§ 1. Suetonius relates the following concerning Nero. But when his hope deceived him, and he was abandoned and now so exhausted and needy that it was necessary even to postpone and defer the soldiers’ pay and the veterans’ rewards, he turned his attention to calumnies and robberies. Before all else, he established that from the goods of deceased freedmen three quarters, in place of one half, should be exacted for him from those who, without a probable cause, bore the name of any family with which he himself was connected.
This was an immense increase of plunder. For whereas the fisc had previously claimed one half, that is, half the inheritance, Nero received three quarters—that is, nine ounces out of twelve. If the inheritance was twelve thousand, the emperor entered upon nine and the heir three.
§ 2. He established that the testaments of those ungrateful to the prince should pass to the fisc, and that the learned men who had written or dictated them should not go unpunished.
An immense abyss under a robber prince. The prince was named in the testaments of all men, especially the wealthy, which was a great thing. Next, no small portion had to be assigned to him, lest he be placed after private persons. Third, he rescinded as ungrateful the testaments of former chief centurions, even of those who had made their wills under Tiberius; thus Suetonius, chapter 38. The chief centurions whose inheritances he seized were rich. From this it is clear that those of whom he was not himself the heir were called ungrateful.
§ 3. To kill those by whom he had been named heir. This was the invention of Gaius, Suetonius. When fear had thereby been instilled, and he was now openly named heir both by strangers among their friends and by parents among their children, he called them mockers because they persisted in living after naming him, and sent poisoned cakes to many.
§ 4. To take rights away from citizens and compel them to purchase them again. Suetonius. He denied that those whose ancestors had obtained Roman citizenship for themselves and their posterity possessed it by right, unless they were sons, for he said that “posterity” ought not to be understood beyond this degree. When the diplomas of the deified Julius and Augustus were brought forward, he lamented them as old and obsolete.
There was more profit in this than even anyone acquainted with Roman affairs could understand. For in this census there was a part of the Romans which, if not the greatest, was certainly immense and consisted of many myriads who possessed citizenship by gift or purchase, not by birth. It was purchased for a great sum, especially under that robber, and from others by those who already enjoyed it; nor was it safe not to purchase again what they possessed, lest they lose life itself.
§ 5. He also accused those census declarations as falsely made to which any increase whatsoever had afterward accrued for any reason. He rescinded as ungrateful the testaments of chief centurions who from the beginning of Tiberius’s principate had left neither Tiberius nor himself heir; likewise, he rescinded as invalid and void those of all others whom anyone said had intended to die with Caesar as heir.
But why did he do this? Because much had accrued to many; and fraud in a submitted census declaration was punished by death, exile, loss of liberty, or certainly confiscation. Consider that among so great a multitude something had accrued to ten thousand men: that monster therefore devoured as many estates through a single calumny—but a most carefully devised calumny.
§ 6. To turn judicial inquiry toward profit. Suetonius. He heard cases of this kind only after first fixing their price; and, impatient of delay, on one occasion condemned more than forty defendants from different charges by a single sentence, and boasted to Caesonia, when she awoke from sleep, how much business he had conducted while she took her midday rest.
For he obtained forty inheritances by one judgment, and apparently splendid ones; for calumnies were contrived against the rich. Next, it is credible that the defendants in whose trials Caligula himself sat were distinguished men.
§ 7. To compel men to buy worthless things at an immense price. Suetonius. After announcing an auction, he offered and sold the remnants of all the spectacles, demanding the prices himself and extending them so far that certain men, compelled to purchase some things for an immense price and stripped of their goods, cut their veins. The affair of Aponius Saturninus is famous. While he was sleeping among the benches, Gaius warned the auctioneer not to overlook a man of praetorian rank who was repeatedly nodding his head to him; nor was an end made of bidding until thirteen gladiators were knocked down to the unaware man for nine million sesterces.
§ 8. To mingle every fraud with a sale. Suetonius. In Gaul also, after he had sold at immense prices the ornaments and household goods, slaves, and even freedmen of his condemned sisters, he was enticed by the profit and demanded from the city whatever belonged to the equipment of the old palace. Even hired vehicles and mill animals were seized for carrying it, so that bread often became scarce at Rome and many litigants, because they were absent and could not appear for their recognizance, lost their cases. In selling this equipment he employed every kind of fraud and allurement: at one time reproaching individuals for avarice and asking why they were not ashamed to be wealthier than he; at another time feigning regret that he was giving private persons the opportunity to possess things belonging to princes.
§ 9. To deduct a portion of sums in litigation. Suetonius. For lawsuits and judgments begun anywhere, he deducted a fortieth part of the sum concerning which the litigation was conducted; nor was anyone without penalty if he was convicted of having settled or given up the business.
How great was that plunder from all the lawsuits in so great an empire? Those times abounded in lawsuits between the greatest and richest men, so that I judge, not without cause, that the sum of all property in litigation was equal to a great kingdom. Indeed, I think it is so even now. By that law, therefore, he seized a fortieth part of some kingdom.
