The Tyrannical Emperors That Defined Ancient Rome | Tony Robinson's Romans Full Series | Odyssey

this channel is part of the history hit network stick around to find out more [Music] the stabbing happened just a few yards from here it was a frenzied attack 23 stab wounds inflicted by the same number of assassins it's one of the most notorious murders in history and it determined the course of western civilization and even though it occurred over 2 000 years ago we still know the exact date that it happened it was the 15th or as it was then known at the ides of march and the murder victim was of course julius caesar caesar's been called the greatest man who ever lived a truly superhuman figure he was a brilliant general a great writer and a man of the people [Music] after his death they mourned him in their thousands so how come he ended up on the wrong end of the assassins dagger what made people hate him so much i've come here to rome to try to find the real caesar the man behind the myth one of the most complex driven people in the whole of human history [Music] to follow in caesar's footsteps is to embark on an epic journey from ancient egypt to the uncharted island of britain [Music] i turned brutal and brilliant he changed the map of europe more importantly he transformed rome itself from a republic into an empire above all he he was the man who terminally destroyed the old system julius caesar celebrates how many people he kills he celebrates in triumph he killed a million people he was really one of europe's great geniuses but facially flawed and look at the cost for everyone else [Music] rome was the center of caesar's universe when he was born here in 100 bc nobody could have predicted that he would one day reign supreme amongst the elegant temples and colonnades while in that direction known as the sabura [Music] it was in dirty crime ridden with its multi-story tenement lost that julius caesar first saw the light of day but he wasn't exactly one of the street kids who roamed the slums the aristocratic caesars traced their roots back to the founding fathers of rome they've lost a lot of money but the baby's three names tell us that he's of noble birth [Music] his first name was gaius julius and caesar were both family names but the name caesar which means cut has led to the first fiction about him in ancient times great men had remarkable births and the legend grew that he'd been cut from his mother's womb the myth gives us the name by which we still know the operation the caesarean section it's a good story but in fact caesar was born quite normally they did do the operation in those days but only to save the life of the child the mother never survived and we know that caesar's mother was still alive when he was 40. in 100 bc the most special thing about the young boy was his aunt julia she'd recently boosted the family fortunes by marrying a charismatic politician called marius that marriage determined caesar's political colors for life [Music] caesar's noble roots made him eligible later in life to sit in the senate house here in the forum where his fellow aristocrats ran rome like a private club but by the first century the senate had split into bitter factions siding with marius put all the caesar family firmly on one side of the political divide julius caesar's early life is dominated by a civil war which is between two army commanders and almost like sort of preempts what he's going to do and he's not in the group which won basically so again he's he's in the aristocracy but there's the possibility of his death at any point as the power struggle slid into anarchy the 17 year old caesar got a terrifying taste of the reality of roman politics a powerful general from the other factions swept into rome and appointed himself as emergency dictator to settle the unrest his name was to deal with political opponents he invented the fiendish system of prescription it works something like this instead of wasting energy arresting and killing people himself sulla put up lists of names in public places these people were then fair game anyone who killed them got a reward sixteen hundred leading citizens were purged in the first wave of murders and more followed some people were just dragged out of their houses and kicked to death in the streets and one of the names on these ominous public lists was julius caesar [Music] he went underground changing houses almost daily relying on a network of discreet family friends in the fetid swampy backstreets he caught malaria as he sweated it out favors neutrals broke at a deal with sulla they secured a pardon on the condition that the teenager come out of hiding to face the dictator sulla was a large menacing man with a blotchy face he turned to the teenager who defied him what he saw was a tall slim young man with piercing black eyes who even when he was looking at the most powerful man in rome wasn't going to give any concessions to tradition instead of the normal short sleeve tunic he got long sleeves with fringes and he wore his belt slung low hipster style if he couldn't dress properly what other customs might he try and break down sulla must have wished he'd never let him off he turned to those who'd negotiated the pardon and made a telling prediction alright he said have it your way but i'm warning you this young man who you're so desperate to protect one day he's going to bring down the very system that we want to preserve history hit is like netflix just for history fans with exclusive history documentaries covering some of the most famous people and events in history just for you history hit has unrivaled access to some of the world's finest historians with familiar faces such as mary beard and tristan hughes we uncover the stories of alexander the great buddhica hannibal and much much more we're committed to bringing history fans award-winning documentaries and podcasts that you cannot find anywhere else sign up now for a 14-day free trial and odyssey fans get 50 off their first three months just be sure to use the code odyssey at checkout a lot of what we know about caesar is written much later by people who already knew what he'd achieved sulla's prophetic statement was probably made up with the benefit of hindsight in 83 bc there were far bigger problems threatening rome than one outrageously dressed teenager and the main problem was the system itself for 600 years rome had been governed as a republic ruled by aristocratic senators who were all volunteers and changed jobs every year it had worked well but then rome expanded from a simple city-state to control an empire that spanned the mediterranean the structure that was designed for local government couldn't cope with running a global superpower [Music] as it expanded rome had switched from voluntary national service to having a professional army to protect and run its dominions but after making rome rich these soldiers retired with nothing the already crowded city was overflowing with vast numbers of angry veterans living in poverty and demanding a pension so-called crowd pleasers like caesar's uncle marius were reformers who wanted to redistribute land to provide for the soldiers others saw any change as an assault on tradition [Music] there was for about the last century of the republic a continuous conflict between what we can call conservatives and reformers but they don't have political parties there isn't such a thing as a reform party there's no clear understanding of this is the way the reform party wants to go and this is the way that the conservatives are trying to stop it what you have is a clash of systems of authority caesar's own clash with authority meant that rome was still not safe for him his family packed him off abroad doing junior jobs and improving his education this foreign travel was meant to give him a low profile but it led to one of the most extraordinary events of his whole career [Music] he was still only 25 with a small retinue of servants he was sailing to rhodes for a course in the art of rhetoric or public speaking from a greek master round the coast of greece was boarded by pirates and caesar was kidnapped the pirates must have thought they'd hit the jackpot when you demand a ransom you don't expect your victim to start trying to negotiate upwards but when they told him that they wanted 20 talents of silver caesar treated the amount with contempt 20 he said i'm worth more than that make it 50. 50 talents is almost a ton of silver it would take nearly a month to collect his men sailed off to try and raise some money from the local banks while caesar remained on board he didn't want to waste his time so he practiced public speaking on the pirates they thought this was a joke and barracked him and when he swore he'd see them hanged they laughed and laughed when the money arrived the pirates let caesar sail away to the nearby port of miletus it was and miletus he hired a squadron of ships and men out of his own pocket returned and found the pirates still at anchor he captured them reclaimed the ransom and took them back to the provincial capital when he found that the governor seemed more interested in taking a bribe in order to let them go free rather than punishing them caesar took the law into his own hands he kept his promise of justice and had every single one of the pirates crucified he'd spent a month in their company laughing around and joking with them so as an act of mercy and for old time's sake he had their throats cut first [Music] this savage punishment and gambling with his own life was caesar's way of making sure of headlines back in rome romans are always competing for they call it farmer fame gloria dignitas and just think of what roman life is like here we are in in the roman forum and the roman ruling class get there by being voted for by people and it's it's an even more direct relationship than with modern politicians i mean maybe the media expose modern politicians in some ways but they they constantly have to see these people face to face and they have to make an impact on them so they're all in the business of arousing cheers making his own pr absolutely they they they're as concerned with spin as any modern politician but caesar had strong competitors attention julius caesar had begun life like a boy's own hero on the run from death squad's one minute battling pirates the next and in 73 bc he was enlisted to fight another epic figure spartacus the gladiator who was at the center of a slave rebellion julius caesar was a junior officer in the campaign against spartacus as the rebels retreated south through the countryside the romans moved to cut them off [Music] whatever the movies might sound there was never any hope of spartacus succeeding the sad fact is that the real life spartacus wasn't a noble revolutionary but a hopeless runaway who ended up as little more than a bandit thousands joined his rebellion but they were rats in a trap caesar joined the roman military machine as it advanced down the country forcing the disorganized rebels into defeat and capture there was absolutely no mercy for this assault on the established order along the appian way six thousand prisoners from the spartacan revolt were crucified anyone traveling north from naples to rome would ride the last few miles to the accompaniment of screams and the stench of the tortured and the dying for caesar it was no less than they deserved caesar was one of those who wanted reforms in rome but he was no revolutionary [Music] as he'd already shown he could be as ruthless as any of his fellow aristocrats in defending the rule of law and the status quo but the spartacus campaign was to be vital for caesar's career in another way when he was 32 caesar took his place in the senate on the lowest rung of the official roman career ladder within the senate there was an ascending order of ranks you could be elected to each with their own qualifying age caesar like most of his contemporaries wanted to reach the top and become consul but roman political life was a risky and expensive [Music] aristocrats on the make borrow huge amounts of money to finance their election campaign against the possibility of getting a province where they will uh extort back everything they've paid out but of course not everyone can get elected so at every stage of the pyramid you've got people falling off it and falling into debt so you've got desperate desperate men caesar's commanding officer on the spartacus campaign had been marcus lucinius crassus crassus was immensely influential mostly because he was the richest man in rome he'd made millions as a crooked property baron and was quite happy to make huge loans to an ambitious young man like caesar finance was vital to caesar because he had to play catch-up he started on the bottom rung two years after he could have done at the age of 32. he was a driven man hungry for success he was sickened when he saw a statue of alexander the great in cadiz he realized that by his age alexander had conquered half the known world to compensate caesar wanted to overdrive as he climbed the ladder he did everything to access unlike politicians today senators paid for their policies out of their own purse when he was in charge of public entertainment his games were bigger and better when he had a job maintaining the appian way he spent a fortune on repairs [Music] on a personal level he had to walk the walk he was lavish with entertainment gifts and bribes caesar had the best of everything wine clothes antiques jewels and women especially women being married never stopped caesar making other conquests back in rome caesar was famous for being one of the most prolific adulterers ever he slept with the wives of his enemies for information he slept with the wives of his friends for fun and sometimes he slept with his friends he was so notorious that the famous poet catullus wrote a poem about the varied and energetic sex life he shared with his chief of staff mumura perverted bedfellows caesar and mumura compete against each other at serial adultery and pulling teenage girls but private life and politics all needed funding besides legitimate expenses caesar also had to buy votes every election to every job meant a fresh advance from crassus [Music] a lifelong post of pontifex maximus the high priest came up for grabs it was an honorary but hugely influential job caesar was the rank outsider but it was too good a chance to miss caesar risked everything to get elected he put himself so deeply in debt that when he left home in the sabura he said to his mother i'll either return as pontifex maximus or i'll be off in exile forever it was a typical high-stakes gamble and he brought it off he got the job and the perks which went with it including a house right in the middle of the forum today caesar stands moral guardian of rome's city council but no political scandal can possibly match the vicious corruption of the senate in caesar's day as a leading advocate of reform caesar was bound to provoke opposition [Music] aristocrat who despised caesar's populist approach cato has his own political ambitions cater wants to make a name for himself and he makes a name for himself as mr virtue and he chooses to identify caesar as mr vice now caesar is an incredibly controversial character right from the start and i uh and i think one must assume that caesar actually as a personality he relished controversy he was never going to compromise with people he just went all out for it this wasn't the kind of friendly rivalry you sometimes see with professional politicians but a bitter personal dislike they both use dirty tactics after one meeting here caesar narrowly avoided being killed by one of cato's bodyguards in his turn caesar used the mob to disrupt meetings he'd organized so-called spontaneous protests when he didn't get his way then he'd calm the mob down and tell them that he didn't want to make any fuss thus earning support from the senate for his dignified behavior was nearing 40. notoriously vain he wore a laurel wreath to cover his thinning hair and had all his body hair plucked and he was still broke for his next promotion he was appointed for a year as a governor in southern spain with a brief to combat the brigands that had been plaguing the province before he set off his wagons were impounded by the bailiffs he had to touch crassus for more money to get them out of hog but for a hard up senator a foreign posting was a payback in the provinces he's rather like a mini king he's king of that area he can make decisions whatever decisions he really wants to and there's almost an expectation of extortion when you go you will always make money caesar fought a brilliant campaign against the brigands and if he also accidentally attacked and looted a few innocent towns rome was willing to turn a blind eye he liked a good victory with success came the booty of war enough to pay off his debts and to reward his men sufficiently well to ensure their future loyalty he was supposed to stay in spain till the end of the year but he wanted to be where the action was he cancelled his contract and returned to rome he'd been awarded a triumph there but more importantly elections were looming he was about to mount the final rung on the roman ladder of success the consulship [Music] caesar came back from spain to stand for election