CORE Metadata, citation and similar papers at core.ac.uk Provided by University of Oregon Scholars' Bank THE CHARACTERIZATION OF CIVIL WAR: LITERARY, NUMISMATIC, AND EPIGRAPHICAL PRESENTATIONS OF THE ‘YEAR OF THE FOUR EMPERORS’ by JON MARK HOLTGREFE A THESIS Presented to the Department of History and the Graduate School of the University of Oregon in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the degree of Master of Arts June 2011 THESIS APPROVAL PAGE Student: Jon Mark Holtgrefe Title: The Characterization of Civil War: Literary, Numismatic, and Epigraphical Presentations of the ‘Year of the Four Emperors’ This thesis has been accepted and approved in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the Master of Arts degree in the Department of History by: Dr. John Nicols Chair Dr. Sean Anthony Member Dr. Mary Jaeger Member and Richard Linton Vice President for Research and Graduate Studies/Dead of the Graduate School Original approval signatures are on file with the University of Oregon Graduate School. Degree Awarded June 2011 ii © 2011 Jon Mark Holtgrefe iii THESIS ABSTRACT Jon Mark Holtgrefe Master of Arts Department of History June 2011 Title: The Characterization of Civil War: Literary, Numismatic, and Epigraphical Presentations of the ‘Year of the Four Emperors’ Approved:_______________________________________________________ Dr. John Nicols This thesis analyzes various literary, numismatic, and epigraphical narratives of the Roman civil war of 69CE, and the representations of the four emperors who fought in it. In particular the focus is on how the narratives and representations relate to one another. Such an investigation provides us with useful insight into the people and events of 69 and how contemporaries viewed the actors and the events. These various presentations, most notably the works of five ancient historians and biographers, give 69 the distinction of being one of the best documented years in all antiquity. Historical scholarship has typically sought to determine which of these authors was the most accurate on the points which they disagreed. These points of difference, largely subjective opinion and therefore equally valid, illuminate instead the diverse ways in which an event can be interpreted. This thesis will focus on why there is such diversity and its usefulness to the historian. iv CURRICULUM VITAE NAME OF AUTHOR: Jon Mark Holtgrefe GRADUATE AND UNDERGRADUATE SCHOOLS ATTENDED: University of Oregon, Eugene, Oregon Miami University, Oxford, Ohio DEGREES AWARDED: Master of Arts, History, 2011, University of Oregon Bachelor of Arts, History, 2009, Miami University AREAS OF SPECIAL INTEREST: Later Republic and Early Imperial Roman History Roman Historiography PROFESSIONAL EXPERIENCE: Graduate Teaching Fellow, University of Oregon, 2009-present GRANTS, AWARDS, AND HONORS: Graduate Teaching Fellow, University of Oregon, 2009-present v ACKNOWLEDGMENTS I would like to thank all of my committee members for their invaluable help and support in the preparation of this thesis. I would like to thank Dr. Nicols for all of the insight and guidance he has provided me since I first began to develop this project. He has taught me much in the last two years and pushed me to grow as a scholar. I would like to thank him in particular for his help in developing my chapter on Coins and Inscriptions as that type of source is something that I had never dealt with before and his helped allowed me to realize the importance of such material and thus incorporate it into my thesis. I would like that thank Dr. Jaeger for her insights into the Latin material for this thesis and her invaluable assistance in editing my thesis, making in clearer and more concise. I would like that thank Dr. Anthony for his guidance in articulating some of the broader historical concepts within this thesis and for his advice in dealing with some of the larger conceptual issues. I would like to thank all of my colleagues in the Graduate program for their help over the last two years improving my work and also retaining my sanity from the rigours of graduate school. I would like to thank all of the other professors I have worked with as well for all their support and for all that they have done to help make me a better scholar. I would like to thank my parents, and the rest of my family, for their encouragement and support as I have gone through Graduate School and last, but not least, I would like to thank my girlfriend Laney for her love and support throughout the writing process. vi To all who have guided me, encouraged me, and supported me over the last two years vii TABLE OF CONTENTS Chapter Page I. INTRODUCTION ................................................................................................ 1 II. COINS AND INSCRIPTIONS ........................................................................... 7 III. TACITUS .......................................................................................................... 27 IV. JOSEPHUS .......................................................................................................50 V. PLUTARCH .......................................................................................................63 VI. SUETONIUS .....................................................................................................84 VII. CONCLUSION .............................................................................................. 103 REFERENCES CITED ......................................................................................... 107 viii CHAPTER I INTRODUCTION What is the character of someone or something? Ask that question to anyone and you will get a variety of descriptive phrases about whatever you indicated. Some character traits are quantifiable: a person’s height, a flower’s color, the nature of the terrain, when an event took place, etc. But what of such intangibles as personality, motivation, or cause? These subjective modes of characterization vary considerably between different observers, depending on their point of view and their relationship with the person or event described, even for a common person or event. The year 69CE provides us with a wealth of striking events, dynamic people, and literate observers whose works have, fortunately, survived.1 This so called ‘long year’ saw both a brutal civil war in the Roman world and the recognition of four different men as Princeps, or emperor, events which gave rise to the other epithet for 69, ‘the year of the four emperors.’ 2 Yet it is for more than the events of the year, which included two large battles between Roman legions, the violent deaths of three emperors, two by the mob and one by his own hands, and the burning of the Temple of Jupiter Optimus Maximus, that 69 can be identified as ‘the long year.’ The year 69 also holds the distinction of being the one in all antiquity about which we have the most detailed information.3 This is largely due to the writings of five different extant writers who dealt 1 All dates are CE unless otherwise noted. 2 The appropriate title is ‘princeps’ and that of the system of government the ‘principate’, however the terms emperor and empire may safely be used as it conveys an accurate understanding of the position, especially as it had evolved by the year 69. 3 Peter Garnsey and Richard Saller, The early Principate: Augustus to Trajan . (Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1982), 15; P.A.L. Greenhalgh, The Year of the Four Emperors (New York: Barnes & Nobles Books, 1975), xi-xii. 1 with various aspects of the year: Josephus, Plutarch, Tacitus, Suetonius, and Cassius Dio. Between these works and a variety of coins and inscriptions we can decipher, often with no more than a few days uncertainty, the events of this civil war throughout the entire year on a level of detail that is impossible for any year before 69, or for many years after.4 This wealth of information includes details about a number of colorful characters. This is where the issue of characterization comes in. Each of the five authors presented his own version of the events of 69 and the characters involved, and while they agreed on general facts, their opinions differ. Scholars have spent much effort determining which of these authors was, both in general and in given situations, the ‘most accurate’ in his characterization. However, because characterization is at least partly subjective, the fact that one account seems less biased or more balanced does not necessarily make it either more or less accurate than another. All we can say for certain is what each author thought of the person or event in question. 5 In fact, these authors’ presentations of character and the choices they made in depicting character tell us as much about the author in question as about the event itself, thus giving insight into what certain groups of people thought and felt about this event at the time of writing. The purpose of this thesis, therefore, is to look at the way four of these five authors characterized the people and events of 69 both individually and in comparison with one another in order to determine both where the accounts differ and why they do. It will also study a sample of the coins and inscriptions dating either from 69 or concerning major participants in events in order to get a glimpse of how the people involved wanted 4 Charles L. Murison, Galba, Otho, and Vitellius: Careers and Controversies (New York: G. Olms Verlag, 1993), 93-94. 5 A.J. Woodman, Tacitus Reviewed (New York: Oxford University Press, 1998), 5-7. 2 to represent the