§ 10. To pursue every disgraceful profit. From the daily earnings of porters he took an eighth part; from the takings of prostitutes, as much as each earned from one act of intercourse. It was added to the heading of the law that both those who had practiced prostitution and those who had practiced procuring were held liable to the public treasury, and that marriages also were subject to it.
It is a small matter to relate, but because of the multitude of porters it was a great tax throughout the whole empire. Shame prohibits speaking about the prostitutes’ takings. Yet no one ought to doubt that, in blind paganism and amid so great a corruption of morals under Augustus, Tiberius, and Caligula, many legions could have been supported from the lusts of criminals. At Corinth, in the single temple of Venus, four thousand prostitutes earned money. But it is better that this Camarina remain unmoved.
§ 11. To impose these things and not publish them, so that transgression might occur through ignorance of the law. Suetonius. After taxes of this kind had been imposed but not posted, and many offenses were committed through ignorance of the writing, at last, when the Roman people demanded it, he indeed posted the law, but in the smallest letters and in the narrowest place, so that no one could copy it.
These things were imposed but not posted; yet the people’s demand shows that enforcement was at hand and that penalties were imposed upon those who violated the law.
§ 12. To establish a domestic brothel. Suetonius. Lest he fail to try any kind of booty, he established a brothel in the palace; and, after a number of chambers had been divided and furnished in accordance with the dignity of the place, matrons and freeborn youths stood in them. He sent nomenclators around the marketplaces and basilicas to invite young and old to lust. Money at interest was furnished to those who came, and men were stationed to record their names openly, as though they were assisting Caesar’s revenues.
§ 13. To play at dice and perjure oneself. Not scorning profit even from the game of dice, he gained more by falsehood and even perjury.
§ 14. To confiscate the wealthy. Once, after entrusting his own turn to the player next to him, he went out into the atrium of the house. When he had ordered two wealthy Roman knights who were passing by to be seized and their goods confiscated without delay, he returned exulting and boasted that he had never had a more prosperous throw of the dice.
§ 15. To compel contributions. When his daughter was born, complaining of his poverty and of the burdens not only of an emperor but now also of a father, he received contributions for the maintenance and dowry of the girl. He also proclaimed that he would receive New Year’s gifts at the beginning of the year, and stood in the vestibule of the palace on the Kalends of January to catch the contributions which a crowd of every kind poured before him with full hands and folds of their garments.
§ 16. To conduct the harshest levies. Caligula also did this, and it was customary to force onto the rolls those young men who would purchase exemption at a great price. Nor are those who compel countrymen to take up arms now ignorant of these arts.
§ 17. How great were the robberies produced by that law of Nero. Suetonius says that then all deeds and words for which only an informer was not lacking were held liable under the law of treason, chapter 32.
How monstrous and barbarous that law was! For men were deprived of life for every word, not merely for deeds; and the goods which the avaricious and needy tyrant sought fell to the fisc.
§ 18. He also recalled the rewards of crowns which cities had ever conferred upon him in contests.
Thus he demands back, as though it were a debt, what had once been given in friendship. Lipsius treats most learnedly of crowns and crown-gold in book 2 of Roman Greatness, chapter 9. At first it was given to victorious commanders for the sake of honor; afterward it was severely exacted and contributed on various occasions, not for a triumph alone, as is clear from the same Lipsius, for two thousand were contributed for Sulla’s funeral. But all the cities had sent Nero crowns of great price for his theatrical contests. He demands these back, or their gold.
§ 19. By calumny to despoil the shops of merchants. Suetonius. When he had prohibited the use of amethyst and Tyrian colors and had secretly sent a man to sell a few ounces on market day, he shut up all the merchants.
How great that spoil was can be considered by one who has estimated the Roman markets.
§ 20. To strip the rich of their goods for a single transgression. Indeed, he is believed, while singing, to have noticed among the spectators a matron dressed in the forbidden purple and pointed her out to his procurators; she was immediately dragged away and stripped not only of her garment but also of her goods.
§ 21. To impel all intermediate magistrates to robberies. Suetonius. He delegated an office to no one without adding, “You know what I need”; and, “Let us see to it that he possesses nothing.”
§ 22. Suetonius. At last he took gifts from many temples and melted down images made of gold or silver, among them the images of the household gods, which Galba soon restored.
§ 23. To beg monies from allies; thus Julius in Spain. Suetonius, chapter 54. He displayed self-restraint neither in military commands nor in magistracies. For, as certain men testified in their memorials, when proconsul in Spain he received from the allies monies begged as assistance toward his debt.
§ 24. To plunder towns without cause. Suetonius on Julius. He plundered in hostile fashion certain towns of the Lusitanians, although they neither refused his commands nor closed their gates when he approached. In Gaul he despoiled shrines and temples of the gods filled with gifts; he destroyed cities more often for plunder than for an offense. Hence it came about that he abounded in gold and sold it throughout Italy and the provinces at three thousand sesterces per pound as merchandise.
§ 25. To steal. Suetonius on Julius. In his first consulship he stole three thousand pounds of gold from the Capitol and put back the same weight of gilded bronze.
§ 26. To sell the property of others. Suetonius. He gave alliances and kingdoms for a price, as one who took nearly six thousand talents from Ptolemy alone in his own and Pompey’s name.
