Julio-Claudian marriages
Feb. 5th, 2004 10:37 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
quislibetI shall go mad if I keep poring over family trees of Julio-Claudian emperors and intermarried noble families of the time. It's because in some cases I want to make an argument that Tacitus wants us to be aware that, for instance, this historical figure is closely related to another one, even if he doesn't explicitly mention it, because they share traits in common or end up in similar situations.
The problems are, of course, that (a) he, well, doesn't explicitly mention it; (b) as is often the case in aristocratic families of any period, the degrees of intermarriage are mind-boggling and who's related to whom can't be significant all the time; and (c) often details of those family trees are prosopographical fantasies -- logical, well-argued fantasies, but not explicitly attested.
Consider, if you will, various female relatives of the emperor Nero. Now, two of Nero's four great-grandmothers were sisters (the daughters of Mark Antony and Octavia, cleverly called, in Roman fashion, Antonia and Antonia), and his double great-great grandmother on his dad's side, the aforementioned Octavia, was the sister of Augustus, his mother's great-grandfather, so that several members of both of his parents' families were already cousins of some sort of one another. And then his mother Agrippina (the Younger, not to be confused with her mother of the same name[*]) married the emperor Claudius, who happened to be her dad's brother -- they had to pass a special law to allow that marriage -- which complicates the issue.
In the face of all of that, is it so important that, for instance, Nero's aunt Domitia Lepida, the sister of his birth-father, was the mother of Claudius's third wife (the infamous Messalina) and ex-sister-in-law (and first cousin, once-removed, because of their descent from the two Antonias) of his fourth (Agrippina, of course, herself infamous, incidentally)? When Agrippina and Domitia Lepida eventually feud, it's said to be about who has greater influence over Nero, and not (for instance) related to the fact that Lepida's daughter (I mean Messalina) had once tried to have baby Nero (her first cousin) killed,[**] or that, as mother of Messalina, Lepida was grandmother to Claudius's natural son Britannicus, whom Agrippina saw as an obstacle to her plans to put Nero on the throne. And yet this last, not explicitly mentioned by Tacitus may well have made Lepida more problematic for Agrippina than any "womanly rivalry" over who got to be Nero's sugar-mama.
Here is a simplified chart, with dozens of other family members left out:
I couldn't figure out how to draw lines to indicate that Agrippa, father of Agrippina the Elder, was also, by an earlier wife, the father of Tiberius' first wife Vipsania (in fact both are named Vipsania Agrippina but were known by different bits of it).[***] When Augustus forced Tiberius to divorce Vipsania to marry his (Augustus') daughter Julia, Agrippa having died, Tiberius was thus marrying his own adoptive sister and the former stepmother to his ex-wife. -- And it may not be exactly clear that Octavia is Britannicus' full sister, the daughter of Claudius and Messalina. She married her stepbrother/type-of-cousin-that's-your-dad's-niece's-son Nero. It was not a happy marriage.
Finally, we note that Caligula seems not to have actually married any close relatives among his four wives, but he did have sex with one or more sisters.
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[*] I pass over here, concerning Agrippina's parents Agrippina and Germanicus, that her -- I mean the elder Agrippina's -- grandfather was Augustus, and that his -- I mean Germanicus' -- grandmother was Livia, and Augustus and Livia were married (so that, for the younger Agrippina and her siblings [like Caligula], Augustus and Livia were doubly great-grandparental), and that Germanicus' adopted father, the emperor Tiberius, was also his uncle (and that, since Tiberius was the adopted son of Augustus, Germanicus' wife's grandfather was legally his own grandfather), and that Tiberius' natural son Drusus married Germanicus' sister Livia (often called Livilla to avoid confusion with her grandmother), and that Drusus' daughter Julia married Germanicus' son Nero (not to be confused with that Nero's nephew Nero, the emperor). It would just be too confusing to go into all that.
[**] The assassins were scared off by magical snakes standing guard in Nero's crib. Tacitus points out that Nero himself used to say there had been only one snake.
