Table of Contents
Prologue
1. The First of the Caesars (27 B.C.E.)– 37 . C.E.)
Augustus (27 B.C.E.).-14 C.E.)Tiberius (14-37 C.E.). Germanicus. Agrippa and Agrippina. Prefect of the Praetorian Guard Sejanus.
2. ‘Little Boots’ – Caligula. (37-41 C.E.)
His horse Incitatus. Incestuous passions. Agrippina the Younger. Roman banquets.
3. The Ignominious Emperor Claudius (41-54 C.E.)
Antonia Minor. ‘A monstrous specimen’. Claudius’s wives. The scheming Valeria Messalina. Juvenal. Pliny the Elder. The Gardens of Lucullus. Claudia Octavia.
4. Nero: ‘What an artist!’ (54-68 C.E.)
Artistic fop. The story that Nero‘Fiddled while Rome burned’. The castration of Sporus. The Showman. Locusta. Poppaea Sabina. Britannicus. Statilia Messalina. Christianity.
5. In the Steps of the Caesars (81-96 C.E.)
Galba, Vitellius, Otho, Titus, Domitian. Pompeii and pleasure seekers. Vestal virgins.The Black Banquet.
6. Good Men...Mostly (117-138 C.E.)
Five ‘Good Emperors’. Trajan and the Empire at its largest. Hadrian and Antinous. Hadrian’s Wall. Titus. Jewish uprising. ‘Greek love’. Marcus Aurelius.
7. Commodus: An Emperor Unhinged (180-192 C.E.)
Gladiators. A bungled plot against Commodus. Perennis. Cleander. Corruption. His sister Lucilla’s plotting his death.
8. 193 C.E. - Rome’s Year of Shame
Septimius Severus. Pertinax. Didius Julianus buying the office of Emperor. Clodius Albinus’s plot to topple Didius Julianus. Virgin soldiers. Pescennius Niger.
9. The Feuding Emperors - Caracalla (211-21 C.E.) and Geta (211 C.E.) Julia Domma. Gaius Fulvius Plautianus. Rape of Alexandria. Prostitution.
10. A Teenage Reprobate - Elagabalus (218-222 C.E.)
Macrinus. Julia Soaemias. Elagabalus and the sun cult. Luxury and aesthetes. Anna Faustina. Alexander Severus.
Epilogue
Philip The Arab. Diocletian. Constantine. Justinian. Visigoths and the Sack of Rome.
Index