5. Imperial Olympic Champion
One of Nero’s childhood dreams was to become an Olympics champion. So he had the games delayed for two years until he could visit Greece and participate. He competed in chariot racing but failed to complete the course when his chariot crashed. The judges, equal parts fearful and sycophantic, awarded him the victor’s wreath on the grounds that he would have won, but for the crash. They also awarded him victor’s wreaths for every event in which he competed, for events in which he did not compete, and for events that were not part of the Olympic competition, such as singing and lyre playing. Nero emptied the treasury with lavish spending, while neglecting the government and entrusting its daily conduct to a corrupt entourage who drove it into the ground.
By 68 AD, discontent reached a boil, and generals and provincial governors across the empire rebelled. In Rome, the Senate officially declared Nero a public enemy and his Praetorian Guard abandoned him. As he fled Rome, Nero thought he should throw himself upon the mercy of the public and beg its forgiveness, while playing the lyre to “soften their hearts”. He was dissuaded when it was pointed out that he would likely be torn apart if sighted in public. As he mulled alternatives, news came that he had been declared a public enemy by the Senate, had been sentenced to be beaten to death publicly, and that soldiers were on the way to arrest him. Out of options, Nero decided to end his life. Unable to do it himself, he had a freedman stab him with a sword, as he sobbed his last words: “Oh, what an artist dies in me!”