[crickets]
Awesome! Let's continue...
...our last discussion ended with the death of Nero in 68AD. Following his death, there was a good bit of turmoil and four men (backed by influential people and men with swords) found themselves fighting for the role of emperor.
...but let's back up a bit before we get too carried away.
After Nero's death, the Praetorian Guard (the emperor's elite bodyguards) decided to name a former consul, GALBA (68AD - January 69AD), emperor of Rome.
Galba wasn't particularly charismatic or charming, but he was old and he didn't have any children, which meant he could be a kind of place-holder who would die soon without causing much trouble. They'd use the meanwhile to find a more permanent emperor.
...but it turned out that Galba was kind of a jerk. He managed, in short order, to alienate all of his allies. He refused to pay the soldiers as much as he'd promised to pay them (and killed the ones who complained), put an over-ambitious man in charge of the legions in Germania Inferior (his name was Vitellius; more on him shortly), and antagonized Otho (an ally who plotted to overthrow Nero and expected to be named successor) to the point of rebellion.
So, in January of 69AD, Galba was assasinated. The year 69AD is referred to as The Year of Four Emperors because four different men, in quick succession, were emperors that year.
After Galba came OTHO (January 69AD - April 69AD).
Otho was one of Nero's wife-swapping buddies who ended up on Nero's bad side and found himself sent from Rome to Portugal. He'd supported Galba against Nero and was sure that Galba would name him as successor. Galba, however, decided to name a man called Piso as his successor because Piso came from a nobler family than Otho. So Otho plotted against Galba with the Praetorian Guard and murdered both Piso and Galba.
While all of this was going on in Rome, VITELLIUS (April 69AD - December 69AD) was plotting to make himself emperor.
Vitellius was a former associate of the emperor Claudius. He'd been in Germany gathering the allegiance of the soldiers ever since Galba sent him to the region in 68AD. He marched towards Rome in April and defeated Otho's army in northern Italy. Otho responded by killing himself. Now Vitellius was emperor.
But 69AD isn't called the Year of Three Emperors, so you know Vitellius was not the last man standing. That title goes to a man named VESPASIAN (December 69AD - 79AD).
Technically, he became emperor in December 69AD when he defeated Vitellius's army and threw his corpse into the Tiber, but he called himself emperor beginning in July when his men declared him so. Vespasian was not well-connected and he was not a noble. He rose through the ranks by being an outstanding soldier, distinguishing himself during Claudius's invasion of Britain and successfully commanding the Roman armies against the Great Jewish Revolt (66AD - 74AD). Vespasian was a family man, especially compared to the emperors of the Julio-Claudian dynasty. He had one wife, a freedwoman named Caenis, and loved her, apparently. He also tore down the gaudy house Nero built for himself in the middle of Rome and replaced it with The Colosseum.
When Vespasian died in 79AD (the first emperor in a while to NOT die violently), his oldest son, TITUS (79AD - 81AD) became emperor.
Titus is best known for finishing construction of the Colosseum and holding 80 days of Roman-style entertainment to inaugurate the building, which was originally conceived as a monument to commemorate the success of Rome's war against the Jews. When Vespasian excused himself from the war in Judea (he had to go to Rome and murder Vitellius), Titus was left in charge of the proceedings. So Titus oversaw the siege of Jerusalem, the destruction of the Temple, and Tisha b'Av (which is what the day is called on the Jewish calendar). Titus was emperor when the city of Pompeii was destroyed by a volcano. They say he toured the site and used his own money to help the victims of the disaster. Titus died abruptly in 81AD of an illness.
DOMITIAN (81AD - 96AD), Vespasian's other son, wasn't much like his brother or his father.
He built the Arch of Titus to remember his brother's victory against the Jews, fought a protracted war against the Dacian kingdom (Romania), and he made people call him "God", which is something that most Romans didn't particularly care for. Augustus was named a god, but it wasn't until after he was dead (well, some territories worshiped him as a god, but he discouraged people from worshiping him in the city of Rome). Julius, on the other hand, named himself a god while he was still alive and it ended up being one more thing that led to his violent demise. Elevating an emperor to divine status after his death was seen as something of a referendum on his rule. If the senate liked you, you got to be a god. If the senate didn't like you, you didn't get to be a god.
The people liked Domitian well enough because he was good at marketing himself to them, but the senators thought he was self-righteous, moralizing, and a hypocrite. So when they finally got around to assassinating him, they did not name him a god and took measures to remove his name from the public record. The people, apparently, weren't much bothered by the assassination.
You guys have time for one more? Yes..?
NERVA (96AD - 98AD) was the next emperor of Rome.
Nerva (a former Senator) was, like Galba, old and childless and a place-holder. Unlike Galba, he knew that he needed to keep his allies happy. The Senate actually elected him to be emperor (at this point, there was less pretense about them holding any real power) and he was attentive to the demands of the army, like when they told him he needed to find an heir. He decided on a general named Trajan and then he managed to die peacefully without anyone killing him or hating him after he was gone. Nobody named him a god or anything, but he is named as the first of the Five Good Emperors; so, well done, Nerva.
If you want to find out anymore about this group of Caesars (because you're interested or because you want to find the mistakes in my retelling), you'll have to read a book. No one really puts any of these guys in movies or television shows.
...and that's the bell. Don't be late for your second period classes and be sure to have your papers on The Importance of Watching Your Back Whilst Hanging Around the Praetorian Guard done by Friday.
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