as consul so he needed some of this white cloth candida in latin to be a candidate he had to come into the center of rome dressed in white and apply in person but at that time this was a big problem for him because he'd also just been awarded a triumph which was an official celebration for conquering generals involving a big procession right up here through to the temple of jupiter in the middle of rome and caesar's problem was that the rules said that a general couldn't come back into rome till after the triumph had taken place the problem was a clash of dates the deadline for applications was before the triumph caesar hated to give up the chance of glory but political power was what he craved most he gave up his triumph and was duly elected consul but his conservative opponents wouldn't let their arch enemy have it all his own way [Music] there were two consoles each year they were supposed to work together but cato and caesar's other enemies made sure that his fellow consul that year would be one of their own men who'd act as an anchor on his ambitions they chose cato's son-in-law bibulus which was a bit like pairing ken livingston with norman tebbett and expecting them to work together this kind of pettiness made caesar vow that he'd never compromise with his opponents again from now on he'd bypass them he did it by making a semi-official alliance with the two most influential figures in rome his money man crassus and pompey the great at the time pompey was the real superstar he was only six years older than caesar but had had a brilliant military career and had already been consoled through crassus and pompey caesar mobilized a network of support and votes this alliance was known as the triumvirate all three had something to gain and pompey can make sure that all his veterans turn up to vote for instance so as simple as that they can say well it's in your interest to do this to support this man so it can mobilize the support of a lot of people he also gets the support of marcus crassus partly because marcus crassus wants to have a new deal for the tax farmers of asia he's representing them here in the senate there was a set order of speaking but caesar always invited his chums pompey and crassus to speak first he had his arch enemy cato arrested for speaking for too long and he intimidated the opposition with hired thugs but number one on his hit list was his fellow consul bibulus when he tried to interrupt while caesar was speaking the hired thugs burst in and tipped a bucket of dung over his head caesar had a positive reforming agenda but sleaze and his bully boy tactics overshadowed everything he did bibulus went in fear of his life he tried to get a state of emergency declared and when this failed he simply went home locked himself in and tried a novel method of blocking all political business bibulus would look out of his front door every morning and whatever the weather even on a nice day like today he'd say he'd seen a flash of lightning which meant that the gods were displeased this may seem daft but actually it was a stroke of genius because it meant that just by turning up to work down at the senate that morning caesar was breaking the law if he tried to pass any legislation it was illegal because it was going against the will of the gods just like a diplomat today he couldn't be charged while he was still in office but the moment he came back into rome as a private citizen he could be charged both sides are cheating of course they're cheating by the roman rules because it is proper to use religious obstruction but bibulus is overusing it he's using it in an absurd fashion and similarly caesar and many others used violence in in a fashion that quite alarmed the romans [Music] romans jokingly called this year the joint consulship of julius and caesar as it drew to a close caesar had to make sure his next job kept him away from rome and the threat of prosecution the tradition was that consuls were rewarded with a plum job in the provinces after their year in office with plenty of opportunities for making money the fact that caesar was a wanted man didn't matter for romans observing the ancient traditions and upholding the honour of the consulship was paramount his enemies voted him one minor post caesar ignored them and wangled the job he wanted he took the governorship of sis alpine gaul a lucrative province that also let him keep in close touch with his interests in rome [Music] he could have ended up as just another corrupt roman politician a footnote in history then fate intervened his allotted province was south of the alps what's now northern italy north of the alps was the roman province of trans-alpine gaul present-day provost and longadoc that was the limit of the empire beyond it the gaulish tribes were causing trouble a new roman governor had already been appointed for transalpine gaul but fortunately for caesar he died on the journey north so it now made perfect sense for caesar to be given that additional province as well along with command of its troops and it was that decision that turned caesar the politician into caesar the general the asterisk stories are probably most people's closest contact with gawlish culture a general sense of jolly meat swelling goals [Music] it works because there's elements of truth especially but ironically we wouldn't know much about the balls way of life if it weren't for julius season [Music] the gauls didn't leave any written record of how they saw themselves indeed the only way that we know anything at all about the world in which asterix lived is because of the person who destroyed it caesar wrote in detail about gawlish customs and religion and habits even while he was doing his best to replace them with what he thought of a civilization what the comic strip doesn't begin to convey is the brutality of that campaign in 60 a.d there were 12 million gauls caesar boasted that he killed a million of them and enslaved a million more it all started with one small problem the romans lumped everyone beyond the empire together as barbarians in fact there were hundreds of different tribes each vying for position with the others contemporary coins show how the gaulish tribes each had their own identity the parisie who lived where paris is today the arverni who give their name to the overn and the tribe that caused the trouble the helvetii what caesar had to deal with was a major immigration problem the helvetii lived in what's now switzerland but when they were attacked by german tribes they started migrating to southwest france the easiest route south took them across a bridge over the road at geneva down the road valley and then cut west across transalpine gall roman territory to stop the trespassing caesar moved north at lightning speed [Music] this is where the rhone leaves lake geneva the bridge that the helvetii were flooding across was somewhere around here where that island is caesar simply destroyed the bridge and left the helvetii stranded on the north bank problem solved his brief campaign was over but as governments have found ever since you can't stop desperate and determined immigrants by blocking one entry route after that the helvetii found a more northerly route which completely bypassed the roman empire so they were no longer caesar's responsibility but much to his delight they started overrunning the lands of another tribe called the i do we who appealed to rome for help against this new invader caesar immediately set off for their territory in what's now burgundy [Music] the headquarters of the idoi was bibracting the vast hill fort in north bergen as the migrant tribesmen camped out in the valley caesar arrived to fight his first battle in goal the battle took place not far from here caesar moved forward in classic formation three lines of troops against the helvetii the tribesmen who were used to fighting man to man fell back against the double hail of javelins towards that mountain over there caesar continued to advance fifteen thousand tribesmen who until that moment had been standing on the sidelines over on that hill moved forward to attack caesar's army calmly he ordered his third line to wheel round and attack the new threat while he continued to advance towards the helvetii the result was victory on both flanks a triumph of roman organization over the next few years caesar sliced his way through gore with each conquest he moved deeper into foreign territory in 57 bc he conquered the belgian peoples in the north they were threatened by the huge roman presence to the south and united to fight it thus giving caesar the excuse he needed to invade the next year it was the turn then caesar moved across the country again to fight a german encroachment over the rhine in a lightning attack he stormed the enemy camp and slaughtered men women and children any survivors were chased to the rhine where they were cut down or drowned but the massacre wasn't enough for caesar he wanted a much bigger and better pr victory he decided to cross the rhine and teach the germans a lesson the local tribes offered to ferry him across but he wanted something much more spectacular so he ordered a bridge to be built the rhine's 400 meters wide at the glens and six to eight feet caesar was determined to intimidate the tribes with a demonstration of what cutting-edge roman technology could achieve in just 10 days the romans spanned one of the greatest rivers in europe and when they crossed it what did they do well the germans ran away so they spent 18 days destroying their crops and villages and when they'd insured famine caesar retraced his steps destroyed the bridge and returned to gaul by 55 bc caesar was 45. what had started as a bit of troubleshooting had turned into a major conquest in five extraordinary years he'd more than rivaled pompey the great's military reputation expanding roman territory and for the first time in his life making a personal fortune he'd gone to the limits of the known world but his quest for glory would take him beyond those limits to the remote island of britain julius caesar was a brilliant general who conquered all of what's now france and belgium how do we know because he tells us the only point of the campaign for caesar was to enhance his reputation in rome military success was key to popularity with the people news would have filtered out anyway but caesar wasn't content with second-hand accounts even though he was a full-time soldier he spent all his spare time writing up his account of his military exploits in serialized form a new book came out every year called the gallic wars they're classics of latin literature but they're also history spun like a government press release in order to enhance his reputation [Music] hundreds of pages of history written while fighting campaigns across the country are not just written written beautifully the workaholic caesar also wrote a book on latin grammar the gaelic wars had to be an accurate account of events other roman soldiers were writing home from the front and any outright lies would be exposed instead caesar's interpretation of why events happened and his role in them puts him in the most favorable night even at the time opinion was divided about caesar and his reputation on the one hand he was awarded an extraordinary 15 days of thanksgiving for his victories on the other there were those who were outraged at his treatment of the barbarians and demanded that caesar should be handed over to the german tribes to be punished for the way he treated them this is a roman statue of a dying gore although he's recognizably barbarian with his shaggy hair and the metal torque around his neck he's portrayed with all the human dignity of a greek hero there were contemporary artists and philosophers who had a different attitude to caesar's ruthless world view let's not forget that just a few decades after caesar's assassination jesus christ was articulating the message of christianity and much of what was adopted by christianity had already been articulated by philosophers like plato so there was an alternative view to this one of dog eat dog on a massive organised and violent scale caesar's governorship lasted five years in 55 bc his time was up in the senate caesar's allies pompey and crassus were trying to get his posting extended for another five years to keep him out of rome and away from prosecution but caesar had to show there was still a job left to do [Music] there was one undiscovered and unconquered realm still in europe a dank misty island right on the edge of the known world he called it britain one of the warring tribes there had appealed to rome for help it was the perfect opportunity caesar got his extension and prepared for an invasion [Music] in these days when you can pop across the channel and back in a day it's difficult to imagine what this meant to the romans it was like proposing a moon landing the channel is only 20 odd miles across but for the romans who are used to sailing the mill pond of the mediterranean there's a huge barrier in addition the transports and troop carriers required to mount a full-scale invasion were a formidable logistical problem just the kind of mission impossible that caesar had made his trademark in 55 bc it was a desperate gamble for glory it was near the end of the campaigning season and the winter storms were fast approaching caesar got separated from his cavalry by bad weather heedless he pressed on with just his infantry on this ill-fated mission british tribes tracked their progress along the coast hurling insults and weapons as he reached what's now deal caesar could see he had a fight on his hands his main problem was actually landing the deep bottom boats just couldn't get near enough the infantryman knew that they'd have to jump into the water in full kit and weighed in under a hail of missiles thrown by the mounted tribesmen up there just waiting to attack the normally fearless troops seemed paralyzed but the spell was broken by the standard bearer who shouted jump lads if you don't want to lose our standards at least history will know that one of us did our duty and he went over the side and into the water the troops followed the legions were surprised by the ferocity of the opposition they had no cavalry to counter the britons in their speedy war chambers it wasn't caesar's finest power grand invasion turned into a survival exercise his troops had a tough few weeks foraging for supplies constantly fending off attacks from the natives before caesar gave the order to return to goal they were lucky to get back at all caesar's transports hadn't been properly beached and were wrecked by storms crammed into the surviving vessels the troops limped back across the channel before winter closed in the julius caesar wouldn't be beaten the british invasion is the perfect example of caesar's ability to live life on an epic scale as soon as he was back in gaul he ordered 800 newly designed ships to be built before returning to italy for a winter of politics and memoir writing then he went back to gaul the following spring and ordered a full-scale invasion but he wasn't just driven by wounded pride britain was renowned for its gold silver and enormous pearls although anyone who lived here could have told him that what he'd actually find most of would be weather he hadn't learned his lesson from the year before his fleet was again completely wrecked on the beach by storms undaunted he left his engineers to repair them and ordering replacements from france this time it went a bit better but caesar still spent a frustrating few weeks marching through kent unable to engage the britons who made gorilla raids then vanished had they known it all the tribesmen had to do was wait until caesar's supply lines were so stretched that he had to give up but they didn't the british army finally gave battle here on the banks of the thames at brentford if there was anywhere they were going to be able to stop this strange mechanical fighting machine from an alien country it was here at the lowest fording point of the thames the british leader arrayed his forces over there on the far bank in woodland with sharpened stakes in front of them for protection caesar knew that if he was going to beat them he was in for a difficult crossing his cavalry went in first followed by the infantry wading in right up to their necks they took everything that the british could throw at them and when they finally got out the other side dripping and in full armor they launched such a heavy assault at the british that tribal resistance virtually crumbled caesar had got the victory he wanted but his conquest was insubstantial a pr exercise rather than a real invasion he had neither the will nor the troops to keep an occupying force in britain instead he imposed an annual tax on the british but as soon as they'd waved goodbye to his patched up boats they probably forgot all about it it would be 97 years before roman standards were seen on british soil again within 15 years caesar had risen to the top of the political tree and conquered half of northern europe but his greatest conquests and challenges were still before him the next 10 years would take caesar from the killing fields of greece to cleopatra's boudoir he'd rise so far they'd have to coin a new word to describe him emperor how can someone be hugely