Tacitus, Annals, 15.20­-23, 33­-45. Latin Text, Study Aids with Vocabulary, and Commentary, 2013a

could have vetoed the capital punishment handed out by a senatorial jury (as
he wished to do – but was pre-empted by Thrasea – in the case of Antistius:
see Annals 14.49, cited in the Introduction, Section 6). That Tacitus presents
Nero as referring to himself in the third person generates more of that ironic
tone with which Tacitus has imbued this little story. ‘Nero said that he would
have been saved, if only he’d waited for a fair, merciful judge... like Nero!’ At
the same time, as John Henderson points out to us, Nero might well have
acted on the principle nomen est omen (‘the name is a portent’) in driving
Iunius Silanus Torquatus into suicide: ‘Besides the hallowed/dangerous name
of Iunius, our Silanus sports the legendary badge of honour “Torquatus”
originally acquired by T. Manlius in solo victory over a champion Gaul
(followed by decapitation and removal of his golden “torque”, or “necklace”
> hence “Torquatus”); besides the degradation of this pre-sentencing suicide,
there is the force of the legend’s sequel to reckon with, as marked by the
Roman proverb “imperia Manliana”, where Torquatus now in command
did not celebrate his son’s copycat solo combat victory but instead had him
executed for leaving the ranks without first asking permission (see Livy
8.7.8–22 for the gruesome details). Like everyone else, Nero knew perfectly
well that “clemency” was not supposed to run in, or apply to, this family!’
(
Chapter 36
nec = et non, with the non
negating the ablative of the measure of difference multo: ‘not by much.’
multo modifies the adverb post (‘later’, ‘afterwards’). omissa ... Achaia is an
ablative absolute, and in praesens another adverbial phrase of time (‘for the
moment’). The sentence harks back to 34.1 where Tacitus mentioned that
Nero came to Beneventum on his way to Greece, at which point the narrative