Numbers

The Year of the Four Emperors

• Galba
• Otho
• Vitellius
• Vespasian

How It's Used

"Of heinous political murders in the year of the four emperors, the Roman historian Tacitus wrote: 'The worst crimes were dared by a few, willed by more and tolerated by all.' That judgment is condemnation enough, as most Germans know. In suggesting that the holocaust was dared by some and willed by all, Mr Goldhagen does violence to common-sense ideas of responsibility. His chief explanatory tool—a peculiarly German type of anti-Semitism—makes for lop-sided history in which the first world war and the class fractures of German society are neglected in favour of a mysterious German-ness. His view ignores the gradations of support, compliance, ambivalence, antipathy and opposition which existed in German society during the Third Reich. The diaries of a German Jew, Viktor Klemperer, offers startling insight into how complex these were."

"The Roman general Vespasian defeated the Jewish government forces in AD 67, but because of the problems of imperial succession at Rome (the 'year of the four emperors' which followed the death of Nero in AD 69) Rome did not lay siege to Jerusalem until April AD 70. Mayhem and massacre then ensued. In August the Romans finally broke into the Temple Mount area. Much of Jerusalem was reduced to rubble, and the Temple destroyed. Remaining insurgents were ruthlessly hunted down (some as far away as Libya and Egypt)."

"Bankers must have their silly codenames, and there's admittedly not a lot of fun to be had out of 23-hour working days poring over due diligence documents and living on take-away pizzas. So someone named the vehicle buying Caffe Nero...

"'Rome'. A bit unexciting. Why not 'Galba', the governor of Spain whose revolt brought down Nero? Or 'Vespasian', who emerged triumphant from the chaos of AD69, the Year of the Four Emperors?"

"Before Vespasian could march on Jerusalem, imperial politics intervened. Nero was assassinated in Rome, and the famous 'year of the four emperors' followed, as various military commanders vied to become ruler. In July AD 69, Vespasian was proclaimed emperor by his troops. Forces loyal to his cause captured Rome, amid tumult and bloodshed, and Vespasian hurried home to claim his throne."

"Classical scholars will be familiar with Cicero’s last word: 'Strike'. This was not an exhortation to workers to down tools. On the contrary. It was an order to his executioner, before whom he was kneeling.

"Similarly, Galba eventually had to bow to his critics. In AD69, only seven months after taking power, he officially tendered his neck, which was accepted.

"It may be some consolation to Brian Cowen that Galba’s immediate successors suffered the same fate during the 'year of the four emperors'. And as he reflects on his own annus horribilis, Mr Cowen might consider the preamble to Tacitus’s account of contemporary events: 'The history on which I am embarking is rich in disasters, terrible with battles, discordant with seditions and savage even in the intervals of peace: four Roman emperors cut off by sword, three civil wars, [...] disasters in the west; Illyricum convulsed, the Gallic provinces wavering, Italy afflicted with calamities unheard of before or else recurring after the lapse of ages; Rome laid waste by fire, her most ancient temples destroyed, the Capitol itself wrapped in flames by the hands of her citizens; the rights of religion violated; enormous adulteries; the sea crowded with exiles, its cliffs stained red with citizens’ blood. [...] Never indeed has it been proved with more terrible calamities [...] that the gods are concerned not with the protection of the innocent but only with the punishment of our guilt.'"

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