popular hero worshipped as a brilliant general and reformer yet hated enough to be killed by the people who knew him best that's the enigma thrown up by the mythic figure of julius caesar so i've come here to rome to try to find something of the complex character who by 55 bc had made as many enemies as he'd won over he was 45 years old he had five swashbuckling years away from home indeed it was only the diplomatic immunity of his foreign posting that stood between him and prosecution in rome because he'd only got to the top through bribery and corruption over the next 16 years he'd fight a civil war he'd have a passionate affair with cleopatra he'd take on the mantle of emperor and finally he'd meet his destiny and the assassin's knife on the ides of march [Music] [Applause] [Music] as he approached 50 caesar looked back on an epic career achieved through ruthless ambition relentless work and a strange mixture of charm and brutality in getting to the top he'd already traveled thousands of miles as governor of gaul he'd fought a brilliant campaign cutting his way through northern europe and then publicized his victories in his own books the gallic wars but he had to stay in goal because of the charge of corruption he faced back in rome he'd formed an alliance with the other two great romans of the age pompey the great and marcus crassus [Music] as part of the so-called triumvirate caesar had written roughshod over the senate his methods led to the charges of corruption and meant he had to keep away from rome but now everything he'd done over the last five years was beginning to unravel caesar thought he'd conquered gore but the gaelic tribes were rebelling as caesar crushed one revolt another broke out in 52 bc the problem became a crisis for the first time caesar met a really dangerous opponent a charismatic young gaelic prince was uniting the disparate tribes his name was verse in gatorics [Music] in the nineteenth century verse in getterings became a symbol of french independence they put up this massive statue to celebrate the man who first brought the people of gaul together [Music] at the time the gauls had no sense of being one nation but they all hated the romans in verse and getterix they had someone who knew how to fight like caesar he'd actually served in caesar's cavalry he knew that the romans main asset was caesar himself the rebellion started in winter caesar was here in northern italy keeping in touch with politics in rome his main forces were spread across northern gore but versus was rousing the tribes here in the middle of gore if caesar ordered his main force south they might have to fight the enemy without him in charge reversing ghettorix commanding the valleys and the mountain passes blocked with snow caesar seemed powerless if you want to understand caesar you need to think like him one anything is possible to do what the enemy least expects he only had a small bunch of raw recruits but he ordered them to dig a route through a pass that was two meters deep in snow not only that but they did it in 24 hours they broke through and even though it was such a tiny force they completely panicked the enemy it was an act of strategic brilliance versus retreated rapidly to the safety of the overn and this brought seize a time to head west reunite with the main force and attack the rebels [Music] but verson getarix wasn't finished he was on home ground and he used the weather and terrain to his advantage [Music] for the first time caesar found himself outmaneuvered caesar crossed and re-crossed the land trying to subdue rebel tribes carried his extended supply lines rarely giving battle then he made his first and last mistake he allowed caesar to trap him into a direct confrontation it took place here at what is now ali's saren thousand years ago you would have seen the great ramparts of elysia a massive gallic hill fort versum ghetrix had botched an attack on caesar's cavalry and was forced to withdraw here with his eighty thousand men as caesar closed the net versus sent out a desperate call for reinforcements versus gatorics and his men were crammed into the fort on the top of the hill over there along with the men women and children who lived there and when his reinforcements arrived they set up on that hill over there up to a quarter of a million of them so caesar's 70 000 legionaries in the valley down there were hopelessly outnumbered and they got two problems they needed to keep versus gatherings in and keep the relieving forces out the solution another vast engineering feat they completely surrounded the town with two immense lines of fortifications first an inner wall to stop anyone getting out then another wall on the outside to defend from outer attack in these infrared photographs you can still clearly see the two lines but it meant the romans were spread terribly thin it wasn't clear who was besieging who [Music] elysia was make or break there were no half measures with caesar and no mercy for the gauls trapped in the hill fort the food ran out one of verse and getarich's lieutenants suggested they kill the old people and eat them versus getariks overruled him and sent all the civilians men women and children down the hill to avoid the final conflict caesar refused to let them through and they starve to death here in no man's land alicia is a terrific danger it must be said um it's a very big force inside the hillthought and there's an even bigger force that's coming to the relief there's a very big army on both sides caesar's gonna have to fight on both sides at once yeah it's a terrific risk but there's terrific amounts to gain as well because if he can win this one it will be clear that he is the master of goal the romans stretched over ten miles of defenses were outnumbered nearly five to one [Music] for four solid days the dawns on the romans slide out it could have gone either way then caesar himself led a surprise assault and the goals collapsed [Music] after the surrender versus taken to rome in chains to await his fate [Music] every roman who'd survived was given a prisoner to keep or sell as a slave there was still mopping up to do but elysia broke the back of resistance all gall was now roman territory [Music] caesar had rewritten the map of rome's dominions the great gaelic hill forts like elysia were replaced with roman settlements miniature roams with their own forum and temple nice and neat thanks to caesar the french have a latin language and europe is a classical not a celtic culture [Music] caesar had surpassed the achievements of rome's greatest living general his ally pompey but pompey didn't like that they were heading for a showdown [Music] by the time he'd conquered gaul caesar was in his late 40s after years of hard campaigning he was tough thin and fit although he suffered from mild epilepsy he was also vague he was so embarrassed by his thinning black hair that he'd started to comb it forward from the back to cover the bald patch like a roman co-mother but the major crisis of his middle age was only too real [Music] back in rome things hadn't been going so sweetly caesar had survived so far because of his alliance with the millionaire crassus and the great general pompey but now relations had grown strained and broken [Music] crassus had been killed on campaign in asia while another death had shattered caesar's alliance with pompey pompey had married caesar's only daughter the two men were united by their devotion to her but she died in childbirth the grieving pompey became distant he was jealous of caesar's success and threatened by his military might he'd been happy to help caesar's career but not at the expense of rome's interests [Music] the rivalry soon degenerated into gang warfare caught out on the streets by hired thugs the senate split into factions lining up behind two massive egos each with their own army at their disposal in 50 bc the crisis reached caesar's time in ball was up the consuls demanded that he return to rome lay down his post and face the charges that had been hanging over his head for 10 years rome waited to see how caesar would react it was a brooding presence waiting with his forces on italy's northern border if he was to resign everything he would be a private citizen and open to attack for all of his actions like he could be attacked for his actions in 59 bc as consul because they were illegal and all of his actions in waging war in ghoul aren't entirely given the rubber stamp of approval by the senate and people who wrote they're not completely legal he could also be tried for extortion so in a way he has really one choice which is if he's going to stay in command of this vast army is to actually just take it with it to rome the boundary between caesar's province and roman soil where troops weren't allowed was the river rubicon if he stayed north of the river caesar retained the power base of his army as soon as he crossed south he'd automatically become a private citizen and if he brought his troops with him he'd be committing treason against the roman people by crossing the rubicon caesar would give us not one but two phrases meaning no going back caesar could have ducked out of the fight he could have obeyed the law he could have avoided the death of the many many roman citizens who fought each other over the next six years but he didn't his sense of his own destiny prevailed on the 11th of january 49 bc he arrived at this little bridge just before dawn in a closed carriage the rest of his men had gone on ahead even now he could have avoided the conflict he thought for a moment and then he said aliyah yaktar est the die is cast he crossed the bridge and when he got to here he was at war [Music] the bitter conflict would last five years and cover thousands of miles but caesar started as the second favorite he had his own troops but pompey with the blessing of the senate had the bulk of the roman army and the navy but the sudden ferocity of caesar's mood spooked his enemies as he stormed south advancing on rome his reputation alone was enough to cause panic pompey evacuated his troops and fled to the port of brindision to escape to greece while caesar came home [Music] he hadn't been to rome for nine years but neither he nor the senator changed much during that time as a matter of form he requested funds for the prosecution of his war against pompey and when they refused he broke into the treasury and simply helped himself pompey had gone to greece caesar moved 600 miles in the opposite direction to spain trying to ensure that he wouldn't be out flanked by pompey's legion station there once he quelled pompey's troops there he made the grueling return and ignoring advice crossed to greece during the winter storms to make an assault on the crucial difference was to be the character of the generals themselves caesar sharp and battle-hardened had utterly loyal troops in contrast pompey hadn't seen active service for 12 years he was 56 suffering from a stomach ulcer caesar came close to defeat in a series of clashes on the west coast but pompey let him escape to the central plains caesar told his men you've survived because you're fighting a man who doesn't know how to grasp victory here outside the town of farsalis pompey the great and julius caesar had their showdown pompey's forces were arrayed under the hills to the west caesar faced him with his back to farsalis [Music] and with the cornfields of greece [Applause] pompey was soundly beaten and fled leaving 6 000 dead and 24 000 prisoners he was victorious but caesar knew the real battle was for the hearts and minds of the roman people at the beginning of the civil war pompey declared everyone who's not with me is against me caesar on the other hand is said to have said everyone who's not against me actively is with me and that's a good example of caesar's political awareness because what he did there was open up a way to forgiveness caesar took most of the captured into his own ranks he didn't know it yet but this policy of mercy was to prove fatal among the captured officers he spared was marcus junius brutus the son of caesar's favorite mistress and the man who would have him killed but pompey himself had got away word week season the sensible thing would have been to consolidate his position and return home but the fight with pompey had become a vendetta he set off in hot pursuit against his enemy and they both ended up here in alexandria pompey came seeking asylum but the egyptians knew who'd won and stabbed him in front of his wife when he was being rowed ashore a few days later caesar arrived and was presented with the embalmed head of his enemy and his signet ring caesar might have thought the affair was over in fact it had just begun [Applause] he'd stepped into a political mind because the royal family were thought to be living gods the rulers were always a brother and sister who married each other and moved jointly although each kept a separate pass incest didn't make them fond of each other there were fear struggles to get the upper hand caesar arrived in 47 bc the child king ptolemy xiii was fighting a civil war against his older sister at the time the king had the upper hand he invited caesar to the palace as his guest he wanted to ensure that the man who was now the most powerful roman alive would be his ally a few days later caesar had an unusual visitor a male attendant came in with a laundry sack over his shoulder he dropped it on the floor opened it and out popped the queen she'd come to enlist caesar's help against the king her brother to a man with a roving eye like caesar's this was big time trouble in front of him exotic and available was cleopatra [Music] it's been said that if cleopatra's nose had been shorter the face of the world might have been different two hundred years after her time she was the most beautiful woman alive people say but the statues that we have and the coins that we have suggest that what plutarch says about her is closer to the truth what plutarch says it wasn't so much that she was beautiful it was simply her charm it was the way she talked to people that's what made her so captivating that's what really brought man after man with whom she talked into her spell the way she looked well love stories tend always to turn the woman into the most beautiful woman alive she didn't need to be the most beautiful woman alive to achieve what she achieved she was 20 he was 52. there was no real reason for him to stay in egypt but he fell for cleopatra's seductive charms and decided to support her instead of her brother caesar found himself besieged with cleopatra in her palace the war if you could call it that was a desperate struggle all fought round this harbour area of alexandria with both sides trying to get possession of the causeway that ran out to the lighthouse after sending for reinforcements caesar tried to set fire to the egyptian fleet but ended up burning the city's ancient library in another clash he had to jump into the sea to save his life kicking off his heavy clothes he swam back to safety apparently still holding some important documents above the water to keep them dry he nearly lost caesar risked his reputation and his life for cleopatra the seas shifted since caesar's day and the palace where he stayed is submerged in the harbour now archaeologists have begun to reclaim some of the treasures that caesar must have seen daily [Music] once reinforcements arrived there was a decisive confrontation cleopatra's enemies were routed caesar installed her as queen the new king and cleopatra's official husband was her 11 year old brother but the baby cleopatra had later that year was called caesarea after his father proof of what seems to have been a genuine love story because even after the politics were done caesar couldn't bear to leave egypt he joined cleopatra on a romantic cruise down the night caesar's affair with the egyptian queen has fascinated people down the centuries but she gave him a dangerous taste of what it was really like to be a king as they relaxed on their two-month honeymoon cruise down the nile he must have felt he was invincible he'd conquered the world he'd won cleopatra it was cold hard politics that would kill him when he returned to his wife and affairs of state in rome he had no idea that three years later he'd be facing the assassin's knife caesar marched back home in triumph up the appian way but he hadn't come straight from egypt typically when he left cleopatra's arms he diverted to northern turkey where he fought a lightning and devastating campaign against a king who'd been trying to invade the empire in a life crowned with military success he'd surpassed himself to celebrate he wrote one of the most famous sayings of all time vani vidi vici i came i saw i conquered a brilliant epigram from a brilliant man but unfortunately not his own that form of expression is not at all unusual we can find parallels in roman comedy came we saw we went away again the greek philosopher democritus said something about the whole of life as being like that we came we lived we went away again what's new about what caesar does is that instead of coming seeing and going away it's i came i saw and i conquered this was early pr caesar wasn't content with mere achievement he wanted to create his own myth at the same time [Music] rome is increasingly