[***]This also means, of course, that Agrippina the Elder was the half-aunt of her husband's first cousin/adoptive brother Drusus.
The problems are, of course, that (a) he, well, doesn't explicitly mention it; (b) as is often the case in aristocratic families of any period, the degrees of intermarriage are mind-boggling and who's related to whom can't be significant all the time; and (c) often details of those family trees are prosopographical fantasies -- logical, well-argued fantasies, but not explicitly attested.
Consider, if you will, various female relatives of the emperor Nero. Now, two of Nero's four great-grandmothers were sisters (the daughters of Mark Antony and Octavia, cleverly called, in Roman fashion, Antonia and Antonia), and his double great-great grandmother on his dad's side, the aforementioned Octavia, was the sister of Augustus, his mother's great-grandfather, so that several members of both of his parents' families were already cousins of some sort of one another. And then his mother Agrippina (the Younger, not to be confused with her mother of the same name[*]) married the emperor Claudius, who happened to be her dad's brother -- they had to pass a special law to allow that marriage -- which complicates the issue.
In the face of all of that, is it so important that, for instance, Nero's aunt Domitia Lepida, the sister of his birth-father, was the mother of Claudius's third wife (the infamous Messalina) and ex-sister-in-law (and first cousin, once-removed, because of their descent from the two Antonias) of his fourth (Agrippina, of course, herself infamous, incidentally)? When Agrippina and Domitia Lepida eventually feud, it's said to be about who has greater influence over Nero, and not (for instance) related to the fact that Lepida's daughter (I mean Messalina) had once tried to have baby Nero (her first cousin) killed,[**] or that, as mother of Messalina, Lepida was grandmother to Claudius's natural son Britannicus, whom Agrippina saw as an obstacle to her plans to put Nero on the throne. And yet this last, not explicitly mentioned by Tacitus may well have made Lepida more problematic for Agrippina than any "womanly rivalry" over who got to be Nero's sugar-mama.
Here is a simplified chart, with dozens of other family members left out:
I couldn't figure out how to draw lines to indicate that Agrippa, father of Agrippina the Elder, was also, by an earlier wife, the father of Tiberius' first wife Vipsania (in fact both are named Vipsania Agrippina but were known by different bits of it).[***] When Augustus forced Tiberius to divorce Vipsania to marry his (Augustus') daughter Julia, Agrippa having died, Tiberius was thus marrying his own adoptive sister and the former stepmother to his ex-wife. -- And it may not be exactly clear that Octavia is Britannicus' full sister, the daughter of Claudius and Messalina. She married her stepbrother/type-of-cousin-that's-your-dad's-niece's-son Nero. It was not a happy marriage.
Finally, we note that Caligula seems not to have actually married any close relatives among his four wives, but he did have sex with one or more sisters.
--------------
[*] I pass over here, concerning Agrippina's parents Agrippina and Germanicus, that her -- I mean the elder Agrippina's -- grandfather was Augustus, and that his -- I mean Germanicus' -- grandmother was Livia, and Augustus and Livia were married (so that, for the younger Agrippina and her siblings [like Caligula], Augustus and Livia were doubly great-grandparental), and that Germanicus' adopted father, the emperor Tiberius, was also his uncle (and that, since Tiberius was the adopted son of Augustus, Germanicus' wife's grandfather was legally his own grandfather), and that Tiberius' natural son Drusus married Germanicus' sister Livia (often called Livilla to avoid confusion with her grandmother), and that Drusus' daughter Julia married Germanicus' son Nero (not to be confused with that Nero's nephew Nero, the emperor). It would just be too confusing to go into all that.
[**] The assassins were scared off by magical snakes standing guard in Nero's crib. Tacitus points out that Nero himself used to say there had been only one snake.
[***]This also means, of course, that Agrippina the Elder was the half-aunt of her husband's first cousin/adoptive brother Drusus.
