slaves by means of the charms of their persons; but this result was not
likely to be secured before those charms were fully matured. So profound
was Nero's passion for Acte that, had he not been with difficulty
restrained, he would have divorced Octavia forthwith and married the
Greek. He is said to have induced men of consular rank to swear that she
was of royal descent. It is by no means impossible that such an
assertion should be true; for the slave markets which supplied Rome were
to a large extent recruited by kidnapped children, picked up wherever
they might be found. It is remarkable that not a word that is
detrimental to the character of Acte is recorded in history. Indeed, we
know but very little about her, though she has always been regarded with
a sort of poetical approbation. There is no evidence of her having used
her power with the emperor for the injury of an enemy.
She seems to have
been modest and unassuming, and it is certain that her love for Nero was
sincere; for it not only outlasted his, but remained true to the latest
hour of his life. When all others had forsaken the fallen prince whom
they had fawned upon, it was Acte who tenderly cared for his remains.
Tacitus represents her as warning Nero from his early evil
extravagances. She remained queen of his affections for four years,--the
best four years of his reign,--and it is said that when he turned from
her to Poppaea she sank into a profound melancholy. Upon all this has
been founded the surmise that Acte was a Christian; but it is nothing
more than conjecture. Whatever may have been the facts in regard to
this, in the little glimpses we obtain of her presence in the awful
tragedies of her age we catch the outline of one whom we are assured
must have been a good woman--a woman innately pure, but forced into
contact with vice by circumstances over which she had no control.
There are numerous examples from history to prove that in the dissolute
reign of Nero feminine goodness was not a rarity; but there are no
pictures of pure light-heartedness and gladsome simplicity such as were
known in the older days. Everything was sombre; death was in the air;
the only gayety was that found in the scenes of reckless profligacy. It
was an age of extremes; on the one side, unrestrained profligacy; on the
other, fear and sorrow occasioned by a tyrant's cruel caprice. It was an
age in which all the experiences of life were intensified. Human life
of the period can only be pictured in high lights and deep shadows;
everything must be shown in strong relief. The fortune of nearly all the
good women of this time whose names we know was to suffer patiently and
die heroically.
Like Acte, the noble matron Pomponia Græcina has been credited by
tradition with having found consolation for the sorrows of the times in
that new faith which was undermining old Rome, both literally in the
catacombs and figuratively in the rapidity with which it was making
converts; but we know not with certainty. It would be unjust to paganism
and untrue to history to claim every instance of moral superiority for
the modern faith. Still, Græcina was accused of yielding to foreign
superstitions. This may have been owing to the peculiarities of her
manner. She had been the close friend of that Julia, daughter of Drusus,
whom Messalina had forced to kill herself. From this time on, for the
space of forty years, Græcina wore nothing but mourning, and was never
seen to smile. Sienkiewicz founds the plot of his Neronian novel on the
idea that Græcina was a Christian; but there are no facts by which this
supposition can be verified. When the charge of entertaining foreign
superstitions was laid against her, she was, in accordance with the
ancient law, consigned to the adjudication of her husband. Plautius
assembled her kindred, and, in compliance with the institutions of early
times, having in their presence made solemn inquisition into the
character and conduct of his wife, adjudged her innocent. She survived
to a great age and was always held in high estimation by the people, but
she never recovered from her melancholy.
When the noble Thrasea had been condemned to death by Nero, the officer
who brought the tidings found him walking in the portico of his house.
He had already opened his veins, and as he stretched out his arms the
blood began to flow. Calling the quæstor to him, and sprinkling the
blood upon the floor, he said: "Let us make a libation to Jove the
Deliverer. Behold, young man, and may the gods avert the omen, but you
are fallen upon such times that it may be useful to fortify your mind by
examples of unflinching firmness." Arria, his wife, wished to share her
husband's fate, but he bade her live for their daughter's sake.
There were many women who presented examples of the same unflinching
firmness for the encouragement of their own sex. The mother of Thrasea's
wife, whose name was also Arria, exhibited a strength of mind and a
magnanimity of spirit equal to that of the noblest Romans in the best
days of the Republic. Duruy recounts two episodes in the career of this
noble woman which illustrate all we have claimed for her as one of the
best of her sex.
"Arria's husband, Cæcina Pætus, and his son were affected with a serious
malady; the son died. His mother took such measures respecting the
funeral that the father knew nothing of it. Every time she entered his
room she gave him news of the sufferer,--he had not slept badly, or
perhaps he was recovering his appetite; and when she could no longer
restrain her tears she went out for a moment, and then returned with dry
eyes and a calm face, having left her grief behind her.
