The Roman Emperors

Of the 198 entries in these pages, 101 died violently by assassination or judicial execution, 13 committed suicide, 10 died in battle (not always against an external enemy), 45 died of natural causes and the fate of 29 – mainly obscure usurpers – is unknown. One might wonder why anyone would wish to rule the Roman Empire at all, let alone risk everything to depose someone else with no guarantee of success and little security thereafter.This biographical dictionary runs from Caesar’s seizure of power in 49BC to AD602, when the dynasty of Justinian and his successors ended (rather bloodily in a mutiny) and the true Byzantine, much more entirely Greek, character of the empire finally emerged. It includes an account of the way the empire evolved constitutionally, vital to an understanding of the fates of emperors. Up to the settlement of Augustus, powerful men were almost sleepwalking into monarchy and trying to stretch the constitutional envelope to enable power to be wielded without a naked revival of the hated institution of kingship. From that time, Roman politics became highly fractured, and men bent on gaining control of the levers of government emerged with increasing frequency. 600 years of triumph and treason are referenced and illuminated here.