Today in history

 

January 15th 69AD.

The most dramatic, most surprising day in Roman history.

At the start of the day Otho decides to declare himself emperor. As Suetonius puts it “It signified nothing whether he fell by the hands of his enemies in the field or his creditors in the Forum.”

He is welcomed by a mere 23 soldiers. Yet by dusk he is emperor.

Quite a turn around.

And certainly one of the bloodiest days on record.

As Tacitus so dryly puts it: “Once killing starts its difficult to draw a line.”

To mark this day here is an extract from Galba’s Men which culminates with that day.

“How much?” insisted Epaphroditus.

“Ahem, two hundred million.”

“Sesterces?” pressed Epaphroditus, though what else could it be.

“The men, ahem, who were so kind with their purses have rather a long reach. There is not a sunny place on earth where they or their associates could not get me. Of course if I had access to the imperial treasury… Problem solved!”

His companion groaned, put his head in his hands.

“How you remind me of my father, he often took such a stance.”

“One question, Marcus. Sabinus took months of dedicated planning to bring down Nero. How long have you etched in your diary for such a scheme?”

Otho scratched his chin, furrowed his brows, and said, “I was rather hoping we could finish it off by sunset. Don’t look so worried, there is no danger of failure.”

“No danger? You want to overthrow an emperor in a day? An emperor with an army, with a personal bodyguard, with the blessings of the law, and you say there is no danger! You’ve flipped Marcus, really you have.”

“Of failing, I said. No danger of that at all. The other type of danger perhaps there will be a smidgeon, might upset things a bit I suppose.”

“I shall forgive you this because you were in Lusitania but when Nero fell it was chaos. The streets were awash with blood and that was with Sabinus’ meticulous planning. With you in charge we’ll be crawling over corpses till summer. What makes you think you will succeed?”