Nero Becomes Emperor

The event

Nero came to power as a teenager in AD 54, guided at first by capable advisors, including the philosopher Seneca and the Praetorian prefect Burrus, and his early years were remembered afterward as a genuine golden moment — later Romans coined the phrase 'the five good years' (the quinquennium Neronis) to describe this opening stretch of his reign.

That promise did not last. Nero had his own mother, Agrippina, murdered in AD 59 after she became an obstacle to his independence, and from there his reign grew steadily more erratic: he indulged an obsessive passion for performing publicly as a singer and actor (activities Roman aristocrats considered beneath an emperor's dignity), executed or exiled a growing number of senators and advisors he distrusted (including eventually forcing Seneca to suicide), and spent lavishly on personal extravagance, including a vast palace complex, the Domus Aurea, built after the great fire of Rome.

Nero's reign is the setting for the first empire-sponsored persecution of Christians, following the fire of AD 64, and for the traditional martyrdoms of both Peter and Paul in Rome. His increasingly tyrannical rule eventually cost him the loyalty of the army and the Senate alike; facing rebellion and abandonment, Nero took his own life in AD 68, becoming the last emperor of the family line founded by Augustus.

Other witnesses

• Tacitus, Annals, Books 13-16
• Suetonius, Life of Nero

Further reading

• Catholic Encyclopedia (1913): Nero
• Bible Odyssey (SBL): Roman Emperors and Imperial Families