If you’ve been brought up with the impressive BBC adaptation of Robert Graves ‘I, Claudius’ then you will have been left with the distinct impression that many of the early Roman emperors and much of the Imperial court at the time were a pit of depravity. However, a lecture I attended at this year’s Hay Festival given by the historian Tom Holland, has made me question my assumptions about just how depraved the early Roman Imperial court really was.

Chroniclers of the early Roman emperors, Augustus, Tiberius, Caligula, Claudius and Nero often point out the libertine and abusive sexuality and violence of the Imperial court. But, as Mr Holland pointed out, there may be other, more subtle ways of reading the history of the Julio-Claudian dynasty that ruled Rome between 27 BCE to 68 CE.

Mr Holland, the author of Dynasty: The Rise and Fall of the House of Caesar and ‘The Shadow of the Sword’ about the growth of Islam, was speaking about the creation, and then the fall, of the Julio-Claudian house. Mr Holland said that the view we have been given by later writers may contain some truth but may also contain gossip that was current at the time. Also some stories may have been embellished or changed for political reasons during the time of the Roman empire. They were stories contrived to shock a society that may not have been as libertine as we have been led to believe and may even have been, according to Roman standards, relatively ‘conventional’. If Roman society had not had a strong element of conventionality then it is unlikely that the stories about the appalling actions of Roman emperors would have had any shock value.

One very well publicised story concerning Tiberius is one that many schoolboys and casual students of ancient history may know. Tiberius was said, by those who compiled various lives of the Ceasars to be in the words of Mr Holland, ‘a massive perve’ who had children that he could sexually abuse whilst he swam. Such actions are those of someone who could be said to have surrendered completely to base lusts and could only be carried out by someone who has lost all fear of those who may say ‘no’ to him because he is so powerful.

But, when sources and the biases of the writers of these stories are examined then the story becomes more complex. Mr Holland admitted that Tiberius, when he ‘retired’ to the Isle of Capri, had a taste for pornographic tableaux on mythological themes, but some of the more lurid stories, like the one above, may just be the product of gossip. In Roman times Mr Holland said, there was normally assumed to be one reason and one reason only that someone would retire, as Tiberius did, from public life, and that is because the person had perverted urges that they could not or would not control. The departure of an emperor to a secluded island may well have given rise to gossip about what the emperor was doing on the island, and to whom.

Tiberius, like the rest of the Julio-Claudian dynasty was without a doubt violent, with a love of violence and one who used violence as a political tool, but these were cruel times in general. To the modern view, Roman imperial court sexuality and behaviour looks monstrous, and to its victims it was. However it may have been played up by later writers for their own ends.

Mr Holland said that the ancient writer Juvenal was violently misogynistic and his view of the female players in Julio-Claudian dynastical drama was coloured by his biases against women. Mr Holland said that Messalina, the wife of Claudius, had been accused of promiscuity and executed because of it. Mr Holland said that it is to Juvenal that we owe this trashing of the character of Messalina.

In examining the story of the Julio-Claudian dynasty we do need to keep in mind that people who tell stories often put their own spin on them and political and cultural influences also play their part in how history is written. Mr Holland said that the Roman historian Tacitus stated that people were frightened about writing about the emperors whilst they were alive, and their opinion of them after they had died was coloured by ‘festering hatreds’.

The influence of politics, class, gender and religious belief in Rome have all played their part in how the ancients chronicled the lives of the Julio-Claudian dynasty, just as these same influences put pressure on those writing the stories of our own times. We all have biases and anybody who says that they are completely unbiased is a liar or a fool. Looking back from our viewpoint Roman politics was strange, Roman society with it’s division between citizen, non-citizen and slave stranger still and Roman sexuality so odd that it is difficult for us to get our heads round. A Roman male citizen could penetrate whoever they wanted without consideration of age or gender or anything else, provided that the victim was not a Roman citizen and provided that the penetrator didn’t really take pleasure from it. Roman society and indeed Roman sexuality was very far removed from our own Western one where each gender is considered more or less equal and where informed consent to sex is required by all.

Although many of the Roman emperors were cruel, savage, sexually incontinent and depraved, the level at which how bad they are shown may be the product of those with axes to grind. Augustus was ‘deeply unpleasant’ according to Mr Holland and his successors were not much better but they were the products of their times. There is the possibility that gossip similar to that relating to the David Cameron and the pigs head kind may have added extra perversions to those we today would consider already deeply perverted. Gossip, especially gossip about the powerful, grows and becomes adorned with extra titbits as it is passed along.

I really enjoyed this lecture and although I was vaguely familiar with the historical period in question, I didn’t have the depth of knowledge about the politics, culture and society that the Julio-Claudian dynasty operated in. This lecture really did help to fill in gaps and make me question received wisdom about this historical period.

This is another Hay session that has inspired me to read the book on which the session was based, because if the book is even a fraction as good as the talk then it will be well worth reading.

The Roman Empire is a fascinating subject made even more fascinating, as it was in this case, by a really good speaker. If you ever get the chance to hear Mr Holland speak then take it, I’m very glad that I did, as it has kindled an interest in ancient politics that I would not otherwise have had.

Links

Tom Holland’s website

http://www.tom-holland.org/

Here’s a list of the titles and ISBN13 numbers for Mr Holland’s non-fiction works (taken from Wiki)

• Dynasty: The Rise and Fall of the House of Caesar. New York: Random House. 2015. ISBN 978-0-385-53784-1.

• In the Shadow of the Sword: The Battle for Global Empire and the End of the Ancient World. New York: Random House. 2012. ISBN 978-1-408-70007-5.

• The Forge of Christendom: The End of Days and the Epic Rise of the West. New York: Random House. 2008. ISBN 978-0-307-27870-8.

• Persian Fire: The First World Empire and the Battle for the West. New York: Random House. 2005. ISBN 978-0-307-27948-4.

• Rubicon: The Last Years of the Roman Republic. New York: Random House. 2003. ISBN 978-1-400-07897-4.