a political scene where propaganda or images image building of one sort or another is becoming more and more important and the idea of caesar the one who's beloved of his army the man who's always so quick guys ariana claritas on the battlefield the one who carries all before him uh the man who is just got winner printed on the middle of his forehead uh that is very much a caesar creation as soon as he got back to rome he wrote up his own account of the civil war playing on his mercy and his willingness to unite the peoples of rome and he threw the party to end all parties [Music] a returning general was often given an official celebration called a triumph caesar had four all at the same time parading the trophies of his many victories rome had never seen anything [Music] legions marched in triumph singing vulgar songs about their over sex general home we bring our bald whoremonger romans lock your wives away all that foreign gold you gave him went his gallic to pay fond insults that you only get after years of affection and respect it wasn't just a show it was prize money for the troops a public feast with 22 000 tables groaning with food gladiators fought to the death athletes ran and wrestled actors performed as a special treat versus getariks who'd been saved up for eight years was paraded in chains before being taken away and strangled quietly in prison no one roman had ever been so powerful and so popular as julius caesar the roman republic was a democracy but for years there'd been a stalemate between charismatic individuals like caesar who wanted reform and conservatives who wanted to keep the status quo the scale of caesar's military success and his public acclaim gave him a popular mandate for a radical change in the senate he swept all before him he was still supposed to be the first amongst equals in practice his power base let him ride roughshod over the opposition caesar rubbed senators noses in his dominance attaching their names to bills without their consent people found themselves credited with putting measures forward when they hadn't even attended the senate everyone is frightened about the future where is this going to take us and the people who say you've got to change things cause great alarm to all the vested interests and when you consider that that two centuries of conquest have created an enormous accumulation of vested interests of people with land and estates and money and so on and they're all hoping to pass them on to their children and they don't want a new political order so one man one of their number rising to supreme power is a terrible threat caesar was a one-man revolution his reforms solved the problems in rome and made the empire a reality rome was overcrowded and there were thousands of retired soldiers without a pension caesar simply took 80 000 people out of the city and resettled them in new towns abroad where he also gave land to army veterans by making roman settle in gall or spain he started to turn them from conquered countries into a true part of the roman system and he reformed the senate expanding the number of senators to include people from the provinces so that they too could have a say in how things were run one of the jokes that went around rome was if you see a guy in trousers don't point him the way to the senate because a guy in trousers is going to be a gall and they're saying you know he's he's even appointing these barbarian goals to our senate now that's an exaggeration but but behind that lies if you have fought an enormous campaign in gaul and you've recruited part of your army from gaul you will indeed promote the successful officers up the system he also drained marshes imposed attacks on luxury goods reduced unemployment and made laws of religious toleration across the empire all good solid respectable civic stuff but caesar's most lasting achievement was made with the help of cleopatra's astronomers who trained here at the great library of alexandria he invented july before caesar the roman year was too short their 12 months followed the phases of the moon and were only 28 days long every so often they had to put in an extra month to make up but during the chaos of the civil war midsummer day had fallen in september caesar understood astronomy he knew the year should be 365 days long he divided up the extra days between the 12 months to get things right he stretched time between november and december 46 bc he put in two extra months then on the 1st of january 45 bc his new 365-day calendar started with minor modifications it's what we have today to mark his achievement the month that contained his birthday was called july [Music] then in the middle of all this activity cleopatra herself arrived in rome with her 12 year old husband and caesar's baby nothing shows caesar's high-handed attitude more than the way he handled her visit he erected a statue of cleopatra in the temple of venus the mother this was blasphemy having a girlfriend was one thing asking romans to treat her like a goddess was another by 45 bc discontent was seeping around the roman elite caesar's military enemies still had power the civil war was threatening to break out again in spain he'd already had to fight in north africa the year before putting down a resurgence of pompous supporters there now pompey's sons wanting to avenge their father were assembling an army near cordova once more caesar rallied his troops for what was to be his last campaign it's 2400 kilometers from rome to cordoba caesar did it in just 27 days in fact he got there before either the enemy or his own men knew he was coming the final battle of the civil war was one of caesar's most desperate struggles it took place just northeast [Applause] the two sets of professional roman soldiers were locked together in classic fashion when suddenly the unthinkable happened caesar's veterans began to give way and fall back leaving a gap between the two armies [Applause] caesar jumped off his horse threw away his helmet picked up a shield and marched up and down the line dodging enemy javelins and shouting if i'm done for then you're done for two when his tribune saw how exposed he was they formed around him and then the legions rallied [Applause] when the battle was won caesar admitted that he'd contemplated suicide when he saw his men begin to fall back i fought for victory before he said but i've never fought for my own life the civil war was over by the age of 55 caesar had such power that the republic could barely fit him into the existing democracy the senate tried to fit the system to the man giving him the highest office of consul for not one but ten years caesar also took an honorary title which has immense significance this is the room of the emperor's at the capitoline museum they're all here nero augustus caligula but they wouldn't be called emperors if it hadn't been for julius caesar his soldiers loved him and gave him the unofficial title of imperator or emperor he hijacked the name and used it as a permanent title so that ever after the boss of rome and its dominions was known as the emperor surely in a sense caesar must be the first emperor imperator is just one of the many titles which these people used and he was the first imperator kaiser do you think that caesar was aware that he was creating something new yes he must have been aware not least because everyone was telling him at the time you are destroying the old system you don't want to do this but he knows that the world has changed in a very significant way and that he has to set a new model [Music] caesar wasn't the sort of character who could play a diplomatic game one day a deputation came to him to tell him about the latest batch of honors the senate had awarded him they were standing he didn't get up this implied he was superior in rank to his fellow senators a great insult his excuse was that he had diarrhea and didn't dare move but it was noted that he still managed to walk home [Music] then in february 44 bc caesar was declared dictator dictators were usually temporary one-man rulers who were appointed to sort out emergencies caesar was given the post for life there was now officially one man more important than his fellow citizens there'd been dictators before like sulla who predicted that caesar would bring down the entire system but none had ever had the cult of personality associated with them until caesar look at this coin it was minted in 44 bc and that head is caesar this is the last year of caesar's life and it was the very first time that any roman coin had had the portrait of a living person on it what hubris and see this one this was minted two years later and on it there's a pair of daggers and a cap which symbolizes liberty and these two words three words the ides of march by 44 bc julius caesar was 56 years old after disregarding the niceties of roman democracy he was now a king in all but name romans hated the very word king 600 years before there had been seven kings of rome and the last tarquin had been such a tyrant they got rid of him and set up the republic instead they never forgot what a disaster kingship would be in fact when people tried to call caesar king he rejected the title but he'd already gone too far in establishing one personal rule i'm quite certain that caesar didn't want to be a king caesar knew roman history extremely well and first steps in roman history is we kill kings we don't like kings we had them once in the past there were seven of them seven is a good round number and seven is enough and roman history from then on is about every time anyone threatens to be a king you're allowed exceptionally to kill him the ringleaders in the assassination plot were two men called brutus and cassius brutus had been spared by caesar after the battle of farsalis cassius harbored a personal bridge caesar had once pinched some lions from him for the public games they started to sound out other people who thought caesar was undermining the republic more and more discontented senators joined in most of rome seemed to know there was something but astoundingly caesar made a move that was typical of his self-belief he sacked his bodyguard to him constantly watching your back was a sign of weakness and fear on the other hand he wasn't going to sit around waiting for something to happen he announced that he was going to launch a new military campaign he would leave rome on the 18th of march that gave the plotters a deadline on the 14th he went out for dinner there was a discussion about what was a good way to die sudden death said caesar one thing sir 24 hours after he made the flipping remark he was dead 2 000 years later he can trace his every move [Music] the 15th was the ides of march and caesar was due at a meeting of the senate but his wife had a premonition in a dream and urged him not to go caesar wasn't normally superstitious but he got a second opinion from a soothsayer and decided not to tempt fate and to stay at home instead the plotters almost panicked but then they had a master stroke they sent for the man that caesar was least likely to suspect in order to try and lure him to the place where they plan to kill him shrewdly decimus didn't try to persuade caesar to attend the whole meeting just to pop out and adjourn it first and as he spoke he took caesar by the hand and led him out into the street [Music] [Applause] [Music] caesar was as usual surrounded by people asking him favors and giving him scrolls to read which were usually passed straight back to the slave secretary behind him but a greek philosophy teacher who knew all about the plot slipped him a piece of paper and asked him to read it at once it concerns you personally he said caesar took it but couldn't read it because of the press of people around him it was his last chance [Music] he went through to meet the senate and his death [Music] but not here at the senate house in the forum the senate building had been burnt down by fire and they were in temporary accommodation waiting for a new one to be built the fateful meeting took place about half a mile in that direction at the theater of pompey it's shakespeare's play that has the murder taking place on the steps of the senate house it's ironic that it really happened in a theater built by the man who became caesar's arch enemy and although the murder is world famous the real location's pretty difficult to find the theater of pompey is shown on the tourist map but there's no sign at all of it in the street other than the intriguing shape of this building which mirrors the shape of the original theater the only actual remains though around the corner the nearest we can now get to caesar's assassination the two brute a moment is around the back of this curved building in the basement of this restaurant bonjour caesar was invited into the senate room just a few meters from here as he went to sit down the plotters struck a man called casker stabbed him in the neck caesar spun round and stuck him in the arm with a metal pen but then someone else stabbed him in the side this was to prove the killer blow but by then all 23 plotters were hacking and stabbing in such a frenzy that some of them even stabbed each other caesar never actually said at tu brute it was all far too confusing lots of blood and screaming instead he just pulled his robe over his face to mask the shame of a dying man [Music] when the coast was clear three slaves carried the body home meanwhile the plotters ran through the streets proclaiming freedom but the people of rome didn't want freedom they loved caesar and turned out in their thousands in the forum to honor him when his body was cremated they wanted another emperor the republic was never restored and in his honor his successors were known as caesar [Music] after more years of civil war it was caesar's adopted son augustus who formalised [Music] but julius caesar is the watershed before him rome was a democracy after him it was an empire ruled by one man and all because of the indomitable force of that one personality even following in caesar's footsteps with the benefits of modern travel's been a pretty exhausting business but at the end of my 2000 mile quest i can certainly say i hail caesar even if given his ruthless ambition i can't actually say that i like him very much nevertheless he was one of history's truly epic figures he lived life with an energy and a ferocity that it's hard to imagine in anyone today and his achievements were really colossal his conquests ensured that european culture would be classical and not celtic and perhaps most important of all he persuaded the roman people that one person ruled could work and this new model of the roman caesar would change roman history forever [Music] little boots are they sweet the kind of thing which makes even the most macho man go gaga two thousand years ago a group of burly centurions on the fringe of the roman empire made a pair of tiny shoes for a toddler and they gave him the nickname little boots the name stuck and 20 years later when the toddler became the roman emperor he was still called little boots or as they say in latin caligula [Music] yes that little toddler became caligula rome's most evil and maddest emperor a man famous for making his horse a member of the senate who sent his legions to the ends of the earth just to collect seashells and who believed himself to be a god a 100 pure maniac capable of having his favorite singer flayed alive while complimenting him on the melodiousness of his screams but was he really like that if caligula was so easy why was there a public outcry when he was assassinated and if he was bonkers why did they make him emperor in the first place so how mad was he deranged or just deadly this is my attempt to analyze one of the most villainous minds in human history [Music] [Applause] [Music] digging up archaeological evidence of the past is hard enough but how do you start getting into the mind of someone who lived 2 000 years ago especially since many of the historical records of caligula's rain have been lost much of what's believed or written about caligula is anecdotal propaganda written after his time what i want to do is try and build up a more balanced picture of him by sorting through the most reliable sources by looking at the different interpretations we can discover another caligula and to understand him we have to look at his family and upbringing because even from the beginning he's surrounded by men [Music] caligula's passport to success was the fact that he was the son of a national war hero in fact there was a story floating around at the time that he'd actually been born in an army camp while his father was fighting a battle the reality though is that he was born here in antiem in south west italy on the 31st of august in the year 12 a.d antiem or anzio as it's now known was the roman equivalent of the hamptons a summer playground for the super rich just a little bit away from town caligula's real name was gaius he was the third son of a wealthy family and if he didn't have his nickname yet he had just about everything else you can imagine his father was the legendary germanicus who won the hearts of rome with his conquest in germany but he was far more than a boy the emperor tiberius had adopted germanicus as his heir caligula's whole life was to be influenced by the