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Updated: September 8, 2025
Junius Silanus further stated that several persons had heard Cethegus say that three consuls and four praetors were to be slain; Piso, also, a person of consular dignity, testified other matters of like nature; and Caius Sulpicius, one of the praetors, being sent to Cethegus's house, found there a quantity of darts and of armor, and a still greater number of swords and daggers, all recently whetted.
As you sit now, Lean almost believe you Queen of the East! Juno's air was not more imperial, nor the beauty of Venus more enslaving. Piso will not dissent from what I began with, or now end with. 'I think you have delivered a true doctrine, I replied; 'but which few who have once tasted of power will admit. Liberty would be in great danger were Livia queen.
XLIV. As the law did not allow a general to enter the city before his triumph, Pompeius sent to the Senate to request they would put off the consular elections and to grant him this favour, that he might in his own person assist Piso in his canvass. As Cato opposed his request, he did not attain his object.
It was not long before every one at Rome had heard it said that Germanicus had been poisoned by Piso, acting, so it was intimated in whispers, at the bidding of Tiberius and Livia. Piso had been the tool of Tiberius; Plancina, the tool of Livia. The accusation is absurd; it is even recognized as such by Tacitus, who was actuated by a fierce hatred against Tiberius.
'Here now has been a wretch of an Arab, a fellow of no appearance, a mere camel-driver, desiring to see you. I told him flatly that you were not to be seen by scum such as he. I advised him to be gone, before he might have to complain of a broken head. And what do you suppose was the burden of his errand? Why truly to ask of the most noble Piso concerning his wife and child!
The obstinacy of Piso was at last vanquished; and he desired "that upon delivering his arms he might remain in the castle till the Emperor's pleasure, to whom he would commit the government of Syria, were known;" conditions which were not accepted; nor was aught granted him save ships and a passport to Rome.
His hope lay in Tiberius, who knew the truth and who certainly desired that these wild notions be driven out of the popular mind. But Tiberius was watched with the most painstaking malevolence. Any least action in favor of Piso would have been interpreted as a decisive proof that he had been the murderer's accomplice and therefore wished to save him.
Overcome however by the unanimous feeling of the senators, he desisted: the law is carried without opposition. Then for the first time the tribunes were elected in the comitia by tribes. Piso said that three were added to the number, whereas there had been only two before. He names the tribunes also, Caius Sicinius, Lucius Numitorius, Marcus Duilius, Spurius Icilius, Lucius Mecilius.
In 180 B.C. the consul Piso was believed to have been murdered by his wife, and whether the story be true or not, the suspicion is at least significant. In 154 two noble ladies, wives of consulares, were accused of poisoning their husbands and put to death by a council of their own relations.
Natalis was the first to mentioned the name of Piso, and he added the hated name of Seneca, either because he had been the confidential messenger between the two, or because he knew that he could not do a greater favour to Nero than by giving him the opportunity of injuring a man whom he had long sought every possible opportunity to crush.
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