By Cameron Reilly & Ray Harris
A long-form podcast about the lives of the Julio-Claudian dynasty.
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In our last episode, we finished on June 9, 68. Nero was 30 years and six months old. He had ruled for 13 years and 8 months. On June 10, 68, while he was still in Spain, The Senate declared...
News of Galba’s betrayal makes its way to Nero who is shocked into action. He sends troops to stop Galba - but they switch sides and join the conspiracy. Nero goes into hiding with the intent of running away to...
Nero celebrates two official triumphs. Not for military victories, but for singing. It’s the last straw. A new rebellion is formed, lead by Vindex and Galba.
Nero didn’t visit Athens or Sparta while in Greece because he was scared of religious and political retribution. Besides, he was too busy trying to become the periodonikes, the Grand Slam champion of all of the Games. But things weren’t...
The year is 67 CE. Nero is still on his 14 month tour of Greece. He dropped into the Temple of Apollo at Delphi and tickled the Omphalos.
It’s 67 CE. Before he sets out for his World Tour of Greece, Nero first needs to insult the Senate, then he needs to deal with a new conspiracy, this one involving Corbulo. While Greece, he becomes unhappy with Vespasian...
Nero gets, not one, but TWO new wives. One of them is a dude.
Nero’s first attempt at building a single property that covered his estates on the Palatine Hill and the Esquiline Hill was The Domus Transitoria, the House of Passage. It burned down in the Great Fire. He replaced it with the...
Nero built his Domus Aurea between 64-68 and, in doing so, revolutionised Roman architecture. He also built a massive statue of himself, because, hey, why not?
Nero was a lover, not a fighter. Not a great leader of armies. He thought of himself as an artist. He wanted to be on stage, not on horseback. He was very proud that he closed his Janus.
If you want to marry a woman, remember to kill her husband first
The Stoics Thrasea and Soranus go on trial. And we run out of Tacitus.
When you’ve been up to no good, and you get caught out, you have two options. Nero, like Ray, is a Number 2 kind of guy. In this episode, he goes after two significant Stoics, Thrasea Paetus and Barea Soranus,...
A family commits suicide together to escape Nero’s prosecution, while others just get stabbed to death. But Tacitus’ explanations for Nero’s behaviour still leave us scratching our heads.
Nero launches a series of attacks that result in the demise of certain members of the Roman elite. But why these particular people? And why now? We tease apart Tacitus to try to work out what’s really going on.
This is the second and final part of our interview with philosopher Michael Tremblay, talking about Seneca and stoicism.
With the recent demise on our show of Nero's favourite Stoic, Seneca, we wanted to go balls deep on Stoicism. To help us out, our guest Michael Tremblay, who has a PhD in philosophy, where he studied Stoic ethics and...
In the year 66, Nero gets taken on a wild goose chase, performs some lovely poetry and harp concerts… oh yeah, and he kicks his wife to death.
This episode is brought to you by - legal weed! The Pisonian Conspiracy is over. Rewards are handed out to those who remained loyal. The Senate wants to make Nero a living god.
Next on the chopping block is Seneca, Nero’s old tutor and adviser and leading Stoic. Historians seem to think he wasn’t directly involved in the conspiracy - but he probably knew about it.
Nero hunts down the main conspirators. Some of them are captured, while others help execute their own colleagues without betraying their allegiance to the cause. Piso is urged to mount the rostra in the Forum and make a case to...
The plot against Nero continues to gather momentum but is finally betrayed by a freedman, a day before shit was about to go down.
When one of the praetorian prefects joins the conspirators, they decide it's time to act. But they can't agree on a plan. It takes a woman to move things along.
We’re talking about the Pisonian Conspiracy of 65. Who started it and why? Theories involve an angry poet and an angry gay man seeking revenge.
Nero has some freedmen executed but the stories are murky. The Parthians decide to try their luck taking back Armenia while Corbulo tries to keep the peace.
This is part two of a massive two-and-a-half-hour chat we had recently Edward J. Watts, a professor of history at the University of California, San Diego, and author and editor of several prize-winning books, including THE FINAL PAGAN GENERATION, a...
Edward J. Watts is a professor of history at the University of California, San Diego, and author and editor of several prize-winning books, including THE FINAL PAGAN GENERATION, a great book about HYPATIA, a book out about the collapse of...
With Seneca out of the way, Tigellinus brings down the other prefect, Rufus. To strengthen his relationship with Nero, he increases his paranoia about the two men Nero had recently exiled for being threats to his power - Plautus and...
In the year 61, Nero deals with riots, treason, Stoics and the death of one of his key advisors.
Boudicea wins round one. But Suetonius has bloodshed and destruction on his mind.
Corbulo finishes round one in Armenia and gets a promotion. Meanwhile in Britain, a certain queen decides to take on the Romans - Boudicea. Exactly why, though, is a bit of a mystery.
Agrippina is dead and Nero decides to party. Tacitus disapproves. He doesn’t like Nero’s parties and he doesn’t like his poetry. But then a comet appears, and everyone assumes it means the end of Nero’s reign - so they start...
Stephen Dando-Collins is an Australian historical author, who, like me, once sold his soul to the gods of marketing and advertising but has been redeeming himself ever since. His new book is about the great Jewish - Roman war of...
We examine the circumstances and theories surrounding the death of Agrippina.
Nero likes hanging out under bridges where he could “take his pleasures more freely” and this leads to trouble for Sulla’s great-great-great grandson. But Nero also wants to abolish taxes because he’s a dirty commie. Then the Germans start some...
Tacitus shares some Salacious Stories from Nero's Rome in the year 58 CE - mostly about ambitious women.
There’s a war with Parthia, Rome’s boogeyman since they cut off the head of Crassus in 53 BCE, a hundred years earlier, and Nero sends Corbulo to deal with it. He whips his troops into order and kicks ass, wearing...
Nero starts his own Fight Club. Apart from that, the years of 56 - 58 were pretty good. Nero made some wise decisions (no doubt with the help of Seneca), showing moderation and generosity. He was turning out to be...
This is where the story becomes really weird. Nero, up until now the golden child, suddenly becomes a cold murderer with the murder of Britannicus.
In the first year of his rule, Nero was a big hit. He built a wooden amphitheatre in the Campus Martius, flooded it, and held a naval battle with sea monsters. In his gladiator shows, nobody died, not even criminals....
Nero becomes emperor on the murder of his step-father. He’s 16 or 17 years old. Why didn’t the Senate stop him? It might have something to do with Seneca and Burrus. Seneca wrote him a speech where he promised to...
This is the story of Lucius Domitius Ahenobarbus. Known to us as Nero Claudius Caesar Augustus Germanicus. Or just “Nero”. On this episode, we ask - how is it possible that a man tutored and guided by one of the...