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TIBERIAS
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TIBERIAS [TIBERIUS CLAUDIJS See also:NERO) (42 B.C.—A.D. 37), See also:Roman' See also:emperor, was See also:born on the 16th of See also:November, 42 B.C. His See also:father, who See also:bore the same name, was an officer of See also:Julius See also:Caesar, who afterwards proposed to confer honours on the assassins, then joined See also:Mark Antony's See also:brother in his mad attack on Octavian, took See also:refuge with Mark Antony, and returned to See also:Rome when the See also:general See also:amnesty was proclaimed in 39 B.C. Livia, the See also:mother of Tiberius, was also of the Claudian See also:family, out of which her father had passed by See also:adoption into that of the Livii Drusi. See also:Early in 38 Livia was amicably ceded to Octavian (the future See also:Augustus), and three months after her new See also:marriage See also:Drusus, brother to Tiberius, was born. Livia had no See also:children by Augustus, and therefore devoted all her remarkable gifts to the See also:advancement of her sons. Tiberius passed through the See also:list of See also:state offices in the usual princely See also:fashion, beginning with the quaestorship at the See also:age of eighteen, and attaining the consulate for the first See also:time at twenty-nine. From the See also:great capacity for See also:civil affairs which he displayed as emperor it may be inferred that he applied himself with determination to learn the business of See also:government. But from 22 to 6 B.C. and again from A.D. 4 to ro by far the greater See also:part of Tiberius's time was spent in the See also:camp. His first service was as legionary See also:tribune in one of the desperate and arduous See also:wars which led to See also:peace in the See also:Spanish See also:peninsula through the decimation, or rather the extermination, of the rebellious tribes. In 20 B.C. Augustus sent Tiberius with an See also:army to seat See also:Tigranes of See also:Armenia on the See also:throne as a Roman See also:vassal. When Tiberius approached the frontier of Armenia, he found its throne vacant through the assassination of the See also: On the See also:death of Drusus in the autumn of 9 B.C. Tiberius, whose reputation had hitherto been eclipsed by that of his brother, stepped into the position of the first soldier of the See also:empire. The army, if it did not warmly admire Tiberius, entertained a loyal confidence in a See also:leader who, as Velleius (the historian who served under him) tells us, always made the safety of his soldiers his first care. In the campaign of the year after Drusus's death Tiberius traversed all See also:Germany between the Rhine and the See also:Elbe, and met with slight opposition. But it would be too much to believe the statement of Velleius that " he reduced Germany almost to the position of a tributary See also:province." He was rewarded with the full triumph, the military See also:title of " imperator," and his second consulship, though the opposition of the powerful Sugambri had been only broken by an See also:act of treachery, the See also:guilt of which should perhaps be laid at the See also:door of Augustus. In 7 B.C. there was another but insignificant campaign in Germany. Next year Augustus bestowed on his stepson the tribunician authority for five years. Tiberius was thus in the most formal manner associated with the emperor in the conduct of the government on the civil side; but See also:Tacitus (See also:Ann. iii. 56) goes too far when he says that this promotion marked him out as the See also:heir to the throne. Tiberius now suddenly begged permission to retire to See also:Rhodes and devote himself to study. He seems to have declined absolutely at the time to state his reasons for this course, but he obstinately adhered to it, in spite of the tears of Livia and the See also:lamentations of Augustus to the senate that his son had betrayed him. The departure from Italy was as See also:secret as it could be made. Years afterwards, when Tiberius See also:broke silence about his motives, he declared that he had retired in See also:order ' See also:Horace, Odes, iv. 14.to allow the See also:young princes, See also:Gaius and See also:Lucius, sons of Agrippa and Julia, a See also:free course. There was perhaps a portion of the truth wrapped up in this See also:declaration. Like Agrippa, who retired to Mytilene to avoid the young See also:Marcellus, Tiberius had clearly no See also:taste to become the servant of the two children whom Augustus had adopted in their See also:infancy and evidently destined to be See also:joint emperors after his death. But it may well be believed that Tiberius, unlike Agrippa, had no burning ambition to see himself in the place destined for his stepsons; and it may have been in his eyes one of the attractions of See also:exile that it released him from the See also:obligation to aid in carrying out the far-reaching designs which Livia cherished for his See also:sake. But the contemporaries of Tiberius were no doubt right in believing that the See also:scandal of Julia's See also:life did more than all