At a later
period, her husband, being concerned in the conspiracy of Scribonianus,
was captured and taken to Rome. He was put on board a ship, and Arria
begged the soldiers to allow her to go with him, 'You cannot refuse,'
she said to them, 'to a man of consular rank a few slaves to wait on him
and dress him; I alone will do him these services.' As they continued
inexorable, she hired a fishing boat and followed across the Adriatic
the vessel in which her husband was conveyed. At Rome, she met the wife
of Scribonianus, who attempted to speak to her. 'How can I listen to
you,' she said to her, 'who have seen your husband killed in your arms,
and who are still alive?' Foreseeing the condemnation of Pætus, she
determined not to survive him. Thrasea, her son-in-law, begged her to
give up this determination. 'Is it your wish, then,' he said to her, 'if
I should be compelled to die, that your daughter should die with me?'
'If she shall have lived as long and as united a life with you as I with
Pætus, it is my wish,' was the reply. Her family watched her carefully,
to prevent her fatal design. 'You are wasting your time,' she said; 'you
will make me die a more painful death, but it is not in your power to
prevent me from dying.' Thereupon she dashed her head against the wall
with such violence that she fell down as if dead. When she recovered her
senses, she said to them: 'I have already warned you that I should find
some means of death, however hard, if you denied me an easy one.' We
cannot wonder that, to decide her hesitating husband, she struck herself
a fatal blow with a poniard; then handed him the weapon, saying: 'Pætus,
it gives no pain.'"
Pliny gives an account of an incident showing similar conjugal devotion
and self-sacrificing courage. "I was sailing lately,"
says he, "on our
Lake Larius, when an elderly friend pointed out to me a house, one of
whose rooms projected above the waves. 'From that spot,'
he said, 'a
townswoman of ours threw herself out with her husband.
The latter had
long been ill, suffering from an incurable ulcer. When she was convinced
that he could not recover from his disease, she exhorted him to kill
himself, and became his companion in death--nay, rather his example and
leader, for she tied her husband to her and jumped into the lake.'" This
was a woman of the common citizens; we do not even know her name.
Modern times have no examples to show of a closer marital sympathy than
this. Our ideas compel us to deprecate the act of self-destruction; but
we cannot question, or more than rival, such devotion.
The like degree
of faithfulness between married couples was common among the Romans; and
this was their manner of showing it.
We have, more than once, seen the statement advanced in all seriousness
by well-informed writers and public speakers that marital affection, in
the modern understanding of the expression, was almost unknown among the
ancients. The object of the contention is to enhance the appreciation of
the effects of Christianity; but the argument is as absurdly
inconsistent with history as it is with common sense.
True, Christianity
discourages conjugal unions in which that affection does not exist, but
it does not create it; nor was there anything whatever in pagan customs
or institutions to prevent the existence of the warmest and purest
affection between husband and wife. The sole conditions in the ancient
world that militated against pure and constant married love were the
customary unions of expediency and the inferior position of the wife. As
to the first of these customs, it is by no means unknown in the modern
world and to Christian times; in regard to the second, the Roman wife in
the period with which we are now engaged was almost equally as well off
as her modern descendant.
Principles of virtue, honor, and duty of a high order had been
inculcated through many generations of ancient Romans; and it could not
be otherwise than that these would reappear and manifest themselves with
invincible insistence, even in the most corrupt days of the Empire. What
higher or more dignified sense of duty could there be than that
exhibited by the lady who had determined to send substantial relief to
a friend of hers, banished by Domitian? It was represented to her that
this money would be certain to fall into the tyrant's hands, and that
hence she would be only wasting her means and gratifying the unworthy.
"It is of little consequence to me," she said, "if Domitian steal it;
but it is of great moment for me to send it." She possessed the sublime
conviction that she was responsible to her consciousness of what
friendship demanded, even though she might be certain of the miscarriage
of her efforts.
There were also women whose spirits were stirred by the love of freedom,
and who were willing to do and dare and suffer in the attempt to wrest
the nation from a tyrant's grasp. Among those who have sacrificed their
own lives at the altar of Liberty, the Roman woman can claim
representatives.
We are told that into the conspiracy against Nero which was headed by
Caius Piso, "senators, knights, soldiers, and even women entered with
the ardor of competition." The plot was to attack Nero while he was
singing upon the stage, though it was considered by some that it would
be a better plan to set his house on fire and then despatch him while he
was excitedly hurrying about unattended by his guards.
"While the
conspirators were hesitating, and protracting the issue of their hopes
and fears, a woman named Epicharis--and how she became acquainted with
the affair is involved in mystery, nor had she ever manifested a concern
for worthy objects before--began to animate the conspirators, and goad
them on by reproaches; but at length, disgusted by their dilatoriness,
while sojourning in Campania, she tried every effort to shake the
allegiance of the officers of the fleet at Misenum, and engage them in
the plot."
