Nero and the Burning of Rome

Chariot-racer, poet, performer and reveller Nero dominated Rome during his erratic and divisive reign. He was the murderer of, among many others, his own mother, brother and wife, but the plot to kill him, supported by Roman officers and philosophers alike, foundered in yet more bloodshed, including the death of Seneca. Tacitus' lively account of the politics and figures of the time, and of the fire that consumed much of Rome in AD 64, is taken from The Annals of Imperial Rome , translated by Michael Grant.