reflected glory of his father his mother's side was no less auspicious she was the granddaughter of the emperor augustus whose charismatic leadership had made the concept of one-person rule popular in rome the emperor to be and his wife [Music] although caligula was their third son he could never have predicted he'd become emperor himself we know caligula was a sickly child and he was spoiled rotten but he also seems to have been something of a prodigy his father used to travel to the outpost of the empire and sometimes he'd take his whole family with him clearly caligula picked up his father's diplomatic skills because at the age of six at a place called asos he made his first public speech he was loved and adored by everyone so it must have made it all the harder when the rug was pulled from under him when he was just seven everything started to go wrong on campaign in syria his father germanicus fell ill and died the tragedy of his early death sealed his mythic character in people's minds caligula's father would always be the dashing young emperor roe never had death made his reputation but it doomed his family caligula's mother expected her eldest son to become heir but instead the emperor tiberius chose his own grandson gameless caligula's mother was furious and in pushing her case she made herself and her family deeply unpopular with the emperor crossing tiberius was dangerous the early emperors had ruled through their own charisma but tiberius was a sour-faced bureaucrat who had no time for buttering people up under him the empire had become a dictatorship he alienated the senate and he made enemies [Music] in fact he became so paranoid about plots that he moved his seat of power to capri but away from rome the remote emperor was even more terrifying he ruled by proxy with his praetorian guards dealing swiftly with supposed threats like caligula's family the teenage caligula was witness to a ruthless purge first his mother and elder brother were exiled and that his second brother was jailed in rome farmed out to elderly relatives caligula was isolated politically and emotionally all he had left in the world were his three sisters with them he formed an intensely close bond so close some people said the relationship was sexual as well [Music] then in 31 a.d when he was 19 caligula lost all family contact he was summoned by tiberius to his island hideaway here on capri as he arrived he must have wondered what lay in store is he going to be an honored guest or a political victim if ever there was a place that could literally tip you over the edge this is it tiberius was famous for his treason trials which he used to hold in secret in his palace senators would be summoned here they'd be dragged in front of the court and never seen again the rumor was that the sentence was carried out by hurling them off this cliff down to their doom below [Music] so this was the kind of oppressive atmosphere that caligula was brought up in for 12 years he hadn't lived with his father for the last four he'd been a virtual orphan farmed out to his great grandmother and an elderly aunt and now he was going to have to live completely on his own but he seems to have worked out a strategy for survival [Music] here in the darkened corridors of tiberius's palace caligula learnt to be a politician he turned himself from a threat into a protege he cultivated tiberius joining him enthusiastically in his intellectual pursuits and hobbies [Music] how much of this was pretense we'll never know he never gave the game away although years later people were to say of him there never was a better servant or a worse master the truth is that he must have been able to see the limitless power that was potentially available to him so however upset he might be about the destruction of his family he was going to keep his mouth shut his mother was in exile on an island about 20 miles in that direction but as far as caligula was concerned it could have been a million miles what increased the tension was that he never knew for sure whether tiberius was for him or against him had the emperor personally ordered his family's fate or were they the victims of plotters back in rome stuck in capri caligula had no way of telling he could hardly ask tiberius but events unfolded that suggested the emperor wasn't behind the plot one day tiberius got a surprise present from an elderly female cousin it was marked for your eyes only and it wasn't the sort of present that you expect from a respectable relative it was porn tiberius's favorite kind of reed but he got more than his usual eye for because inside she'd smuggled a message which told him the full extent of the plot against caligula's family caligula may have hoped that this revelation would save his relatives but although tiberius purged the plotters he made no attempt to free caligula's family in fact far from it despite tiberius's hand ringing caligula's mother was kept in exile his brother in prison until they both died and to make matters worse tiberius publicly announced the caligula's brother had been starved to death and when he died had been found clawing desperately at the hay of his own mattress [Music] be wonderful if we could get into the mind of caligula while he was on capri he may well have blamed tiberius for what was happening to his family on the other hand he may have been indifferent to what was happening to his family we just don't know and it's very possible that he saw the demise of his brothers as opening up an opportunity for himself and so was really quite indifferent to their fates but his silent strategy towards the man who murdered his family paid dividends the family's woes had started because caligula's mother had pushed for one of her sons to be emperor by a twist of fate it was caligula who found himself named as joint heir with tiberius's grandson gameless eighteen months later on one of his brief visits to the mainland tiberius died in mysterious circumstances a hundred years later historians reveled in the rumors they said that caligula had been alone with tiberius in his bedroom when he died they said he had both the opportunity and the motive there were no marks on the body so the cause was either poison or a pillow over the face and the further away from these events the stories were the wilder the details became until finally these later accounts became the official version but the only source we have from the time specifically clears caligula the philosopher seneca says that tiberius died of old age but who was going to be his successor tiberius had kept everyone guessing by naming caligula and gameless as joint heirs throughout his reign tiberius had terrorized the roman senate and now they'd have a chance to claw back some of their power for them there was only one candidate there really was no competition between gameless and caligula who would you choose gameless the grandson of a ruthless tyrant or caligula the son of a national war hero who had the praetorian guard on his side he stepped out of the shadows into the warm sunlight of power but would it go to his head [Music] history has left us a portrait of caligula as the archetypal mad tyrant but when he became emperor at the age of 25 there was no sign that he was unstable backed by the praetorian guard and with the gleam of his father's charisma still right he literally rome gave him a tumultuous welcoming home [Music] the crowds that thronged the appian way leading to roe were massive and wild with excitement they were more like adoring fans than respectful subjects instead of bowing and cursing as he passed by historians tell us they shouted out names like chick star and baby the army loved it the family of germanicus was back in power and the mob had got the son of their old war hero as their new emperor and superstar in spite of his terrible reputation everyone agrees that caligula's first six months were a triumph and he could do no wrong tiberius had been a glum spoilsport a mean grey-suited administrator who denied the mob their fair share of entertainment in contrast after six years in silent terror on capri caligula shared their enthusiasm for a bit of fun his games and entertainments lasted from morning till evening lavish gifts and an ambitious building program money was no object and he did the right thing by his family bringing his mother's ashes back to rome for a state funeral people loved him and were happy to accept him as sole heir even if it hadn't been tiberius his will [Applause] [Music] you can certainly say that he was a talented young man he he had a lively sense of humor he was very personable very attached to his uh to his family and his uh in his youth but he also had um an irresponsible reckless side to him and the great tragedy of course is that there was no one to hold that reckless side in check historians tell us he was fanatical about chariot racing and wasn't content just to be a spectator he liked to ride himself this was something no well-read roman was supposed to do but caligula was empty he could do it was here under what's now the headquarters of the roman catholic church that the impetuous side of his character was given full reign believe it or not i'm standing on what was once a roman race track and that obelisk was the halfway point in the ben hur style chariot races in 38 a.d when christianity was still a minor sect of judaism caligula built a private stadium right here across what's now the vatican and he brought that obelisk all 300 tons of it all the way from egypt a major feat of engineering for the empress playground [Music] the track of the stadium was like a huge long thin dog track with the top curve right in the middle of what's now the square somewhere around where the obelisk is and then the track itself was about 40 or 50 meters wide and it stretched about 500 meters in that direction so the halfway point was just beyond where the front of saint peter's is now [Music] [Applause] huge crowds used to turn up to watch the young emperor play and if the aristocrats frowned they were willing to overlook a little youthful enthusiasm as far as the senate was concerned an inexperienced emperor with other things on his mind would be malleable enough to give them the control they sought in their book he promised to return power to the senate after tiberius's autocratic reign to abolish the dreaded treason trials and he said he destroyed all the secret files naming the plotters against him and his family for six months the senate and caligula you come into power and everyone is is is wonderful to you yeah yeah gives you good stuff everybody else absolutely everyone wants you on their side you're still an unknown quantity and he he he he swims in this he loves it and he knows the right things to do he knows that that tiberius was hated and that anything he can do to to distance himself from what tiberius was hated for will be good very soon he has to cope with the problems of actually being emperor and one should never underestimate how colossally difficult that is so you think that caligula was just incredibly irritated by the day-to-day tasks i think caligula was enormously insecure with his his upbringing in in the imperial tiberius is court is a real nightmare people are murdering each other plotting against each other that must be true beyond any a doubt whatever exaggerations there may be in the historical sources is a ghastly place he has no psychological basis for being a stable person to react to the real problems of being an emperor outwardly the young caligula put on a brave face but the public exterior disguised the complexity of his feelings behind the mask of the successful young aristocrat lurked a very different personality he was dark and brooding he wandered the corridors of the palace late at night his dreams racked with nightmares he was intelligent but highly strung and lurched from happiness to deep despair in an instant when he spoke he spoke rapidly without stopping um very very eloquently but but he would be carried away by the power of his uh of his own rhetoric he seems to be very very impatient with individuals around him very very sarcastic so he was a man i think who found it very difficult to relax the last six months had been all too much for caligula the release from repression the emotion the excitement took their toll on the highly strong emperor in late september he suffered some sort of breakdown we don't know whether the illness was mental or physical but we do know it took him out of circulation and it marked a turning point for three months it was touch and go as news filtered down from his palace on the palatine the empire held its breath people slept out in the open in the shadow of the palace waiting for press releases it was a bit like the death of princess die the whole nation seemed consumed by depression over enthusiastic aristocrats made rash promises to the gods that they'd fight as gladiators or commit suicide if caligula would only recover later they must have wished they'd kept their mouth shut early the following year caligula appeared to make a full recovery there was joy and relief all around the empire but it was a very different caligula who emerged from his enforced isolation and the first victims of this were changed toadies had wished so hard for his recovery the man who'd volunteered to fight as a gladiator [Music] was forced to fight in the arena several times before he was finally released [Music] as for the volunteer suicide victim caligula kept him to his word he was prepared for sacrifice dressed in sacred garlands trust up and paraded through the streets till the procession arrived here at the banks of the tiber prior to the victim being cast into the waters as a present to the gods except of course that caligula had absolutely no intention of killing him he just wanted to teach him a lesson for being such a creep so at the last minute he let him off it was as though the illness had made scales fall from his eyes caligula saw that the tide of affection was shallow hypocrisy and he was disgusted by it while some had pleaded for his survival others had hoped for his death but to caligula they both looked very much the same while he'd been ill the senate had planned who would take over if caligula died the natural successor was tiberius's grandson gameless it was a sensible contingency plan but to caligula it looked suspicious was there a plot or was he paranoid either way in ancient rome you didn't send soldiers to kill someone for their misdeeds you send them to make sure the guilty party killed themselves soldiers were dispatched to tell gameless that he'd been found guilty of masterminding a plot against caligula although from what followed it was clear he was hardly up to the job poor old gameless not the brightest bulb in the pack was given a sword and told to dispatch himself but then had to be shown how to do it caligula's bubble had burst what did the adulation and praise add up to if they wanted to replace you just for being ill from now on he'd take a cynical line if they don't care i don't either no one would ever be allowed to let him down again so far the caligula we've found hasn't been simply saved our interpretation of the anecdotes of has uncovered a far more complex devious character than that the illness that ended his six months popularity was followed by another blow to his psyche the death of the person he was closest to in the world his sister drusilla he'd always had an unnaturally intense relationship with his sisters especially drusilla and when she died in 3818 he was devastated he was too stricken to attend the funeral rides and instead took himself off to the country refusing to cut his beard and hair as a sign of mourning there's very little in contemporary accounts to back up later allegations of incest but his sister's death broke something public games and festivities which had made him so popular were banned and drusilla was declared a goddess her statue was set up in the temple of venus [Music] it's the caligula that emerges from this period of mourning that gives us all the memorable anecdotes about it these are the stories that have given rise to the belief that he was utterly mad but you can learn more about caligula by setting them in context his feasts were legendary with loaves of bread made of gold and pearls melted in vinegar's drink we know this to be true but luxury and excess were normal for a rich rose it said caligula would take any senator's wife he fancied away from the feast and then come back and give the table a lurid account of what he'd just done to her or he'd undress his own wife in front of company to show what a lucky man he was but it seems to me that this only proves he had a viciously sadistic streak not that he was mad even though he loved his wife he'd often kiss her neck and whisper in amusing way off comes this very attractive head whenever i choose to say the word but what's revealing is how often the butts of his sadistic humor the people he saw as his political enemies members of the senate [Music] in one story three obsequious senators are summoned to the imperial palace late at night not good news at the best of times they're ushered into the emperor's private theater and they sit there not knowing whether it's execution or exile when suddenly the curtain opens