Nero, Roman Emperor

Arsenic has long been recognized as a poison, and was reputed to have been used by Agrippina to assassinate the Roman emperor Claudius and by the Roman emperor Nero to kiU Claudius son Britannicus. In the latter case, after the first attempt had failed and had instead aroused suspicion, the arsenic was put into the water used to cool his soup rather than into the soup itself which was tested by a taster. In the seventeenth century a woman by the name of Tofana produced arsenical powders which became known as les poudres de succession , as they were used to remove obstacles like rivals, husbands, and so on. The powders contained arsenic sulphide, aconite, box, caustic lime, powdered glass, and honey. She is reputed to have committed some 600 murders. Her most well-known poison was Aqua Tofana, probably a solution containing arsenic and lead. 

For centuries it was supposed not only that there could be, but that there actually was, a single antidote to all poisons. This was Theriaca Andromachi, a formulation of 72 (a magical number) ingredients amongst which particular importance was attached to the flesh of a snake (viper). The antidote was devised by Andromachus whose son was physician to the Roman Emperor, Nero (AD 37-68). 

The Roman Emperor Nero (AD 37-68) murdered his severely constipated aunt by ordering the doctors to give her a laxative of fatal strength. He seized her property before she was quite dead and tore up the will so that nothing could escape him. (Suetonius (trans) R Graves). 

In sixty-seven a.d. the roman emperor Nero entered the chariot race at the Olympic games, and although he failed to finish the race, the judges unanimously declared him the Winner. 

Roman emperor Nero, who was nearsighted, watched gladiator games at the Roman Colosseum through a large handheld emerald lens centuries before the invention of spectacles. 

Although this and other research suggests the Romans were exposed to a considerable amount of lead—and they absorbed quite a bit of it—no one yet knows if they were adversely affected. Lead poisoning could explain why Roman children suffered from high mortality as De Muynck and his colleagues noted in their paper, Approximately 26% of Roman children died before the age of fourteen, while approximately 14% even died in the first year of life. The disorder may also account for the apparent madness of emperors such as Caligula and Nero. However, these and other problems could easily be due to other causes. 

The Romans were the first to discover the vicissitudes of a culture a that derives its power from finance. Gold, like any other commodity, I does not have an absolute value it depends on how much of it there is around. The gold denomination of the Roman Empire was the aureus, which was worth twenty-five silver denarii. But the later emperors were prone to grotesque displays of wealth - Nero constracted a Golden House with jewel-encrusted walls. These excesses removed so much gold and silver from circulation that the coin minters were forced to add other metals to the aureus and the denarius. By the third century ad the denarius was 98 per cent copper. Naturally, a trader will not give as much for a coin that is mostly copper as for one that is pure silver, even if they are called the same thing and bear the same stamp. 

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