else to render his position at Rome intolerable. His conduct to her from first to last gives a strong impression of his dignity and self-respect. When at length the emperor's eyes were opened, and he inflicted severe See also:punishment upon his daughter, her See also:husband, now divorced by the emperor's act, made See also:earnest intercession for her, and did what he could to alleviate her suffering. At Rhodes Tiberius lived simply, passing his time mainly in the See also:company of See also:Greek professors, with whom he associated on See also:pretty equal terms. He acquired considerable proficiency in the studies of the See also:day, among which was See also:astrology. But his attempts at See also:composition, whether in See also:prose or See also:verse, were laboured and obscure. After five years' See also:absence from Rome, he begged for leave to return; but the boon was angrily refused, and Livia with difficulty got her son made nominally a See also:legate of Augustus, so as in some degree to See also:veil his disgrace. The next two years were spent in solitude and gloom. Then, on the intercession of Gaius, Augustus allowed Tiberius to come back to Rome, but on the See also:express understanding that he was to hold aloof from all public functions--an understanding which he thoroughly carried out. He had scarcely returned before death removed (A.D. 2) Lucius, the younger of the two princes, and a year and a See also:half later Gaius also died. The emperor was thus See also:left with only one male descendant, Agrippa Postumus, youngest son of Julia, and still a boy. Four months after Gaius's death Augustus adopted Agrippa and at the same time Tiberius. The emperor now indicated clearly his expectation that Tiberius would be his See also:principal successor. The two essential ingredients in the imperial authority—the proconsulare imperium and the tribunicia potestas—were conferred on Tiberius, and not on Agrippa, who was too young to receive them. Tiberius' career as a general now began anew. In two or three safe rather than brilliant See also:campaigns he strengthened the Roman hold on Germany, and established the See also:winter camps of the legions in the interior, away from the Rhine. In A.D. 5 it became necessary to attack the formidable confederacy built up by Maroboduus, with its centre in Bohemia. At the most See also:critical moment, when See also:Pannonia and See also:Dalmatia broke out into insurrection, and an unparalleled disaster seemed to be impending, Maroboduus accepted an See also:honourable peace. The four serious campaigns which the See also:war cost displayed Tiberius at his best as a general. When he was about to celebrate his well-won triumphs, the terrible See also:catastrophe to Varus and his legions (A.D. 9) turned the rejoicing into lasting sorrow, and produced a profound See also:change in the Roman policy towards Germany. Although Tiberius with his See also:nephew and adopted son Germanicus made in A.D. 9 and ro two more See also:marches into the interior of Germany, the See also:Romans never again attempted to See also:bound their domain by the Elbe, but clung to the neighbourhood of the Rhine. Tiberius was thus robbed in great part of the See also:fruit of his campaigns; but nothing can deprive him of the See also:credit of being a See also:chief founder of the imperial See also:system in the lands of See also:Europe. From the beginning of r r, when he celebrated a magnificent triumph, to the time of the emperor's death in 14 Tiberius remained almost entirely in Italy, and held rather the position of joint emperor than that of expectant heir. Agrippa Postumus had proved his incapacity beyond See also:hope, and had been banished to a desolate See also:island. In all See also:probability Tiberius was not See also:present when Augustus died, although Livia spread reports (eagerly amplified by Velleius) of an affectionate interview and a lingering farewell. Tiberius ascended the throne at the age of fifty-six. What struck his contemporaries most was his See also:absolute impenetrability. All his feelings, desires, passions and ambitions were locked behind an impassable barrier, and had to be interpreted by the very uncertain See also:light of his See also:external acts. It is recorded of him that only once did he as See also:commander take counsel with his See also:officers concerning military operations, and that was when the destruction of Varus's legions had made it imperatively necessary not lightly to See also:risk the loss of a single soldier. The See also:penalty of his inscrutability was widespread dislike and suspicion. But behind his defences there See also:lay an See also:intellect of high See also:power, See also:cold, clear and penetrating all disguises. Few have ever possessed such See also:mental See also:vision, and he was probably never deceived either about the weaknesses of others or about his own. For the littleness and servility of public life in regions below the See also:court he entertained a strong contempt. It is a question whether he ever liked or was liked by a single being; but he did his See also:duty by those with whom he was connected after a thorough though stern and unlovable