caligula prances on stage does a bit of a song and a dance act then disappears without comment into the night presumably really pleased with himself at the terrifying effect of his practical joke he wasn't just interested in humiliating individuals when he came to power he promised to work with the senate but after his breakdown he saw them all as enemies and it wasn't just paranoia [Music] he'd grown up believing that it was tiberius who'd killed his parents but when he searched through the records he discovered the role that the senate had played in going along with it he turned on them viciously he entered the senate here and launched a fierce and confrontational attack he said that he'd actually still got the documents which he'd said he'd destroyed they told him that all the people that tiberius had tried and killed were in fact guilty not only that but they named some of the co-conspirators who've done for his family given these revelations caligula said he was going to reinstate the treason trials to find the rest of the culprits he ended with the words let them hate me as long as they fear me on both counts the senators did the senate is full of precisely the power brokers of the roman empire if anyone is going to be powerful going to be doing anything they're going to be in the senate and so of course his friends and his enemies are going to be in the senate a wise emperor plays down the enemies ignores them marginalizes them and plays up the friends caligula does the one thing you should never do which is rant against the senate as a body caligula despised the sham of democracy in the roman system one of the most famous stories taken to prove his madness was in fact a deliberate slur on the senate it said he wanted to make his favorite horse console the highest office in the land but he never did it was an insulting joke even my horse could do a better job at the heart of caligula's story is a conflict between two visions of what the emperor was supposed to be the senate believed the emperor was only there with their permission caligula saw himself as the inheritor of augustus a member of the imperial dynasty with a divine right to rule and it's in this context we should see the most spectacular example of what his enemies saw as madness and what he saw as proof of his absolute power it took place in the summer of 39 a.d and it all happened right here or rather out there in the bay of naples nothing would get in the emperor's way even if he wanted to walk on water caligula proposed riding his horse three kilometers across the bay of naples once he decided to turn the sea into land this whole area became one enormous shipyard he built lots of boats here in the bay and got lots of others in from ports outside so he got about 200 of them which he lashed together in two long lines right the way across the bay then he anchored them and laid a big wooden bridge all the way along on top then dressed in a long purple cloak encrusted with gold and jewels and wearing the breastplate of his hero alexander the great he and the praetorian guard charged all the way along the length of the bridge [Music] but he wasn't finished yet he waited for dark and awarded thousands upon thousands of torches to be lit across the bay it was extravagant it was outrageous caligula had turned water into land and night in today he was rivaling the gods he was in charge the ordinary romans loved this excessive display but the people challenged by caligula's absolute power that was vulgar and dangerous he could command fear but not loyalty and back in rome problems were brewing with an increasingly excluded senate later that year a widespread plot was discovered reaction shows that he still had a firm grip on reality to act in a political crisis the plotters were killed or exiled and in response caligula came up with a brilliant plan for restoring instability an emperor with control of the army had control over sanity and there was nothing the legions liked more than a successful leader like julius caesar or caligula's own father germanicus [Music] [Music] this is where caligula decided to make his presence felt here at the very edge of the empire on the banks of the river rhine this natural barrier was supposed to separate roman civilization from the barbarians beyond but for years a lax roman commander had been totally unable to prevent the troops making embarrassing sorties over this side of the river caligula sacked him and had him replaced by a strict disciplinarian then as soon as the troops had been knocked back into shape again caligula headed north to join them on the border [Music] this was no exercise to please the vanity of the lunatic securing the german frontier was a strategic action caligula had places all along the ride where troop movements were well planned and well put out what he did was to carry out brief raids across the river at the head of his troops he probably didn't kill a single german himself but the fact that the emperor went into battle personally not only restored the spirit to his men it also made them loyal to him in rome and throughout the empire they honored caligula's success with special games and celebrations he'd proved himself as a soldier and a tactician caligula had got the army on side and he could do what he liked [Music] ever since julius caesar had made a brief incursion the romans had been talking about making a full-scale invasion of the damp island on the edge of the world securing the german border had only been part one of caligula's master plan he wanted to invade britain with the german tribes subdued caligula borrowed forces from the border and marched towards the edge of the world what's now beloy and then his brilliant strategy turned into one of the most famous castles in history the troops were all lined up on the shore caligula got on board a trireme set sail for england but then immediately turned around came back again disembarked and climbed up on a high platform overlooking his men then he gave the order i want you all to walk along the beach pick up as many shells as possible and put them in your helmets and one stroke the greatest fighting force in the world was transformed into a legion of day trippers then all the shells were solemnly taken back to rome as the booty of war so what was going on again academics have put forward several plaudible explanations for what appear to be caligula's random actions some think the very act of bringing the soldiers to the seashore was enough to claim rebellion and the seashells are a purely symbolic beauty of war others think that caligula was forced to abandon his plans because the soldiers refused to cross the channel for them this was the edge of the world everything over there was virtually another galaxy three years later when claudius invaded england he faced a virtual mutiny if something similar happened to caligula then the episode of the seashells becomes a typically humiliating lesson for his mutinous centurions humbling a bunch of tough soldiers fits in with the sadistic side of caligula's character but he reserved his real cruelty for the roman elite and when a deputation of senators arrived to request his return to rome he slapped his sword and said i'm on my way and i'm bringing this caligula was returning for a showdown [Music] had been emperor for three years but he was still only 28. coming to absolute power with a mercurial temper and a sadistic humor that no one understood he was like a spoiled child given the power of life and death and he looked the part of a man he was poor with spindly legs a nervous face with deep set eyes and he made it worse by pulling scary faces in the mirror he was so embarrassed about his thinning blonde hair but he made it illegal to stand above him so no one saw his bald patch altogether a damaged insecure human being [Music] as soon as he returned from his botched invasion of britain he launched another scathing attack on the senate demanding that they recognize his true status as a god he built a lodge here on the capitoline hill near the temple of jupiter because he wanted to be close to the god who was his role model [Music] he commissioned a life-sized gold statue of himself as his favorite god which he dressed up in different clothes every day but not content with that he used to stand in the forum between the statues of the various gods pretending to be jupiter so that he could get a bit of worship himself it's difficult to tell how seriously caligula took all this when a simple working man told caligula he was acting like an idiot the emperor just laughed but caligula's demands that the senate recognize him as a god were far less outrageous than you might think the romans had many gods his great-grandfather augustus had been deified after death and for centuries eastern rulers like the pharaohs had been seen as living gods caligula's claims weren't delusions but demands for additional status but this further alienated the roman elite who still believed that the emperor should essentially be just another citizen [Music] caligula's demands to be recognized as god his consequent contempt for other people's beliefs would spark a potentially deadly conflict in the furthest reaches of the empire in alexandria in egypt the romans and the jews had lived peacefully together but under caligula anti-semitism reared its ugly head and it began here two thousand years ago alexandria was a greek city but with a large population of jews and they'd never really got on then the jews were herded into one area of the city the world's first ghetto and there were riots anti-semitic attacks and reprisals it was the emperor's job to act as peacemaker a jewish delegation was sent to present their case in the road when they arrived caligula was busy sorting out the finishing touches to his newly redecorated palace he was clearly in a mischievous mood and the delegates were desperate to show their loyalty so he encouraged them to chase after him as he scuttled from room to room dealing with his carpenters and his interior decorators then finally he turned on them and he said so why don't you eat pork and when they stuttered their replies he interrupted them with yes it doesn't taste very nice does it of course his cronies fell about in 40 a.d caligula's anti-semitism and his blind desire for immortal status came to a head he demanded that the most sacred place in judaism the temple of jerusalem should be converted to an imperial shrine and in the holy of holies would be a giant statue of caligula as jupiter the announcement caused pandemonium there were riots in jerusalem but the way caligula reacts following the event shows that even if he was a self-promoting bully he was still sane enough to make a diplomatic u-turn caligula's attitude towards the the jews softened considerably and in fact he rescinded his order to have his statue erected in the temple he was persuaded that it would cause a great deal of distress and probably a great deal of civil disorder so in the end it's clear that caligula could still behave rationally strategically and sensibly in fact many people thought caligula was a good ruler he may have battled with the senate but he'd done nothing to alienate the roman man in the street and in terms of his administration he was a real success he kept the provinces peaceful and stable improved the roads he built new waterways into rome to give people good drinking water most importantly he abolished the roman sales tax their equivalent of v18 then as now people liked anyone who kept the economy stable and taxes low and although his critics said he was profligate there was still a healthy balance in the treasury after his death if he'd only carried the senate with him he might have survived but caligula was willing to compromise with everyone apart from the people who really mattered the people who could get rid of him he couldn't stop the plots he flogged senators to death he had them tortured with fire in the rack he gagged their mouths with sponges so that they couldn't cry out he beheaded them he even executed them in the evening because he didn't want to have to wait till next morning he called the executions clearing his accounts [Applause] and yet he was so moved by the wrecked body of an actress called quintillia who'd survived the torturers without revealing anything that he gave her eight hundred thousand sisters by way of compensation and yet the irony was that although many of his victims were innocent of the crimes they'd been tried and tortured for quintilia was actually guilty of taking part in a conspiracy to murder caligula it didn't matter how unpopular an emperor [Music] caligula was that fool the boss of the praetorian guard was a tough soldier called kyrie but he'd got this thin reedy voice and so the emperor used to tease him for being a bit of a girl for instance if kyrie had to thank him for anything the emperor would hold out his hands to be kissed and then whip it away at the last moment and give an obscene gesture or if kyrie had to ask him what the password of the day is caligula would say that it was something obscene like venus or big willy let's hope caligula enjoyed the joke because he paid for it with his life [Music] the assassination took place at a temporary theater here on the palatine caligula had come to watch his favorite actor in a play he was in high spirits there was the sort of carnival atmosphere that had made him so popular there were no reserved seats and the theater was in chaos free gifts of fruit had been distributed to the crowd and this attracted the exotic birds laid on for public amusement the show began with caligula sacrificing a flamingo that spattered his toga with blood the conspirators waited for caligula in one of the tiny alleyways leading out of the theater that was so constricted that his bodyguards couldn't protect him at lunchtime caligula usually went home for a bath and as he left the throne the senators held the crowd back showing proper respect for the emperor although actually they were making sure that the bodyguards couldn't protect him when caligula got to the alleyway he stopped to talk to some dancers who were rehearsing there and it was at that moment that the plot has struck kyrie came forward and asked for the password caligula delivered his usual taunts and kyrie slashed him between the neck and the shoulder groaning caligula tried to get away but he was stopped by a hail of blows from the other senators in the conspiracy he was stabbed no less than 30 times then the plotters fled the scene and the bodyguards went wild stabbing both plotters and innocent bystanders [Music] meanwhile the conspirators also went on the rampage they stormed into the palace they wanted to ensure that caligula had no air so they stabbed his wife then took his baby daughter by the feet and dashed out her brains against [Music] the senate met in great excitement it seemed that this was their chance of regaining ultimate power and re-establishing the republic that had been destroyed by julius caesar but just like the senators that had killed caesar they'd underestimated the people's affection for their emperor [Music] even the most hostile sources recalled that the crowds of the theater were stunned by the news of caligula's assassination now they turned up on the streets in anger to demand a successor to caligula even claudius caligula's stuttering uncle who became the next emperor was preferable to the senate caligula's killing proved he was no god but the mob's reaction is the final evidence that he was far more complex than a cardboard cutout lunatic so was caligula mad he was certainly calculating and cruel with a strong streak of sadism although i doubt if any judge today would section him but in a way isn't that worse this bright young manipulative man who thought he could get away with anything but when his manipulation brought him supreme power it turned him into even more of a monster caligula came from a long line of revered military men but instead of glory on the battlefield he chose to fight with everyone even the senate if anyone was mad it was the senators themselves for thinking that the son of a hero would be a hero too rather than the paranoid young sadist he actually was in the end it was them who paid the price for his short sharp and brutal career [Music] it's become one of the great symbols of the corruption of power the maniac fiddling while his city burns the tyrant was nero the city rome fiddling while rome burns is just one of the stories that's made nero's reputation as one of the most evil men in history the psychopath who killed his wife and mother who threw christians to the lions who was condemned to an early death all these things are true but the fact that he never even played the violin should alert us to the fact that there's more to him than the monster that historians have consigned to the dustbin of the past because there was another nero a man who loved peace not war the world's first rock star cheered by his adoring fans an enlightened lover of music theater and the arts and it's this nero that i want to try and rescue from the ashes of his terrible reputation [Music] [Applause] [Music] nero's story was played out here in rome in the imperial palaces on the palatine hill these walls were all that's left of the corridors