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AVENGERS IN DYNASTIC CONFLICTS
Although Tacitus clearly stresses hunger for power as Anicetus’ personal
motive, the uprising can hardly have been inspired by him alone. As with
Aedemon, it is likely that at least as important a role was played by the
readiness to revolt of a proportion of the local population that was hostile to
Rome. The other cause implied by Tacitus, the greed of the destitute, later
identified as fugitive slaves, extends our picture of events so that it fits a set
of motives characteristic of the usual pattern of such cases, but by doing so
makes us suspect this of having been doctored to fit a cliché. 101
6 Three false Neros
We stay in the period following Nero’s death, but leave the courts of Roman
client princes to return to that of the emperor to deal with three attempts to
resurrect the dead ruler. Before going into detail, the very knowledge that
efforts were made to bring back to life the wretched Nero allows two solid
inferences. First, that anyone who attempted this could expect no sympathy
from Roman historians along the lines of that extended, to some extent,
to the avenger of Agrippa Postumus. We can expect negative reporting
concerning ‘bandits’. Second, we may also expect the influence of a desire for
vengeance. This is not to say that the false Neros saw themselves as avenging
the real Nero for purely personal reasons. Rather, the desire for vengeance
could be moved along a stage, and used as a means of obtaining the backing
of supporters of the unlucky emperor. The existence of such supporters in
significant numbers over a long period after Nero’s fall is demonstrated by
the repeated attempts to revive him and is confirmed by remarks by Tacitus,
who stresses Nero’s popularity among the urban poor of Rome and has
Galba say to Piso that although there would always be people of the worst
sort (pessimus quisque) who wanted Nero back, their task was to prevent them
from being joined by the respectable classes (boni). 102
This brings us to the first of these three cases, which occurred in 69.
The false Drusus had already caused upset in the eastern provinces and after
the death of Nero Greece and Asia Minor fell victim again to an imposter –
unless, that is, Tacitus developed the parallel only to confirm his picture
of the gullible Greeks. 103 At any rate, he tells of a slave or freedman from
Pontus or Italy who was induced by his similarity in appearance to Nero104 to appear as the emperor. 105 He is the first of the three attested false Neros,
but in his narrative on him Tacitus suggests that he knew of several such
cases which he would deal with in their respective contexts. 106 If there was
nothing more in the lost parts of the ‘Histories’ then this announcement has
no force, but it could be that there were more false Neros than the three we
know of. 107
The first false Nero was helped in his activities by the current rumour
that Nero was not dead. Belief in the imposter was strengthened further
151