fashion. As a general he commanded the full confidence of his soldiers, though he was a severe disciplinarian; yet the men of his own legions greeted his See also:accession to the throne with a See also:mutiny. Tiberius proved himself capable in every See also:department of the state more by virtue of See also:industry and application than by See also:genius. His mind moved so slowly and he was accustomed to deliberate so See also:long that men sometimes made the See also:mistake of deeming him a waverer. He was in reality one of the most tenacious of men. When he had once formed an aim he could wait patiently for years till the favourable moment enabled him to achieve it, and if compelled to yield ground he never failed to recover it in the end. The See also: Perhaps with any other commander than Germanicus the dangerous mutiny of the troops on the Rhine which broke out soon after Tiberius's accession would have ended in a See also: In his See also:memoirs of his own life Tiberius declared that he killed Sejanus because he had discovered that he entertained a mad rage against the sons of Germanicus. But the destruction of Sejanus did not See also:save Agrippina and her two children. The third son Gaius Caesar (Caligula), lived to become emperor when Tiberius died in 37. Throughout his reign Tiberius strove earnestly to do his duty to the empire at large; his guiding principle was to maintain with an almost superstitious reverence the constitutional forms which had been constructed by Augustus. Only two changes of moment were introduced. The imperial guard, hitherto only seen near the See also:city in small detachments, was by the See also:advice of Sejanus encamped permanently in full force See also:close to the walls. By this measure the turbulence of the populace was kept in check. The officer in command of the guard became at once the most important of the emperor's lieutenants. The other change was the practically See also:complete abolition of the old See also:comitia, But the senate was treated with an almost hypocritical defer ence, and a pedantically precise compliance with the old republi, can forms was observed towards the senatorial magistrates, The care expended by Tiberius on the provinces was unremitting, His favourite See also:maxim was that a See also:good shepherd should shear the See also:flock and not flay it. When he died he left the subject peoples of the empire in a See also:condition of prosperity such as they had never known before and never knew again. Soldiers, See also:governors and officials of all kinds were kept in wholesome dread of vengeance if they oppressed those beneath them or encouraged irregularity of any kind. Strict See also:economy permitted light See also:taxation and enabled the emperor to show generosity in periods of exceptional See also:distress. Public See also:security both in Italy and abroad was maintained by a strong hand, and See also:commerce was stimulated by the improvement of communications. See also:Jurisdiction both within and without the capital was on the whole exercised with steadiness and See also:equity, and the See also:laws of the empire were at many points improved. The social and moral reforms of Augustus were upheld and carried further. Such risings against the emperor's authority as occurred within the Roman domain were put down with no great difficulty. The See also:foreign or rather the frontier policy was a policy of peace, and it was pursued with consider-able success. With few exceptions the duties of the Roman forces on the See also:borders were confined to watching the peoples on the other side while they destroyed each other. On the Rhine, at least, masterly inactivity achieved tranquillity which lasted for a long See also:period. The disrepute which attaches to the reign of Tiberius has come mainly from three or four See also:sources—from the lamentable See also:story of the imperial household, from the tales of hideous debauchery practised in deep retirement at Capreae during the last eleven years of the emperor's life, from the tyranny which Sejanus was permitted to wield in his See also:master's name, and from the See also:political prosecutions and executions which Tiberius encouraged, more by silent compliance than by open incitement. The stories of immorality are recorded chiefly by Suetonius, who has evidently used a poisoned source, possibly the memoirs .of the younger Agrippina, the mother of Nero. Tiberius loved to See also:shroud himself in See also:mystery, and such stories are probably the result of unfriendly attempts to penetrate the darkness. If history ventures to doubt the blackness of See also:Theodora, that of Tiberius grows continually lighter under the investigations of criticism. Suetonius makes the emperor's condition to have been one of See also:mania, issuing frequently in the See also:abandonment of all moral See also:restraint. But in that See also:case the authority of Tiberius, which was as firmly upheld during the years spent at Capreae as it had been earlier, must have fallen to pieces and come to an end. With respect to Sejanus, it is impossible to acquit Tiberius of blame. If he was deceived in his favourite he must have