ABSTRACT
One of the many difficulties presented by this uprising is its precise cause. As the soldiers had received a substantial increase in pay only five years before and, more recently, had had their privileges and immunities as veterans confirmed,6 they should have had little cause for dissatisfaction. Seven years later, the soldiers alone regretted Domitian’s assassination: they wanted to deify him, and, so we are told, they would have avenged him, had they not lacked leaders (Dom. 23.1). It may have been the same in 89. The men, but not all their officers, were enthusiastic supporters of the emperor. Pressure for revolt may have come from above rather than from below.
