The Lake of the Condemned — Claudius: Found Behind a Curtain, Poisoned With Mushrooms?
Agrippina is not content with the title of Augusta. Tacitus records that she sends a colony of veterans to the chief town of the Ubii, where she was born, and names it after herself (12.27). Thus arises Colonia Agrippinensis, today’s Cologne on the Rhine. She also gets rid of the commanders of the Guard, suspecting that they stayed loyal to Messalina and her children. The new prefect is Burrus, who knows well to whom he owes his promotion (12.42).
She rides up to the Capitol in a carriage, something until then permitted only to priests and sacred statues. Tacitus remarks that she is the only woman known who was the sister of one ruler, the wife of another and the mother of a third (12.42).
A captive arrives in Rome whose name was known even in Italy. The British king Caratacus fought the Romans for nine years. The queen of the Brigantes handed him over in chains. Claudius stages a spectacle for the Romans: the Guard drawn up in formation before the camp, a procession of captives and spoils, and last of all the king (Tacitus 12.36).
All the captives cower in fear. Caratacus does not. He addresses the emperor. Had he shown moderation in success, he would have entered Rome as a friend, not a prisoner. If the Romans want to rule the world, must the world accept slavery? If they kill him, his fall and their triumph will be forgotten. If they spare his life, he will be a monument to their mercy (12.37).
Claudius spares his life, his wife’s, and his brothers’. The freed captives pay homage to Agrippina too, who sits nearby on a separate throne. Tacitus writes that this is a novelty, foreign to ancient custom: a woman before Roman standards. Agrippina boasts that she is a partner in the empire her ancestors won (12.37).
AD 52. Claudius opens a tunnel under a mountain that is meant to drain the water from Lake Fucinus and free the land for farming. The work lasted eleven years and employed thirty thousand men (Suetonius, Claudius 20). Before opening the outlet, the emperor stages a spectacle: a naval battle.
According to Tacitus, nineteen thousand condemned men take part in the battle on large ships. The shores are ringed with rafts bearing guardsmen and war engines, so that no one can escape. The surrounding hills are full of spectators, like a theater. The emperor sits in a military cloak, and beside him Agrippina in a cloak of cloth of gold (Annals 12.56). Before the condemned set to fighting, they call out to the emperor, as Suetonius records (Claudius 21): Ave imperator, morituri te salutant. Hail, emperor, those who are about to die salute you.
The condemned take this as a pardon and refuse to fight. Claudius hesitates over whether to destroy them with fire and sword. In the end he leaps up from his throne and runs along the shore with his unsteady gait. With threats and promises he forces them to fight (Suetonius, Claudius 21).
After the battle the outlet was opened. It came to light that the tunnel had not reached the bottom of the lake. It had to be deepened. At the banquet by the outlet the water burst out with such a roar that it terrified the guests. Agrippina used the emperor’s fear to accuse Narcissus, who had directed the works, of greed. Narcissus did not let this pass. He reproached her for her domineering character and unbridled ambition (Tacitus 12.57).
From this moment Narcissus and Agrippina are open enemies. Both sides know what they are playing for: who will stand at the emperor’s side when the emperor is gone. The year is AD 52. Claudius has two years left.