been willing to be deceived. He conferred on Sejanus a position as great as had been held by Agrippa during the reign of Augustus, and the minister was actually, and all but formally, joint emperor. Of the administrative ability of Sejanus there can be no question; but the See also:charm and secret of his power lay in the use he made of those apprehensions of See also:personal danger which seem never to have been absent from his master's mind. The growth of " delation," the darkest See also:shadow that lies on the reign, was mainly a consequence of the supremacy and the arts of Sejanus. Historians of Rome in See also:ancient times remembered Tiberius chiefly as the See also:sovereign under whose See also:rule prosecutions for See also:treason on slight pretexts first became rife, and the hateful See also:race of informers was first allowed to fatten on the gains of judicial See also:murder. Augustus had allowed considerable See also:licence of speech and See also:writing against himself, and had made no See also:attempt to set up a See also:doctrine of constructive treason. But the history of the state trials of Tiberius's reign shows conclusively that the straining of the See also:law proceeded in the first instance from the eager flattery of the senate, was in the earlier days checked and controlled to a great extent by the emperor, and was by him acquiesced in at the end of his reign, with a sort of contemptuous indifference, till he See also:developed, under the See also:influence of his fears, a readiness to See also:shed See also:blood. The principal authorities for the reign of Tiberius are Tacitus and Suetonius. The See also:Annals of Tacitus were not published till nearly eighty years after the death of Tiberius. He rarely quotes an authority by name. In all probability he See also:drew most largely from other historians who had preceded him; to some extent he availed himself of oral tradition; and of archives and See also:original records he made some, but comparatively little, use. In his history of Tiberius two influences were at See also:work, in almost equal strength: on the one hand he strives continually after fairness; on the other the See also:bias of a See also:man steeped in senatorial traditions forbids him to attain it. No historian more frequently refutes himself. Suetonius was a biographer rather than an historian, and the ancient biographer was even less given to exhaustive inquiry than the ancient historian; moreover Suetonius was not gifted with great criticalfaculty, though he told the truth so far as he could see it. His Lives of the Twelve Caesars was written nearly at the time when Tacitus was composing the Annals, but was published a little later. Velleius Paterculus is by far the See also:oldest authority for any part of Tiberius's life. He had been an officer under Tiberius, and he eulogizes his old general enthusiastically—feeling it necessary, however, to do less than See also:justice to the achievements of Germanicus. To Velleius all defenders of Tiberius have eagerly appealed. In truth it is his silence alone which affords any external aid in repelling the charges of Tacitus and Suetonius, and the fact that Velleius published his work in the lifetime of his master deprives that silence of its value. The eulogy of Sejanus which is linked with that of Tiberius must needs shake faith in the scrupulousness of the author. It is still doubtful whether Dio See also:Cassius (whose History ended with the year 229) in his narrative of the reign of Tiberius is to any great extent See also:independent of Tacitus. In See also:recent times a considerable See also:mass of See also:inscriptions has added to our knowledge of the See also:administration of this emperor. The chief See also:account of Tiberius in See also:English is that contained in See also:Dean See also:Merivale's History of the Romans under the Empire. See also:Professor E. S. See also:Beesly has written an interesting See also:defence of him in his See also:Catiline, See also:Clodius and Tiberius (1878). The best recent history of this period is See also:Hermann See also:Schiller's Geschichte der romischen Kaiserzeit (See also:Gotha, 1883). Much See also:historical See also:information is given in the See also:editions of the Annals of Tacitus, of which the best in English is that of See also:Furneaux (See also:Oxford, 1884); See also:Freytag, Tiberius and Tacitus (See also:Berlin, 187o) (following Stahr, Tiberius, Berlin, 1863), exposes the inconsistencies of Tacitus' account. Many mono-graphs have since appeared, written on similar lines, among which may be mentioned Ihne, Zur Ehrenrettung See also:des Kaisers Tiberius (See also:Strassburg, 1892) ; See also:Gentile, L'Imperatore Tiberio secondo la See also:modern¢ critica storica (1887) ; J. C. Tarver, Tiberius the See also:Tyrant (1902). The principles of the imperial administration of the provinces by Tiberius have been treated by See also:Mommsen in the fifth See also:volume of his History of Rome, translated into English by W. P. See also:Dickson (1886). (J. S. Additional information and CommentsThere are no comments yet for this article.
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