and darkened rooms where a drama played out that was half political thriller half domestic tragedy nero's life has all the elements of a soap political intrigue bitter jealousy passionate love affairs this hostile picture was built up by propagandists after his death as the centuries passed historians exaggerated the myths of nero my job is to sort the fact from the fiction to balance the later propaganda against other sources and plain common sense what we know for certain is nero came to power when he was just 16. at an age when most kids are deciding which subjects to do for a level he was made ruler of half the world that's when his history as emperor began but in order to understand nero we have to go back further because it's what happened to him as a little boy that made him the emperor he became nero was the name he adopted later but he was born lucius domitius ahina barbus on the 15th of december 37 here at antion on the coast near rome it was the playground of the roman elite and these are the ruins of nero's own palace nero's family had links to the emperors going back to julius caesar family connections were everything to the romans in terms of social standing nero had a great family although in terms of a healthy psychological background they were a disaster first there was his father a tough and brutal alcoholic called nias this is a man who killed an ex-slave during a drinking bout gouged out a fellow senator's eye when he criticized him in the forum and deliberately killed a young boy in a traffic accident in a fit of road rage but the real aristocratic blood came from his mother's side nero's story is about the women who influenced him and central to that story is his mother agrippina the ultimate pushy woman she created him she made him and in the end she all but destroyed him father the war hero germanicus had been heir to the imperial throne but had died tragically young she was ferociously ambitious and well aware that the only way to power for a woman was through a husband or better still a son she saw nero as a passport to power agrippina like sort of a lot of mothers in particular has an ambition for herself she has she has a son who is going to become powerful or could become powerful nero had rich powerful parents but he also had an uncle who was emperor in the year nero was born agrippina's evil brother caligula became emperor caligula was paranoid he saw treason everywhere there were secret trials political murders and terror throughout rome when nero was just two caligula sent agrippina into exile on suspicion of being involved in a plot against him the toddler nero was left in the care of his alcoholic father then just as he was getting used to having no mother tragedy struck again his father died nero was abandoned brought up by household slaves a dancer and a barber hardly a good start for a future emperor [Music] but in 41 a.d nero's luck took a turn for the better caligula was assassinated by senators determined to stop his reign of terror nero's mother was brought back from exile caligula was replaced by nero's stuttering great uncle claudius a figure of fun who'd survived by looking harmless anyone who's read the book or watched the tv series of i claudius will assume that nero's problems were over but far from it claudius was much more than the wise stuttering clown we're led to believe he was he also shared the sadistic characteristics of his predecessor and kept the levels of terror at court just as high there were secret trials in private chambers suspects tortured in front of him just for the fun of it nero grew up knowing that anyone he was close to could be murdered at any time but the chief threat to his existence didn't come from claudius but from his third wife messalina the seven-year-old nero became the pawn in a power struggle between two ruthlessly ambitious women messalina wanted her son to be an emperor after claudius agrippina wanted it to be nero both women were willing to fight dirty [Music] around 44 a.d while the young and handsome nero lay sleeping an attempt was made on his life messalina sent two assassins into his rooms in the dead of night and he was saved by a miraculous event as they pulled back the sheets to finish him off a snake slithered out of his bed and they fled in terror it's a colorful way of dramatizing this domestic squabble but this episode only emerges a century later and it's got suspicious parallels with roman folk tales at the time the only bit of evidence for this is actually a snakeskin is found in the bedroom which his mother has made into a bracelet for him so it's one of those stories that it's rather like sort of hercules and the snakes and sort of hercules kills the snakes it's one of those stories which you make up about childhood it's a it's a lovely story but it's probably not very true it was nero's my agrabah [Music] she'd begun a scandalous affair that was the talk of rome agrippina made sure that the news was linked to claudius and messalina was forced to kill herself with her rival out of the way agrippina put the next stage of her plan into effect and married her uncle claudius part of the deal was that her son was adopted by claudius changing his name to nero it effectively made him heir to the imperial throne but agrippina strengthened the world with an arranged marriage [Music] a wife nero would also need political clout and agrippina realized she didn't have to look far for that she arranged a marriage between the 15 year old nero and claudius's 13 year old daughter octavia not surprisingly she had to have the law changed first to avoid any charges of incest [Music] the next stage in agrippina's plan was to tighten her grip on power by making strategic appointments [Music] this is where emperors were made and broken the viminal gate a military camp on the outskirts of rome that's still used by the italian forces today the legions weren't allowed inside rome so the emperor had his own elite force called the praetorian guard who were based here any aspiring contender for the imperial throne who didn't have their support didn't stand a chance usually they were under the command of two prefects agrippina created just one boss a tough straight-speaking soldier called burus he and his fellow officers knew that they owed their loyalty to her and her son burus was to be one of the twin pillars of support for the teenage emperor her second appointment was a master stroke the most respected philosopher of his day seneca was employed as nero's teacher and speechwriter with burus and seneca agrippina groomed the teenage nero for power but it seems nero found his official role quite a bore he hated the endless formal dinners with his stuttering uncle claudius who slobbered over his gourmet food and got slowly but steadily drunk but according to the historians these dinners had a much more immediate consequence they gave agrippina the opportunity to murder her husband claudius loved mushrooms the historians say agrippina employed the most famous poisoner in rome to prepare a powerful potion for his favorite dish claudius had a food taster to guard him against poisoning but agrippina had bought him off this man put the poisoned mushroom onto the plate after she taken her portion claudius swallowed the bait literally the poison was designed to act slowly claudius retired drunk and with the first symptoms of stomachache which got worse but then news arrived that he'd thrown up shortly after supper if he survived then he'd know there'd been an attempt on his life and both nero and agrippina would be done for agrippina went into overdrive the poisoner was brought in again this time a feather was dipped in a quick acting potion agrippina gave it to another of her stooges claudius's doctor he told claudius that if he tickled the back of his throat with the feather he'd vomit again and feel a lot better claudius followed the doctor's orders gave a sigh and lay back historians writing later enjoyed telling the story of agrippina killing claudius but we now know that there wasn't any poison that could work that quickly at the time claudius was pushing 60 and in poor health and it's far more likely that he died from drink over indulgence or even food poisoning what the stories really tell us is how people saw agrippina a ruthless politician who was quite capable of murdering her own husband whether natural causes or foul play the next few hours followed the same course as imperial deaths have done from maoist china to the queen mother agrippina didn't announce his death straight away she needed to play for time prayers were offered up for the emperor's recovery and musicians were invited in to cheer him up even while his body was growing cold as a precautionary measure she called out the praetorian guard from their barracks to surround the palace while she worked on the official announcement with burus and seneca finally at midday the following day the pronouncement was made the emperor is dead long live the emperor nero the crowds love their glamorous 16 year old ruler claudius's palace on the palatine had been a place of fear secretly run by the emperor's clique now nero announced a new regime the senate would be restored to power tyranny was over it seemed a new era agropina and nero both knew that he owed her everything when the praetorian officer came to him that evening to ask for the official password nero told him it was to be optima mater the perfect mother but if agrapina thought that nero was going to be her puppet she was very much mistaken the perfect mother didn't want compliments she wanted power for herself [Music] thanks to his scheming mother nero was emperor of rome at the tender age of 16. but now agrippina wanted payback for her investment she craved power she'd been the sister and wife of an emperor and now with her novice son in charge she tried to fix the system so she could have even more power she got the senate to meet up here in the palace rather than down there in the forum so that she could listen to the all-male assembly from behind a curtain but a stranglehold on power was about to be loosened no roman woman could hold political office but it's clear from these coins minted at the beginning of nero's reign how the important thing about these coins is they're contemporary documents they're not laser writings and they give you the official imperial view the imperial spin if you like there's no court gossip there but that's exactly what the emperors wanted you to see about them the ashmolean museum in oxford houses an extensive collection of coins from ancient rome that vividly tell the story of nero and his mother [Music] as soon as he becomes emperor the power of agropina is absolutely apparent is that his mother that's his mother facing him and it's the first time an imperial woman ever been shown on the same side of the coin as the emperor and you can see she's actually in some ways she's given precedence because her name and titles are on the head side of the coin and his name is on the other side and they're staring at each other almost as equals but of course it doesn't last and the next coin shows the next stage in that process because his mother andrepino is still there but nero is shown side by side with her but he's in front and she's relegated to being behind him so what caused the rift not the economy or foreign policy but an argument over a girlfriend nero had fallen madly in love with a woman called acte he had his official child bride octavia but this was a real woman aktay was older than nero mature sexy but she was greek and an ex-slave [Music] nero wanted to keep news of the affair from his mother but he wanted to get rid of octavia and marry acte and when you want to divorce your wife and make a slave girl the empress of rome it is a bit hard to keep it a secret agrippina went ballistic as far as she was concerned aktay had to go poor old nero was forced to go scurrying around various senators trying to persuade them that aktay was actually an eastern princess and therefore eligible for the throne but nobody bought it nero had to give up love for duty and it hurt agrippina may have won but in the long term it damaged her bullying nero forced him further and further into the arms of his advisers the philosopher seneca the head of the praetorian guard boris and a few elder statesmen who were quite prepared to put up with nero's foibles but not those of his mother within a year of taking over the balance of power had shifted in favor of the 17 year old nero moved agrippina out into a separate palace for a time he barely spoke to the woman who had once been the perfect mother he and was we begin to unpick the myth of the tyrant mirror because even historians like tacitus who destroyed nero's reputation after his death had to admit the first five years of his reign were a huge success he gave power back to the senate he administered the provinces fairly and cemented his popularity by giving every citizen a cash handout as a fun-loving teenager he seemed to have a natural touch with the man in the street bread and circuses has always kept the mob happy but now nero came up with a brand new ploy the lottery he showered little wooden balls with numbers on them into the crowd and if you've got a prize winning number then you could turn up at the palace and claim a lavish free gift horses slaves even a holiday home nero's popularity i think stemmed from his youth the fact that he really tried to be such a good boy at the beginning and did all the things he was supposed to but his relationship with the populace i think was particularly strong because he was very generous spent a lot he gave very good entertainments and they really loved brennan circuses as we know and also he was rather accessible that is we're told a number of occasions there are banquets or entertainments in which nero is walking among the crowds and they actually see him and i think that means quite a lot to them nero started well but he found the constraints of being in charge where he had a personality that needed to break out like a typical adolescent anywhere he loved to go out with his mates and get drunk but preferably without anyone realizing he was the emperor so if they went to a pub or a brothel he'd go in disguise which had its downside because after one particularly rowdy night he came back home with two black eyes although his advisors brewers and seneca gave nero a long leash a roman emperor wasn't supposed to act like jack ladd and his mother kept nagging him to behave himself the increasing tension with agrippina came to a head again over a new affair [Music] nero was 22. this time the object of his affections wasn't a slave girl but a member of the aristocracy called pompeo nero was of course married to octavia the princess who'd given him his passport to one half of the imperial line popeya started pressuring nero to get divorced and this became all the more urgent when she discovered that she was pregnant and could provide nero with an heir the only opponent to their relationship was his mother things disintegrate he starts ceasing to have public or private meetings even with his mother he won't be alone with his mother he doesn't trust his mother kept up the pressure she taunted nero for being a mummy's boy told him an emperor should be able to do what he wants subtly she persuaded nero to think the unthinkable [Music] no one knows for sure when nero decided to kill his mother but we do know exactly how he did it and no one but him could have thought up such an extravagant plot he got the idea at the theater he went to a show with some friends and part of the entertainment was a boat that collapsed and out through the holes ran a whole series of wild animals the idea of the collapsible boat must have stuck he had one specially built to take his mother home from a dinner party on the night of the murder it was waiting at the keysight crewed by his loyal naval commander annie catus [Music] right on cue halfway across the bay to agrippina's home the boat started to sink there was general panic but agrippina was a natural survivor she persuaded her maid to pretend to be her while she jumped ship the maid thought this would save her life and shouted i'm agrippina save me but when the assassins heard her they beat her over the head and killed her meanwhile agrippina managed to swim until she was picked up by a fishing boat which took her safely home home but not safe it can't have taken long for the truth to dawn on the exhausted and fearful mother that her son wanted her dead on the other side of the bay word reached nero that agrippina had survived terrified he panicked he ordered burris to get the praetorian guard to go and finish her off boris refused saying that his men would never agree to kill a member of the royal family particularly the daughter of their hero germanicus in the end it was the naval man and iketus who agreed to do it nero's thanks are revealing you've given me my empire he said [Music] at dawn the sailors broke down the doors of agrippina's villa as they burst in her servants fled leaving her alone to face her executioners at first she stalled playing for time saying thank you please go back to the palace and say that i've fully recovered but as they moved closer she screamed that her son would never have ordered her