« Dio 58.14 | Dio 58.15 | Dio 58.16 | About This Work »
15Of those against whom charges were brought, many were present to hear their accusation and make their defence, and some expressed their minds very freely in so doing; but the majority made away with themselves before their conviction. 2They did this chiefly to avoid suffering insult and outrage. For all who incurred any such charge, senators as well as knights, and women as well as men, were crowded together in the prison, 3and upon being condemned either paid the penalty there or were hurled down from the Capitol by the tribunes or even by the consuls, after which the bodies of all of them were cast into the Forum and later thrown into the river. But their object was partly that their children might inherit their property, 4since very few estates of such as voluntarily died before their trial were confiscated, Tiberius in this way inviting men to become their own murderers, so that he might avoid the reputation of having killed them—just as if it were not far more dreadful to compel a man to die by his own hand than to deliver him to the executioner.
« Dio 58.14 | Dio 58.15 | Dio 58.16 | About This Work »