ROME’S BLOODIEST EMPERORS

1. TIBERIUS

(Ruled AD 14–37)

Tiberius was the successor to Augustus, but Augustus did not particularly want Tiberius to succeed him. In fact, it was only the untimely deaths of the emperor’s grandsons Gaius and Lucius – and Augustus’s decision to exile their younger brother, Agrippa Postumus – that put Tiberius in line for the imperial throne.

Tiberius was a gifted military commander and respected the authority of the senate. However, he had a gloomy and increasingly suspicious outlook that won him few friends and led him into a bitter dispute with Agrippina – the widow of his war hero nephew, Germanicus. Fatally, Tiberius relied heavily on the ambitious and ruthless administrator, Aelius Sejanus, who instituted a reign of terror until Tiberius, learning that Sejanus planned to seize power himself, had him arrested and executed.

Tiberius then sank into a state of dangerous suspicion, distrusting everyone around him. He retreated to the island of Capri, revived the ancient accusation of (treason) and used it to sentence to death anyone he suspected. Roman historians Suetonius and Tacitus painted a picture of Tiberius living on Capri as a depraved sexual predator. This may