§ 27. To seize without a pretext. Suetonius. Later, by the most evident robberies and sacrileges, he bore both the burdens of civil wars and the expenses of triumphs and public entertainments.
§ 28. Not to pay creditors. Thus Vitellius, as Dio of Nicaea relates. Then, when a man whom no one had previously been able to see in the forum because of the multitude of his creditors ascended the Capitol with so great a body of soldiers—and when at last everyone worshiped a man whom previously no one had even wished freely to embrace—those who laughed could not restrain themselves. But when those who had lent him a great sum as he was departing for Germany pressed him and scarcely permitted him to depart after sureties had been given, they then not only did not laugh but, moved by pity, even concealed him. Vitellius, however, afterward sought out his creditors, said that he had returned safety in exchange for the money lent, and demanded back the instruments of the contracts.
He frequently came to the theaters in order to attract the affections of the plebs to himself. He dined familiarly together with the leading men so that he might bind them to himself to a greater degree. He often mentioned his old companions and held them in honor. For he did not think it disgraceful or unworthy if he appeared to recognize anyone from among them—a thing which most men do who, raised to the greatest and unexpected honors, hate those by whom they understand that they were known when previously humble and abject.
§ 29. To proscribe the friends of enemies. Thus Severus. For when he had defeated Albinus, he proscribed the friends of Albinus’s soldiers and commanders, and left to his sons as much money as no one else.
§ 30. To have the soldier himself as a source of revenue. Tacitus indicates the method. For the common soldier paid as though an annual tribute. Some wandered among the companies; others on furlough or in the camp itself, until they paid the fee to the centurion; and no one gave thought either to the measure of the burden or to the kind of profit. By brigandage and plunder, or by servile services, a soldier purchased freedom from military duty. Then every wealthiest soldier was worn down by labor and savagery until he purchased exemption. When, exhausted by expenses, he had miserably languished in idleness, he returned to the company, poor instead of rich and slothful instead of vigorous. And in turn one after another, corrupted by the same poverty and license, rushed into sedition and dissension and, finally, civil wars.
§ 31. To have a compact and partnership with pirates. The viceroy of Algiers is accustomed to do this.
§ 32. To kill those who have discharged magistracies. The emperor of the Turks possesses this custom. His principal revenues come from confiscations and gifts. Thus the Political Treasury, concerning the empire of the Turks:
And although the ordinary revenues in the Turkish Empire do not exceed the sum which we have stated, it can nevertheless scarcely be believed how much accrues extraordinarily to the prince’s treasury, especially from confiscations and gifts. For pashas and other Turkish ministers suck out the blood and fortunes of the subjects like swallows, and accumulate inestimable treasures, which in the end generally pass to the prince’s fisc. Ibrahim Pasha is said to have carried away from Cairo sixty times one hundred thousand gold pieces, that is, six million. Mehmed the vizier had acquired for himself a much greater sum. Occhiali possessed, in addition to other immense riches, three thousand slaves. The sultana, sister of Selim II, received each day two thousand five hundred sequins or crowns, and began to conduct an aqueduct for the convenience of pilgrims from Cairo all the way to Mecca—certainly an incredible work. It is easy for the sultan to find some cause for taking away from anyone, at his pleasure, life together with fortune.
The gifts also are great and immense. For no ambassador dares to approach him without a gift. No one can obtain any office or dignity unless money intervenes. No one comes into the sight of so great a prince from a province over which he presided, or from an expedition which he conducted, with empty hands. Nor are trifles or farthings given to so great a prince. The voivodes of Moldavia, Wallachia, and Transylvania redeem and preserve their principalities by gifts. The princes of Moldavia and Wallachia are changed very frequently; for those principalities are given to those who offer more. In order to fulfill their promises, these men do not shear but flay their peoples and reduce their provinces to poverty.
Nevertheless, in an earlier period we saw the treasuries of the Turks exhausted by the Persian war and almost all their treasures consumed. In recent years, both at Constantinople and throughout the whole Turkish Empire, the price of gold was increased beyond what can be believed, so that a gold coin was worth twice as much as previously. Moreover, the very substance of the gold and silver was so adulterated that the Janissaries, seizing an occasion from this, set fire to the city of Constantinople and struck immense fear not only into the citizens but also into the sultan himself. At that time, sixty thousand gold pieces had indeed been sought as a loan in the sultan’s name from the merchants of Aleppo.
§ 33. To sell honors and judgments. Thus Vespasian, Suetonius, chapter 16. The only thing for which he is deservedly blamed is his desire for money. For, not content with having recalled the taxes omitted under Galba, added new and heavy ones, increased the tributes of the provinces, and even doubled those of some, he openly practiced dealings which would have been shameful even for a private person, buying up certain things only so that he might afterward sell them for more. Nor did he hesitate to sell offices to candidates and acquittals to defendants, the innocent no less than the guilty.
§ 34. To sell the possessions of the rich. Dio on Caligula. There it was a public crime to be rich; and when he himself sold their possessions, he obtained much more money from them because everyone was compelled to buy for more than the things were worth.