But, though an enthusiastic conspirator, Epicharis proved herself an
unwary recruiting agent. She especially applied herself to an old
acquaintance named Proculus, who confided to her the fact that he had
been one of the party concerned in the assassination of the emperor's
mother, and that he was dissatisfied with the reward he had received for
such eminent service, he being only a minor officer in the fleet. He
added that it was his settled purpose to be revenged, should a fitting
opportunity present itself. Epicharis did not wait to consider the
unwisdom of incontinently intrusting the knowledge of the whole plot to
a man of insufficient principle to prevent him from looking upon the
murder of a defenceless woman as an exploit to be liberally rewarded.
Moreover, it is likely that she inadvertently had dropped some hint of
what was in her mind, and Proculus lured her on by suggesting the
possibility of himself as a convert. Epicharis first gave him the whole
plot, and then set about persuading him to join it. She recounted all
the atrocities of the emperor; and concluded with the remark "that Nero
had stripped the Senate of all its powers; but," she added, "measures
had been taken to punish him for overturning the constitution; and
Proculus had only to address himself manfully to the work and bring over
to their side the most energetic of the troops, and he might depend upon
receiving suitable rewards."
One indiscretion she did not commit: she did not divulge the names of
the conspirators. So, when Proculus laid information before the
emperor--thinking doubtless that this was a readier path to reward than
any plot of assassination of which a woman would be cognizant--his
evidence was of little avail; but Nero considered it best to detain
Epicharis in prison, in anticipation of anything that might occur.
The conspirators at last concluded to perpetrate their design at the
Cirensian games. Lateranus, a man of determined spirit and gigantic
strength, was to approach the emperor as a suppliant and, apparently by
accident, throw him down. Scævinus was to perform the principal part
with a dagger he had procured from the temple of Fortune for the
purpose. Piso was to wait at the temple of Ceres until he was summoned
to the camp, which he was to enter attended by Antonia, the daughter of
Claudius Cæsar,--a woman of an entirely opposite character to that of
her grandmother, after whom she was named,--and who, it was hoped, would
conciliate the favor of the people. How deeply Antonia was involved in
this plot it is impossible to say. It appears improbable, as Tacitus
remarks, that she should have lent her name and hazarded her life in a
project from which she had nothing to hope.
It was through the dagger mentioned above, and also the cupidity of a
woman, that the whole conspiracy came to light. Scævinus impatiently
ordered his freedman Milichus to put the weapon to the grindstone and
bring it to a sharp point. Milichus, putting together this and other
preparations he witnessed, guessed the project that was on foot. He told
his suspicions to the emperor. Scævinus was arrested; but his bearing
was so confident that the accuser would have broken down had not the
wife of Milichus reminded him that "Natalis had taken part in many
secret conversations with Scævinus, and that both were confidants of
Piso." Then followed numerous arrests, confessions, and accusations,
each conspirator endeavoring to lighten the burden of his own guilt by
revealing how many there were who shared it. Lucan the poet even
informed against his own mother, Atilla.
Amid all this disaster, there was one spirit that remained undaunted,
one tongue that could not be persuaded by promises or compelled by
torment to confess and thus implicate others. Epicharis had been held
in custody from the time of her unguarded enthusiasm in Campania. Nero
recollected her, and commanded that she should be put to the torture.
"But," says the historian, "neither stripes, nor fire, nor the rage of
the tormentors, who tore her with the more vehemence, lest they should
be scorned by a woman, could vanquish her." Thus the first day of
torture was passed without producing any effect upon her. "The day
following, as she was being brought back to suffer the same torments,
riding in a chair, for all her members being disjointed, she could not
support herself, taking off the girdle that bound her breast, she tied
it in a noose to the canopy of the chair, and, placing her neck in it,
hung upon it with the weight of her whole body, and thus forced out the
slender remains of life. A freedwoman, by thus screening strangers and
persons almost unknown to her, though pressed to divulge their names by
the most extreme torture, exhibited an example which derived augmented
lustre from the fact that freeborn persons, men, Roman knights, and
Senators, untouched by the instruments of inquisition, all betrayed
their dearest pledges of affection."
Among the many who suffered from the discovery of this conspiracy was
Seneca, the aged philosopher and the former tutor of Nero. It is
probable that he was innocent; but he had incurred Nero's displeasure,
and the tyrant was glad of the opportunity to destroy him with seeming
justice. The parting of Seneca with his wife and her conduct at the time
well merit the pains which the historian has taken with the recital.
Embracing his wife, he implored her to "refrain from surrendering
herself to endless grief; but to endeavor to mitigate her regret for her
husband by means of those honorable consolations which she would
experience in the contemplation of his virtuous life."
Paullina,
however, expressed her determination to die with her husband, and called
for the assistance of the executioner to open her veins.
