Produced by D. Alexander and the Online Distributed Proofreading Team at http://www.pgdp.net Makers of History Nero BY JACOB ABBOTT WITH ENGRAVINGS NEW YORK AND LONDON HARPER & BROTHERS PUBLISHERS 1901 Entered, according to Act of Congress, in the year one thousand eight hundred and fifty-three, by HARPER & BROTHERS, in the Clerk's Office of the District Court of the Southern District of New York. Copyright, 1881, by BENJAMIN VAUGHAN ABBOTT, AUSTIN ABBOTT, LYMAN ABBOTT, and EDWARD ABBOTT. [Illustration: ENVIRONS OF ROME.] PREFACE. In writing the series of historical narratives to which the present work pertains, it has been the object of the author to furnish to the reading community of this country an accurate and faithful account of the lives and actions of the several personages that are made successively the subjects of the volumes, following precisely the story which has come down to us from ancient times. The writer has spared no pains to gain access in all cases to the original sources of information, and has confined himself strictly to them. The reader may, therefore, feel assured in perusing any one of these works, that the interest of it is in no degree indebted to the invention of the author. No incident, however trivial, is ever added to the original account, nor are any words even, in any case, attributed to a speaker without express authority. Whatever of interest, therefore, these stories may possess, is due solely to the facts themselves which are recorded in them, and to their being brought together in a plain, simple, and connected narrative. CONTENTS. CHAPTER PAGE I. NERO'S MOTHER 13 II. THE ASSASSINATION OF CALIGULA 34 III. THE ACCESSION OF CLAUDIUS 55 IV. THE FATE OF MESSALINA 77 V. THE CHILDHOOD OF NERO 105 VI. NERO AN EMPEROR 124 VII. BRITANNICUS 148 VIII. THE FATE OF AGRIPPINA 172 IX. EXTREME DEPRAVITY 208 X. PISO'S CONSPIRACY 228 XI. THE FATE OF THE CONSPIRATORS 250 XII. THE EXPEDITION INTO GREECE 272 XIII. NERO'S END 299 ENGRAVINGS. PAGE MAP--ENVIRONS OF ROME _Frontispiece._ ENCAMPMENT OF A ROMAN LEGION 21 CÆSONIA 53 DISCOVERY OF CLAUDIUS 64 MESSALINA IN THE GARDEN 89