Tiberius on Flattery

"He so loathed flattery that he would not allow any senator to approach his litter, either to pay his respects or on business, and when an ex-consul in apologising to him attempted to embrace his knees, he drew back in such haste that he fell over backward. In fact, if anyone in conversation or in a set speech spoke of him in too flattering terms, he did not hesitate to interrupt him, to take him to task, and to correct his language on the spot. Being once called "Lord," he warned the speaker not to address him again in an insulting fashion. When another spoke of his "sacred duties," and still another said that he appeared before the senate "by the emperor's authority," he forced them to change their language, substituting "advice" for "authority" and "laborious" for "sacred."

[Suetonius, Life of Tiberius, 27]

Highland Campaigning

Like great Roman generals before him,* the Emperor recently undertook a campaign into the remote Northern Highlands.

It has to be said that the Emperor's recent expedition was of a more recreational than military bent, but the terrain was certainly challenging and the Imperial forces camped under canvas like the armies of old.

Well, perhaps with a modicum of modern comfort, but it was camping none the less.

The troops were well provisioned; lacked for nothing in fact and the camp was in high spirits.

  

The beautiful beaches and strange characters found on them, were a wonder to the Emperor who had led his armies to the farthest and uncharted shores of the North.

A long and arduous progression through the most mountainous of terrain, saw the Emperor safely marshal his forces back to civilisation.

  

-------------------------------------

*One is reminded of of the Roman general Agricola , who in c.82AD made a concerted attempt to subdue the Northern lands of the Caledonian Tribes. Its fair to say the locals were not cooperative:

"We, the choicest flower of Britain's manhood, were hidden away in her most secret places. Out of sight of subject shores, we kept even our eyes free from the defilement of tyranny. We, the most distant dwellers upon earth, the last of the free, have been shielded till today by our very remoteness and by the obscurity in which it has shrouded our name. Now, the farthest bounds of Britain lie open to our enemies; and what men know nothing about they always assume to be a valuable prize. But there are no more nations beyond us; nothing is there but waves and rocks ... "

 

[Tacitus, Agricola, 30. Dramatic words of the Caledonian War Chief Calgacus, as imagined by the Historian Tacitus]