Tiberius
Tiberius (42 BCE–date::37 CE)
| Tiberius | |
|---|---|
| Roman Emperor | |
 Bust of Tiberius | |
| Reign | 18 September 14 – 16 March 37 |
| Full name | Tiberius Caesar Divi Augusti filius Augustus |
| Born | 16/11/42BC |
| Birthplace | Rome, |
| Died | 16 March 37 (aged 77) |
| Place of death | Rome |
| Buried | Mausoleum of Augustus, Rome |
| Predecessor | Augustus, |
| Successor | Caligula |
| Consort |
Vipsania Agrippina Julia the Elder |
| Issue |
Drusus Julius Caesar Tiberillius Germanicus Nero Julius Caesar Drusus Caesar |
| Father | Tiberius Claudius Nero |
| Mother | Livia |
Great Roman General to Perverted Old Man?
To sum up Tiberius' life the consensus is that he was generally regarded a great General whose victories laid the foundations of the expansion of the Empire northwards. When it seems he has reached the apogee of his career he retires to Rhodes in 6 AD thinking he can live out his years as a wealthy well-connected Roman just enough steps away from the center of power to be of no threat to anyone seeking to become Augustus's successor. As Suetonius somewhat mockingly writes He also gave up his usual exercises with horses and arms, and laying aside the garb of his country, took to the cloak and slippers [1]
His great plans for his future, if indeed this was what was in his mind, had started to go awry years earlier. With the death of Agrippa and Marcellus he and his brother Drusus were getting closer to the succession. He was also forced by Augustus to divorce his first wife Vipsania Agrippa for the promiscuous Julia in 11BC.
Watching the George Baker portrayal in BBC's I-Claudius by Robert Graves, one sees a physically powerful man, dominated by his mother Livia who has been poisoning and plotting away through Rome 's "great and the good" since Augustus rise to power. A tortured soul who was reluctant to assume power, he came contemptuous of it during his 22 years as Emperor.
Suetonius implies that despite his reluctance he was implicated in the murder of the young Agrippa soon after Augustus' death, but this was undertaken more to stabilize power than to seize it. it is not known whether Augustus left this letter when he died, to remove a future source of discord, or whether Livia wrote it herself in the name of her p329 husband; and in the latter case, whether it was with or without the connivance of Tiberius [2]
, emperor Julius Caesar Augustus (14–37 CE), son of Tiberius Claudius Nero and Livia. He first marries Vipsania Agrippina, the daughter of Marcus Agrippa, and fathers two children by her, but, after Agrippa’s death in 12, he is forced by Augustus to DIVORCE and marry JULIA MAIOR, Agrippa’s widow and Augustus’s daughter. After she gives BIRTH to a child that dies soon after, Tiberias stops having sex with her. He retires to Rhodes in 6, out of favor with Augustus. After Julia’s banishment in 2, Augustus procures Tiberius a divorce. He returns to Rome in 2 CE. Early in his reign, in 27, he retires to the island of Capri. There, Tiberius reportedly acquires infants to nurse on his penis, and boys and girls, whom he called pisciculi, “little fishes,” to arouse him by nibbling at him when he goes BATHING, or to play Pan and nymphs in special groves called Caprinea. He converts the latrines (sellaria; pl. 37) of Capri into male BROTHELS for which he procures “fancy boys,” sellarii (CINAEDI), one of whom is the future emperor Vitellius (Suetonius, Caligula 16.1, Vitellius 3.2). He also acquires “men of gigantic proportions, whom he called spintriae, to copulate in threes to excite his failing DESIRES.” He compiles an erotic library and art gallery, SEX MANUALS by Elephantis and paintings by Parrhasius, especially one that depicted ATALANTA FELLATING Melcager. And in his OLD AGE, he is accused of being a CUNNILICTOR; one woman kills herself afterwards, complaining of “the bad breath of the goat,” capri in Latin, a phrase that became popular in Atellan farces (THEATER). Once, at a sacrifice, he lusted after the incense bearer and had him brought to his chamber to rape both him and his flute-playing brother; when they complained, he had their legs broken. Since it was forbidden to execute virgins, he had the daughter of Sejanus raped first by the executioner. And he would trick men into drinking vast amounts of wine, and when they were tortured he would have their penises tied up so they were unable to urinate (DOGKNOT). Suetonius, Tiberius. Tiresias
TIBERIUS attracted both types (Suetonius, Tiberius 43.1, Caligula 16.1);
Vitellius was even nicknamed “Spintria” because as a boy he was rumored to have
prostituted himself with Tiberius at Capri to obtain his father’s political advancement
(Suetonius, Vitellius 3.2).