murder in reply they beat her over the head with a club she fell to the ground she pointed to the womb that had borne nero and said strike me here they did as she requested and she died [Music] back in rome boris and seneca invented the story that agrippina had killed herself because her plan to murder nero had been discovered although they were prepared to cover up for the emperor they gradually realized they'd lost control of him with this unforgivable act of murder nero had crossed the line into tyranny and there was no going back nero's reign as emperor had started with great acclaim but by the age of 22 power had already corrupted him he'd murdered his mother so he could divorce his wife octavia and marry his mistress popeye but octavia was still a woman of influence in rome with all the clout of the royal family so popeye persuaded nero for his own sake that he needed to get rid of his ex-wife permanently and there was no one left to tell him not to [Music] unable to deal with nero the philosopher seneca had retired to the country and his military adviser burris had died he was replaced by a ruthless yes man tigolinus if seneca and burus had managed to keep nero on the rails it was tigulinas and popeya who derailed him again they invented a plan for nero to humiliate and discredit octavia with a trumped-up charge that she'd slept with an egyptian musician her maids were systematically tortured to provide the evidence but octavia inspired such loyalty that they refused to crack even in her death throws one of them used her last ounce of strength to spit into tiggliness's face the words my mistresses vaginas cleaner than your mouth but their plan to humiliate octavia backfired they not only underestimated the loyalty of her servants but they'd also reckoned without the affection of the roman mob who adored their old empress they came out on the streets in force hurling popeye's statues to the ground reinstating octavias and covering them in flowers the people didn't like a descendant of the noble augustus being treated like dirt nero knew he'd have to come up with a pretty convincing plan to discredit octavia if he was going to have any chance of survival so he invited agrippina's assassin anikatus to the palace and he offered him a stark choice he could either go to the senate and say he'd slept with octavia or he could be executed he went to the palace and he gave a very convincing performance he said that octavia not only wanted his body but she also wanted to get the navy on side so she could affect a political coup everything was going to plan and nero waved goodbye to anacatus as he set sail for rich exile in sardinia octavia was taken off to a prison island near naples where she was murdered quietly after her arrival her severed head was sent to popeye as a trophy somehow nero weathered the storm that followed the mob were pacified with more free gifts and entertainment and nero was left to enjoy life with popeya here on the palatine he wrote poems studied singing and acting and hosted soirees with poets and artists he might have been remembered as a noble patron of the arts if it weren't for the greatest catastrophe of israel [Music] this is the surface maximus 2000 years ago this place would have been as full of people and as exciting as the cheltenham gold cup all the way around here was the chariot racing track with free seating for 300 000 people all the way around on massive wooden structures with wooden slums behind up there was the palace with nero's royal box where he had a bird's eye view not only of a day at the races but of the first flames from the fire that swept through rome in the earliest historical account tacitus writes the great fire of rome probably started as a simple accident brazier got kicked over just outside the stadium the strong wind was blowing and in moments the flames took hold it was a devastating blaze it tore through the tight platforming slums spreading quickly to the posh houses and onto nero's palace itself rome had a form of it was the worst fire in history until hamburg dressed in the second world war and it literally burned itself into people's memories as time went on people started telling stories about nero himself seen on the palace balcony with a liar manically reciting his own epic poem the fall of troy as the flames lapped the palatine [Music] and it's these stories recorded by later propagandists that sealed nero's reputation but tacitus tells us he wasn't even in rome nero was actually miles away here at his holiday villa in anzio when it happened immediately he heard the news he jumped on his horse rode back to rome and took charge of the fire fighting and organizing shelter and food for the homeless day and night he could be seen rushing around the city completely without any of his bodyguards who he told to go and help fight the fire until eventually after nine long days and nights the flames gradually abated and it didn't stop there when the fire was eventually put out rome was devastated and there were thousands of homeless refugees nero acted swiftly to solve the problems caused by the fire he slashed the price of grain and let people camp in the temples of the forum while their homes were rebuilt he also commissioned innovative plans to design a safer city so why do we remember him as the villain of the peace the answer is the simplest in history all these good plans a fire tax it made him far more unpopular than killing his mother [Music] he'd come good in a crisis but hitting people in the pocket afterwards was the unforgivable sin and despite his labors putting out the fire when he started to rebuild his palace rumors began to spread that he had something to do with starting the fire himself he needed a scapegoat and his choice was to seal his reputation throughout history he picked on a small religious sect who were already deeply unpopular they were called christians the romans already deeply distrusted them they refused to take the vow of allegiance to the emperor which was tantamount to treason so when nero needed someone to blame [Music] we know that the persecution was completely unjustified and that the fire started by accident but at the time the idea of a conspiracy didn't seem that far-fetched the christians believed that the world was about to end in a massive conflagration their leader had said i will cast fire upon the earth the punishment was harsh even for such a despised roof the christians were crucified fed to wild beasts in the arena and used as flaming torches in nero's own gardens these punishments weren't invented for the christians they were all standard roman ways of dealing with common criminals but nero's remembered because he was the first emperor to create a christian martyr the leading disciples of peter who'd come to rome to preach the gospel died in the first wave of nero's persecution some peter's basilica is built where he was killed a lasting monument to nero's scapegoats in 64 a.d nobody cared about a few christians being massacred pinning the blame on them might have could have stopped [Music] blunder of his life [Music] [Music] nero had done his best to squash rumors about his part in the fire of rome with two architects he'd redesigned the city for the public good and people might have thanked him for it but a key part of the scheme hadn't included him fencing off a great slice of the devastated city for his own pet project nero's palace up on the hill there looked pretty flashy before the fire but now he and his architects were conceiving a house that would make louis xiv or else and john look shine retiring the golden house was a fantastical design villas and palaces gardens and parkland a vast lake and at its entrance the golden statue of nero as a god 120 feet high [Applause] if you look at the plan of ancient rome the golden house took up about a quarter of the city most of it's destroyed but one section of this amazing architectural feat remains because it was used for the foundations of the public baths that were built after nero's death [Music] in nero's day all this would have been open to the light but now it's a vast underground [Music] labyrinth rome had never seen anything like it all the walls and ceilings were covered with great art fourteen centuries after nero renaissance artists were still being lowered down through the roof to study the paintings walking where he walked i began to get a real sense of nero's mind he was obviously refined but detached from political reality he wanted popularity but he couldn't see how something so beautiful would wind people up [Music] two things strike me as really obvious about this building first of all it demonstrates that nero had really good artistic taste but secondly how affronted the citizens of rome must have been who just had their houses burned down when they saw this huge edifice going up i don't think i'd ever realized until now that there still existed anywhere in the world a roman house as big and magnificent as this and what a house it was there would have been huge elaborate hangings over these walls and the rest of the walls would have been encrusted with gold and precious stones and pearls and there were pipes coming out of the walls and out of the ceiling to shower the visitors with scent and with flower petals and this room which was the centerpiece revolved it was a rotunda and it rotated day and night in synchronization with the stars it was the biggest plushiest most elegant roman nightclub in the whole universe nero poured public money into building the golden house and that alienated him from the mob who before that had always supported him nero could have survived that unpopularity if he hadn't terminally offended the aristocracy as well [Music] the ideal one was a great military model like julius [Music] one who promoted poetry theater and peaceful games like the greeks had to the roman elite this created a huge division between them and nero to them it was all effeminate foreign nonsense and what's more highly inappropriate behavior for an emperor worse still nero didn't just promote these cultural pursuits he actually took part this is singing practice roman style weights usually made of lead placed on the chest to strengthen breathing nero embarked on a greek inspired athletics and artistic career that was all-consuming he wanted to be a professional liar player and singer other emperors like caligula had performed in private but this was really serious a strict regime of diet and exercise he detoxed for days drinking only chives preserved in oil and when his muscles ached from the rigor of exercise he'd rubbed them down with dried bores dung everything was focused on getting him into tip-top professional shape nero was putting himself at the forefront of an artistic crusade rome might have conquered greece but the emperor was now giving prominence to greek ideas and culture but for nero treading the boards wasn't just a cultural campaign it was a way of boosting his self-esteem he'd always acted some played the liar and recited poetry to invited audiences the applause gave him the illusion of instant affection and adulation and so in 65 a.d when he was rapidly losing political popularity naturally he went on tour nero decided to go public and stepped into the limelight of a professional performing career his first performance was in naples then a greek speaking city and the crowd went wild mind you his thin reedy voice was helped by the amphitheater's acoustics if you speak from here you sound pretty ordinary but if you stand here your voice sounds like a god [Applause] the greek population of naples loved it they cheered they clapped they encored but like a rock star it went to his head the adulation he'd always craved was finally in his grasp and now nothing would stand in the way of his ambitions on a wave of popular acclaim he set out on a wild crazy artistic conquest of greece itself you couldn't say it was a modest effect two thousand carts of men with equipment including five thousand paid applauders to ensure he received a rapturous reception at every gig the four major greek festivals went in yearly to fit into nero's schedule he got them all to take place during his visit and he entered everyone in front of the judges stood the ruler of the known world this was a man who'd made them change customs established over centuries and rescheduled whole competitions but he sweated he wiped his brow with his arm he was so nervous that on one occasion he actually dropped his scepter while he was performing a dramatic play and really thought that the judges would mark him down for it of course they didn't and when they solemnly awarded him the victor's laurels he was pleased flattered emotional there were 1800 competitions that year and nero got first prize in 1800 of them [Music] in greece nero was genuinely popular not least because he declared the country free from taxation but back in rome they were horrified at nero's antics to make matters worse he awarded himself a triumph the traditional celebration of a returning military hero instead of the emblems of successful battles and captured prisoners he paraded with his lawrence to members of the senate it was demeaning to the name of rome it wasn't what a roman emperor should be doing nero's grip on reality was loosening [Music] the neglected empire was falling apart he'd never bothered to visit the military outposts and this lack of interest was coming back to haunt him but as rebellions broke out and his army began to defect nero seemed paralyzed he simply sat at home unable to act then in june 68 a.d the emperor woke up one night to find the palace deserted this wasn't a good sign his praetorian guards had gone to a secret meeting of the senate the very senate he'd given power to was now turning its back on cold hard reality finally sunk in nero was on his own still in his night clothes he fled the palace looking for somewhere to hide the sensible thing would have been to head for the port of austria where he could have gone overseas to rally his loyal forces abroad but he wasn't thinking straight he bumped into three slaves who got horses and took him to a villa on the outskirts of the city when they arrived they found that the front door was locked and they had to crawl through the undergrowth into the side entrance [Music] they were holed up now and there was nothing to do but wait eventually a messenger arrived with the news that nero had been declared an enemy of the state and had been sentenced to death in the ancient manner nero had no idea what that meant and asked one of the slaves who told him he'd be stripped naked and paraded through the streets of rome with his head clamped in a forked branch then he'd be stoned to death the slave politely added that suicide might be the better option as dawn broke he watched as they dug his grave then some roman soldiers approached and with the help of a slave he stabbed himself through the throat his last words were what an artist dies with me he was 30 years and 6 months old the last of the giulio claudian line that stretched back to augustus [Music] nero marked the end of a dynasty and the end of an era the first emperors julius caesar and augustus had persuaded the roman people that one person ruled was a good thing over the course of a century there'd been six emperors but the dynasty had degenerated into corruption and self-indulgent tyranny rome stuck with the idea of an emperor but after caligula and nero it was clear that just being related to caesar and augustus wasn't enough [Music] after a year of chaotic civil war the next emperor vespasian wasn't related to anyone special but he was what the empire needed a common sense leader in an attempt to wipe out nero's memory he knocked down the golden house drained the lake and where the great colossus of nero had stood he built the public theater we called the colosseum but nero was too colorful a character to be forgotten [Music] nero saw himself as an artist his enemies thought of him as a tyrant and a buffoon the truth is he was all three he certainly wasn't very good at running an empire but then what did rome expect if you put a messed up 16 year old in charge of half the known world you're asking for trouble rome learnt the hard way from now on it abandoned the giulio claudian line of emperors in favor of skilled administrators but nero did leave his mark on history whatever else he wasn't he was a showman he did everything in a big way from building his house to killing his mother he thought of himself as an actor but no party ever played on the stage could match the drama the spectacle and the sheer theatricality of his own life

Channel: Odyssey - Ancient History Documentaries

Views: 5,437,059

Keywords: ancient history, classical history, ancient civilisations, classical antiquity, history documentary, classical documentary, Ancient Rome, Ancient Egypt, cleopatra, Nero, Caligula, julius caesar, Tony Robinson, Rome, Odyssey, odyssey

Id: tPunugK7WqY

Length: 191min 1sec (11461 seconds)

Published: Wed Jul 06 2022

Reddit Comments

[u/vh1atomicpunk5150]

Quite good if you're interested in this kind of material. He addresses popular myth and legend surrounding many of the first imperial rulers of Rome, and then spends time covering them as human beings with their strengths and flaws.