Seneca, proud
of her devotion and as willing to see her acquire the glory of such an
act as he was to be assured that she was safe from the hard usages of
the world, replied: "I had pointed out to you how to soften the ills of
life; but you prefer the renown of dying. I will not envy you the honor
of the example. Though both display the same unflinching fortitude in
encountering death, still the glory of your exit will be superior to
mine." Then they had the veins of their arms opened at the same moment;
but being unable to bear up under the excessive torture, and afraid lest
the sight of his sufferings should overpower her, Seneca persuaded his
wife to retire into another room.
When Nero heard what was being done, having no dislike to Paullina, and
not willing to incur the odium of a double death and one so affecting,
he ordered her wounds to be dressed and the flow of blood stanched. She
survived but a few years, and these were devoted to the memory of her
husband. It is also said that an excessive paleness was the continuous
witness to the sacrifice to conjugal devotion which she had done her
best to make.
Not so fortunate was Servilia, a young woman of twenty who, at this
time, was arraigned before the Senate, charged with having distributed
sums of money among the magi. Servilia was the daughter of Soranus, who
had been Proconsul of Asia. There was no accusation against Servilia's
father more severe than that he was a friend of Plautus, whom Nero, for
reasons utterly unjust, but entirely satisfactory to himself, had caused
to be executed. Tacitus suggests the picture of her trial: the consuls
on the judgment seat in the presence of the assembled Senate; on one
side of that tribunal, an old, gray-haired man who for many years has
served his country with honor and integrity; on the other side, the
daughter, so young and yet widowed, for her husband has been sent into
banishment, and hence is as dead to her. The thought that she, who had
endeavored to aid and comfort her father, had only added to his dangers
is so oppressive that she has not the heart to look at him. The accuser
questions her: "Did you not sell your bridal ornaments, and even the
chain off your neck, to raise money for the performance of magic rites?"
Instead of answering, the unfortunate girl falls to the floor, embracing
the altar, as though hoping that divine aid would be given, where human
mercy was not to be expected. At last she gathers voice, and is able to
falter: "I have used no spells; nor did I seek aught by my unhappy
prayers than that you, Cæsar, and you, fathers, would preserve this best
of fathers unharmed. It was with this object alone I gave up my jewels,
my raiment, and the ornaments belonging to my station; as I would have
given up my blood and life, had the magi required them.
To those men,
till then unknown to me, it belongs to declare whose ministers they are,
and what mysteries they use; the prince's name was never uttered by me,
save as one speaks of the gods. Yet to all this proceeding of mine, if
guilty it be, my most unhappy father is a stranger; and if it is a
crime, I alone am the criminal." Then Soranus pleads for his daughter.
Her age is so tender that she could not have known Plautus, whose friend
they accuse himself of being. Do they impeach him for mismanagement of
his province? Let it be so; yet his daughter had not accompanied him to
Asia. Her only crime was too much filial piety, too great solicitude for
her father. He would gladly submit to whatever fate awaited him, if only
they would separate her case from his. Overcome with emotion, the old
man totters forward with outstretched hands to embrace his daughter,
who springs to meet him; but the stern lictors interpose the fasces and
deny them this sad comfort.
The Senate exercises a heartless clemency; Servilia and Soranus are
allowed to choose their own deaths. This faithful daughter, for seeking
by means of her religion to aid her father, is privileged to die with
him. With them also perished Thrasea, who had added to his crime of
disbelieving in the deification of Poppæa that of neglecting to
sacrifice for the preservation of Nero's beautiful voice!
A strikingly magnificent feature of the old Roman character is the
manner in which these people met death. This was the one virtue which
the Romans, down to the latest period of the decadence, did not cease to
retain. In the most dissolute times, the Roman might live badly, but at
least he could die bravely. This was the one opportunity always left
when atonement might be made for the errors of life. In this ability to
meet death with calm fortitude the women shared no less than the men.
The maids and matrons of Rome were habituated by training and by their
best traditional examples to look upon the possibility of exit from the
world as an ever ready refuge from unendurable ills.
Lucretia was for
Roman matrons an ideal in her death as well as in her life; and they
seem to have found it less irksome to follow her in the former respect
than in the latter.
In the endeavor to show how, even in the days of Nero, when wickedness
reached its climax, virtue and honor and devotion were not utterly gone
out of the world, it has been necessary to adopt as illustrations some
of the saddest of the many tragedies of human history.
Neither side of
any true picture of this period can be a pleasing one.
Human life in the
city of Rome during the middle of the first century of our era was for
the most part either insane or sad. To exult in unrighteousness or
mourn in bereavement was the lot of every prominent personage; for there
were few quiet, honorable folk whom the hand of tyranny did not touch
through their friends. Therefore, in the endeavor to show the better