sasguru hits mainstream press

[thunderlizard]

Augustus and Nero

I meant Augustus lived in a modest house and left Rome with a unified government and military and the foundations for empire to replace the squabbling triumvirate system that he'd started with. While Nero built himself a massive palace and the state immediately fell to bits after he'd gone.

[Gibbon]

I meant Augustus lived in a modest house and left Rome with a unified government and military and the foundations for empire to replace the squabbling triumvirate system that he'd started with. While Nero built himself a massive palace and the state immediately fell to bits after he'd gone.

On that I would agree. But we have to be careful with Nero, the building of his Domus Aurea could also be seen as a way of providing work for the unemployed after the great fire destroyed much of it. Also him being the last of the Julian/Claudian clan to be emperor he had to be vilified to atone for the spilling of imperial blood. There is some scholars who think the christians did set fire to Rome to hasten the end of the world and so the second coming of christ. At that time his was expected to come again within Peters lifetime.

[AtW]

Rome already had its best days behind it when Nero came to power.

[Gibbon]

Rome already had its best days behind it when Nero came to power.

Although many would argue that it was betwwen Nerva and Marcus Aurelius.

[thunderlizard]

Nero was certainly a populist as well as an egomaniac (a bit of a Mugabe figure in some ways) & it would kind of fit if he'd had his palace built as a job creation scheme.

I've never heard that particular conspiracy theory for the fire before - I suppose they'd be the Roman Christians that St Paul was writing to. You can tell they were hard liners from the tone of the opening couple of chapters. Plus this was before the Gospels were finalised, so lots of room to speculate on their theological position.