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Notes Do not display Latin text | Translated by Alfred John Church and William Jackson Brodribb Book XIII Chapter 45: Nero and Poppaea[AD 58] | Next chapter Return to index Previous chapter |
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A profligacy equally notorious in that same year proved the beginning of great evils to the State. There was at Rome one Sabina Poppaea; her father was Titus Ollius, but she had assumed the name of her maternal grandfather Poppaeus Sabinus, a man of illustrious memory and pre-eminently distinguished by the honours of a consulship and a triumph. As for Ollius, before he attained promotion, the friendship of Sejanus was his ruin. This Poppaea had everything but a right mind. Her mother, who surpassed in personal attractions all the ladies of her day, had bequeathed to her alike fame and beauty. Her fortune adequately corresponded to the nobility of her descent. Her conversation was charming and her wit anything but dull. She professed virtue, while she practised laxity. Seldom did she appear in public, and it was always with her face partly veiled, either to disappoint men's gaze or to set off her beauty. Her character she never spared, making no distinction between a husband and a paramour, while she was never a slave to her own passion or to that of her lover. Wherever there was a prospect of advantage, there she transferred her favours. And so while she was living as the wife of Rufius Crispinus, a Roman knight, by whom she had a son, she was attracted by the youth and fashionable elegance of Otho, and by the fact too that he was reputed to have Nero's most ardent friendship. Without any delay the intrigue was followed by marriage. Event: Nero and Poppaea | Non minus insignis eo anno impudicitia magnorum rei publicae malorum initium fecit. erat in civitate Sabina Poppaea, T. Ollio patre genita, sed nomen avi materni sumpserat, inlustri memoria Poppaei Sabini consularis et triumphali decore praefulgentis; nam Ollium honoribus nondum functum amicitia Seiani pervertit. huic mulieri cuncta alia fuere praeter honestum animum. quippe mater eius, aetatis suae feminas pulchritudine supergressa, gloriam pariter et formam dederat; opes claritudine generis sufficiebant. sermo comis nec absurdum ingenium. modestiam praeferre et lascivia uti; rarus in publicum egressus, idque velata parte oris, ne satiaret adspectum, vel quia sic decebat. famae numquam pepercit, maritos et adulteros non distinguens; neque adfectui suo aut alieno obnoxia, unde utilitas ostenderetur, illuc libidinem transferebat. igitur agentem eam in matrimonio Rufri Crispi[ni] equitis Romani, ex quo filium genuerat, Otho pellexit iuventa ac luxu et quia flagrantissimus in amicitia Neronis |