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Agrippina’s role in the early years of Nero’s reign

    

There are a number of questions to consider about the role of Agrippina in Nero's reign:

  • How much REAL power, if any, did she have?

  • Did she really 'attempt to make herself a partner in his rule'?

  • What was her relationship with Nero?

  • WHEN/HOW did she fall from power?

  • WHY did she fall from power (why did Nero murder her)?
     

The Primary Record

The most powerful evidence that Agrippina occupied a position of huge power at the start of Nero's reign is offered by in the Visual images of Agrippina the Younger and Nero (which you should study carefully.  Although the confronted heads disappear from coins after ad54, there were coins minted showing jugate heads of Nero and Agrippina in ad55, and a coin from the empire still showing an image of Agrippina on the reverse up to ad66.

 

You should be able, using the summary-of-mentions sheet, to discover for yourself what the ancient writers Tacitus, Suetonius and Dio said: 

 

Links:

The following websites will help you complete the task:

You can read the summary-of-mentions sheet here .

You are recommended to read Peter Roberts's notes here (starting at page 170, col 2).

And this article looks at the unpleasant subject So – did Nero commit incest with his mother?  You will need to study it as you consider what you think about 'Nero's relationship with his mother'.

 

Task

Use your summary-of-mentions sheet to think about what the ancient writers Tacitus, Suetonius and Dio said about Agrippina's fall-from-power - when and how did they think it happened, and why.

Then click the yellow pointer to compare the comments that my pupils made:

  •  Tacitus, Suetonius and Dio on Agrippina's fall from power:
    • TACITUS:
    • •  Tacitus puts the break IMMEDIATELY - even though 'every honour' is 'heaped' upon her, Narcissus is forced to commit suicide 'against Nero's wishes', and Nero's opening speech to the Senate openly criticises and mocks Claudius's (and therefore Agrippina's) rule.
    • •  The subsequent clashes - over legal fees, the Armenian envoys, Acte and dresses - are presented as results of that break, and outworkings of Agrippina's womanly rage.
    • •  The Acte affair is given as THE moment Nero 'threw off all respect' for his mother.
    • •  Tacitus's account is shot through with contradictions. If he had 'thrown of all respect' for his mother (13.13) why did Poppaea accuse him of being scared of her (14.1). If she was such a raging terror (13.13), why was she so scared at Britannicus's death (13.16)? If mother and son had broken so completely over Acte (13.13), why did they become so lovey-dovey just before he murdered her (14.2). Why did Seneca use Acte to warn Newro about the incest when he was having an affair with Poppaea? Etc.
    • SUETONIUS:
    • •  Much simpler and more common sense that Tacitus.
    • •  At first (as you would expect of a 17-year-old) Nero left the whole government to his mother.
    • •  He gradually became increasingly 'offended' by his mother's behaviour, ans first threaten to go to Rhodes, then sent her away from the palace, then actively persecuted and harried'her, then decided to kill her.
    • DIO:
    • •  A sensible synthesis of Tacitus and Suetonius.
    • •  At first Agrippina controlled the government, including receiving foreign embassies.
    • •  Seneca, Burrus and Nero broke Agrippina's power at the embassy of the Armenian envoys, after which she was not allowed to have any say in government; thereafter she lost all political influence.
    • •  Acte was not the breaking point - it was the moment Agrippina began to threaten to remove Nero from the throne.
 

 

 

Modern Interpretations

The artist Anne-Marie Thérèse, in her autobiography (2010), touches upon Nero and Agrippina, linking the deterioration in relationship to Nero’s increasingly degenerate behaviour, and commenting:

Nero and his mother were two people of enormous egos, so they clashed.

This is to interpret the relationship between mother and son entirely (and anachronistically) in terms of modern ‘helicopter-parent’ syndrome.

Most serious modern historians – e.g., Anthony Barratt (1996) – identify the Acte affair as the occasion of Nero’s break with his mother. Thus they tacitly too acknowledge personal/emotional issues as the cause of the split, and place it very early in the reign:

Within a year the two had split irrevocably.

writes Edward Champlin (2005).

Jasper Burns (2007), by contrast, places the emphasis on the political/power confrontation … and he puts the break even sooner, implying that the it came almost immediately:

Agrippina tried to keep a grip on things, but the system was against her.

Agrippina’s problem, says Burns, was that women were not allowed direct involvement in the decision-making of government; her power relied solely on influence, and it was easy for Nero, Seneca and Burrus simply to freeze her out.

 

Task

Use your summary-of-mentions sheet and Mr Clare's blog Did Nero commit incest with his mother? to think about the relationship between Agrippina and Nero. Mr Clare dismisses incest as a possiblity - so what do you think about the relationship?.

Then click the yellow pointer to compare the comments that my pupils made:

  •  What was the relationship between Agrippina and Nero in the early years of his reign:
    • •  What you decides very much depends on which of the three ancient writers you most trust.
    • •  HOWEVER:
    • •  External evidence (e.g. the Visual Sources) suggests that Agrippina had considerable prestige and power at the start of Nero's reign, and Tacitus's account (= immediate break) gives no time for this to have happened.
    • •  The belief of Barrett and other modern historians that the Acte affair was critical, puts the main impetus on the personal relationship between Nero and Agrippina; this may be true, but we need to be careful that we are not anachronistically labelled Nero a 'rebellious teenager'.
    • •  Dio's account gives Agrippina time to have exercised power and, moreover, as Jasper Burns suggests, makes the break a political/power issue, and not just a relationship issue.

 

Now use your summary-of-mentions sheet about the other issues in the reign.

Then click the yellow pointer to compare the comments that my pupils made:

  •  Analysis of Agrippina's role in Nero's reign:
    • •  She appeared on coins and statues and had honours 'heaped'upon her.
    • •  Suetonius (9) and Dio (61.3) suggest that for a time she ruled the Roman Empire.
    • •  There is no evidence of her making any laws, building any aqueducts etc..
    • •  Indeed, all the evidence in the ancient writers is of her failing to achieve what she wanted.
    • •  Maybe Tacitus was correct that her role was superficial image only.
  •  When/how did Agrippina fall from power?
    • •  What you decides very much depends on which of the three ancient writers you most trust.
    • •  Tacitus stresses Acte, Dio the Armenian envoys, Suetonius a gradual alienation.
    • •  Barratt identifies the Acte affair, Champlin puts it within a year.
    • •  External evidence (e.g. the Visual Sources) suggests that Agrippina had considerable prestige and power at the start of Nero's reign, and Tacitus's account (= immediate break) gives no time for this to have happened.
    • •  The unanswered question is why, if Agrippina had lost power, Nero felt it necessary to murder her in ad59.
  •  Why did Agrippina fall from power?
    • •  What you decides very much depends on which of the three ancient writers you most trust.
    • •  Tacitus stresses Acte, Dio Seneca and Burrus, Suetonius a gradual alienation.
    • •  Barratt stresses the relationship issue, Burns stresses the political/power issue, Thérèse regards it as the clash of two huge egos.
    •  

  

Now write an answer to the following question:

'Because of his passion for Acte, Nero "threw off all respect for his mother".'  How far do the ancient sources support this opinion?

In your answer you should:

•  give a brief account of Agrippina's fall from power;

•  discuss why this happened;

•  show knowledge of the relevant sections of Tacitus and Suetonius;

•  consider how reliable you think these sources are.                                       [30]