a worse Emperor than both Caligula and Commodus????? Please... unburden my Curiosity.
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Constantine XI
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Posted: 20-Sep-2006 at 06:59 |
As for the year of the four emperors, I don't think they were all bad.
Judging from Suetonius, Galba and Vitellius were both pretty poor. But
he has alot of positive stuff to say about Otho, and certainly the man
went out with a death that had an element of nobility to it.
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Ahmed The Fighter
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Posted: 20-Sep-2006 at 10:58 |
The worst Roman? That is a pretty big title for one to have to wear. There were certainly many who were bad. Caracalla, Commodus and Elagabalus number amongst the more popular choices. How influential either one of these or others were in actually leading to the fall of them Empire, well, I think it is too hard for me to say.
My candidate is Honorius
Hiding in Ravenna, ready to escape at a moments notice without making any effort to save the Empire or at least alieviate the sufferings of the Italians. Even if he might have been a bad leader he could have at least tried. Apparently his greatest passion as Roman Emperor was tending to his beloved tomatoes on his small farm while the rest of Italy was getting raped by the barbarians.
He had sufficient troops at his disposal and he had lots of money as well as a companion in the East who he could have begged or paid for reinforcements from. There was a lot Honorius could have done but instead he didn't do a thing and to make things worse he had a very long reign and died of natural causes!
Anyone with a bit of determination could surely have turned the tide and Honorius' reign was at the decisive moment when the Western Roman Empire still had options available to recover. After his reign and the damage he caused, it was then too late to recover, the vital moment was lost.
Honorius was in my opinion like a 'dead' Emperor, under his reign Italy (essentialy the Western Empire at this point) virtually had no government and no protection, the government was weak and corrupt and still bleading the Italians with heavy taxes while offering them nothing in return.
sorry I'v been so harsh but I really dislike this man.
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QueenCleopatra
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Posted: 26-Sep-2006 at 09:11 |
Nero by a long shot! I watched a program on him last week - a docu-drama and the man was head case. Although to be fair I think he did suffer from some Mental Illness , maybe dementia or schizophrenia , that caused him to act as he did. Still he was a pretty disasterous ruler.
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Philhellene
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Posted: 28-Sep-2006 at 17:19 |
Valentinian III would definately be a good canidate for worst emperor, especially because of the fact that he murdered Flavius Aetius after all of his years of service to the empire. I always thought of Val. III as a weak man in general, very sneaky like a vermin.
Aetius was a real military dictator, it was him who actually ruled the Western Roman empire under Valentinian. His tension with Roman general Bonifacius caused loss of Africa, by the way he finally killed Bonifacius.
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