ABSTRACT
WORD OF TIBERIUS’ death would have travelled the 120 or so miles to Rome very quickly. It met with a varied response in the city. Herod Agrippa’s freedman, Marsyas, might announce the news to his master with a melodramatic flourish: ‘the lion is dead’, but Agrippa’s jailer simply refused to believe the story, and his reaction was not, in fact, untypical. Romans generally were unwilling to trust what they heard, fearing a trick to test their loyalty, and conflicting rumours were spread that Tiberius was alive and would be coming soon in person. As the truth gradually took hold anxiety yielded to jubilation. The people gave vent to their old resentments, praying that Tiberius’ spirit would be damned for eternity. His physical remains were also the subject of lively discussion. Some thought they should be thrown down the Gemonian stairs (the fate of common criminals), or hurled into the river — ‘Tiberius in Tiberim!’ was the popular slogan — or even taken to the amphitheatre at Atella (near Misenum) and given a semi-cremation.1
