A Dictionary of Greek and Roman biography and mythology. By various writers. Ed. by William Smith. Illustrated by numerous engravings on wood.

776 CLAUDIUS.
Augustus and his uncle Tiberius always treated
him with contempt; Caligula, his nephew, raised
him to the consulship indeed, but did not allow
him to take any part in public affairs, and behaved
"towards him in the same way as his predecessors
had done.
In this manner the ill-fated man had reached
the age of fifty, when after the murder of Caligula
he was suddenly and unexpectedly raised to the
imperial throne. When he received the news of
Caligula's murder, he was alarmed about his own
safety, and concealed himself in a corner of the
palace; but he was discovered by a common soldier, and when Claudius fell prostrate before him,
the soldier saluted him emperor. Other soldiers
soon assembled, and Claudius in a state of agony,
as if he were led to execution, was carried in a
lectica into the praetorian camp. There the soldiers
proclaimed him emperor, and took their oath of
allegiance to him, on condition of his giving each
soldier, or at least each of the praetorian guards, a
donative of fifteen sestertia-the first instance of a
Roman emperor being obliged to make such a
promise on his accession. It is not quite certain
what may have induced the soldiers to proclaim a
man who had till then lived in obscurity, and had
taken no part in the administration of the empire.
It is said that they chose him merely on account of
his connexion with the imperial family, but it is
highly probable that there were also other causes
at work.
During the first two days after the murder of
Caligula, the senators and the city cohorts, which
formed a kind of opposition to the praetorian guards,
indulged in the vain hope of restoring the republic,
but being unable to make head against the praetorians, and not being well agreed among themselves,
the senators were at last obliged to give way, and
on the third day they recognized Claudius as emperor. The first act of his government was to
proclaim an amnesty respecting the attempt to restore the republic, and a few only of the murderers
of Caligula were put to death, partly for the purpose of establishing an example, and partly because
it was known that some of the conspirators had
intended to murder Claudius likewise. The acts
which followed these shew the same kind and
amiable disposition, and must convince every one,
that, if he had been left alone, or had been assisted
by a sincere friend and adviser, his government
would have afforded little or no ground for complaint. Had he been allowed to remain in a private station, he would certainly have been a kind,
good, and honest man. But he was throughout his
life placed in the most unfortunate circumstances.
The perpetual fear in which he had passed his
earlier days, was now increased and abused by
those by whom he was surrounded after his accession. And this fear now became the cause of a
series of cruel actions and of bloodshed, for which
he is stamped in history with the name of a tyrant,
which he does not deserve.
The first wife of Claudius was Plautia Urgulanilla, by whom he had a son, Drusus, and a
daughter, Claudia. But as he had reason for believing that his own life was threatened by her, he
divorced her, and married Aelia Petina, whom he
likewise divorced on account of some misunderstanding. At the time of his accession he was
married to his third wife, the notorious Valeria
Messalina, who, together with the freedmen Nar

CLAUDIUS,
cissus, Pallas, and others, led him into a number
of cruel acts. After the fall of Messalina by her
own conduct and the intrigues of Narcissus, Claudius was, if possible, still more unfortunate in
choosing for his wife his niece Agrippina, A. D. 49.
She prevailed upon him to set aside his own son,
Britannicus, and to adopt her son, Nero, in order
that the succession might be secured to the latter.
Claudius soon after regretted this step, and the
consequence was, that he was poisoned by Agrippina in A. D. 54.
The conduct of Claudius during his government,
in so far as it was not under the influence of his
wives and freedmen, was mild and popular, and he
made several useful and beneficial legislative enactments. He was particularly fond of building,
and several architectural plans which had been
formed, but thought impracticable by his predecessors, were carried out by him. He built, for example, the famous Claudian aquaeduct (Aqua
Claudia), the port of Ostia, and the emissary by
which the water of lake Fucinus was carried into
the river Liris. During his reign several wars
were carried on in Britain, Germany, Syria, and
Mauretania; but they were conducted by his
generals. The southern part of Britain was constituted a Roman province in the reign of Claudius,
who himself went to Britain in A. D. 43, to take
part in the war; but not being of a warlike dispo-.
sition, he quitted the island after a stay of a few
days, and returned to Rome, where he celebrated
a splendid triumph. Mauretania was made a
Roman province in A. D. 42 by the legate Cn.
Hosidius.
As an author Claudius occupied himself chiefly
with history, and was encouraged in this pursuit
by Livy, the historian. With the assistance of
Sulpicius Flavius, he began at an early age to write
a history from the death of the dictator Caesar;
but being too straightforward and honest in his
accounts, he was severely censured by his mother
and grandmother. He accordingly gave up his
plan, and began his history with the restoration of
peace after the battle of Actium. Of the earlier
period he had written only four, but of the latter
forty-one books. A third work were memoirs of
his own life, in eight books, which Suetonius describes as magis inepte quam ineleganter composita.
A fourth was a learned defence of Cicero against
the attacks of Asinius Pollio. He seems to have
been as well skilled in the use of the Greek as of
the Latin language, for he wrote two historical
works in Greek, the one a history of Carthage, in
eight books, and the other a history of Etruria, in
twenty books. However small the literary merit
of these productions may have been, still the loss
r of the history of Etruria in particular is greatly to
- be lamented, as we know that he made use of the
I genuine sources of the Etruscans themselves. In
SA. D. 48, the Aedui petitioned that their senators, should obtain the jles petendorum /ionorum at Rome.
Claudius supported their petition in a speech which
- he delivered in the senate. The grateful inhabiStants of Lyons had this speech of the emperor
- engraved on brazen tables, and exhibited them in
Spublic. Two of these tables were discovered at
Lyons in 1529, and are still preserved there. The
- inscriptions are printed in Gruter's Corp. Inscript.
s p. DII. (Sueton. Claudius; Dion Cassius, lib. lx.;
I Tacit. Annal. libb. xi. and xii.; Zonaras, xi. 8,
- &c.; Joseph. Ant. Jtud. xix. 2, &c., xx. 1; Oros,