Speaker 1: This is a podcast from WOOR. It is The Jesse
Speaker 1: Kelly Show. Another hour of The Jesse Kelly Show on
Speaker 1: a Wednesday, a Hoday, a day where we will eventually
Speaker 1: get back to making fun of Doug m Hoff. We
Speaker 1: are going to continue to pray for Florida as Hurricane
Speaker 1: Milton bears down on them, so please keep Florida in
Speaker 1: your prayers. We are going to read emails. We're going
Speaker 1: to do many things still on the world famous Jesse
Speaker 1: Kelly Show, but we're not doing any of those things
Speaker 1: right now. You ever thought about gouging out somebody's eye? What, Chris?
Speaker 1: It's part of this story we're about to tell is
Speaker 1: an eye gouging thing. I can't stop thinking about it.
Speaker 1: It was one of the parts of the Bible that
Speaker 1: used to fascinate me when I was a kid, because
Speaker 1: I was a big Samson fan, because you know, he
Speaker 1: and I have a lot in common. But Samson, when
Speaker 1: they Philistines got him, they gouged out his eyes or
Speaker 1: burnt out his eyes. I don't know. I heard it
Speaker 1: a couple different ways, but I will tell you that
Speaker 1: occupied a lot of my thinking when I was a child.
Speaker 1: Why Chris, Because it's sick and it's gruesome, and I
Speaker 1: want to know how they did it, and I want
Speaker 1: to know how bad it hurt, and I want to
Speaker 1: do it to you. So no, I'm just kidding, but
Speaker 1: gouging out people's eyes is terrible, and it's part of
Speaker 1: our story. We talk about politics, the degradation of our politics.
Speaker 1: We look at all the idiots and losers who run
Speaker 1: our country now and I'm not going to lie and
Speaker 1: say it's good, but I think every now and then
Speaker 1: maybe some perspective on real ugliness at the highest levels
Speaker 1: of power, how ugly it can get. You want to
Speaker 1: talk a little bit about Nero, You want to talk
Speaker 1: about Nero and branding. To stay with me here, Nero.
Speaker 1: I know you know who Nero was. You're probably going
Speaker 1: to learn a couple of things here, but I know
Speaker 1: you know who Nero was. He was a Roman emperor,
Speaker 1: remember the Roman Empire. It's not how Rome began. Rome
Speaker 1: is mostly known today by people for its emperors, the
Speaker 1: Neros and Caligulas, and everyone knows who Julius Caesar is
Speaker 1: and those types. Even if you don't know anything about
Speaker 1: any of these people, that's what you know about. But
Speaker 1: Rome was originally a republic run by the Senate, and
Speaker 1: then through a long list of things that we've discussed
Speaker 1: many times on the show, Rome ended up well where
Speaker 1: we're going to be here in the time of Nero.
Speaker 1: Rome ended up being run by one man, an emperor. Now,
Speaker 1: who is Nero? Where'd all this stuff come from? Okay,
Speaker 1: so let's do just a little bit of background on Nero.
Speaker 1: Something you know about Nero? I'm going to shoot a
Speaker 1: hole in today, should I should let you know right now? Yes?
Speaker 1: He was very very bad human being with there are
Speaker 1: some things about Nero that have been inaccurate anyway, So
Speaker 1: who was what's going on the time? This is about
Speaker 1: the time of Jesus. It's after the time of Jesus,
Speaker 1: but I don't like to get specifics in nerd out
Speaker 1: on the dates. It's after fifty years after the time
Speaker 1: of Jesus. Okay, so that's roughly where we're at here.
Speaker 1: Jesus is gone, Chris's people killed him. It's over. Now
Speaker 1: we're in Rome, and there's another part of Rome. Honestly,
Speaker 1: Chris jokes aside, there's another part of Rome. You should
Speaker 1: understand the religious aspect of it. This is going to
Speaker 1: come into play in Nero's life later on. Anyone who
Speaker 1: knows the history will understand a little bit of why.
Speaker 1: But the religious aspect of it. First Rome, you know
Speaker 1: what kind of religion they had, or at least I
Speaker 1: think you probably know what kind of religion they had.
Speaker 1: They had very similar to the Greeks. There's a god
Speaker 1: of the sun, and a god of war and a
Speaker 1: god of love, and you need a temple for this
Speaker 1: guy and a temple for this guy. So it's one
Speaker 1: of those types of places. And we've had this talk
Speaker 1: before on the show, because it was a false religion
Speaker 1: was really its roots were created by the state to
Speaker 1: serve the state. That's a great way to test your
Speaker 1: religious beliefs. Do they serve the state? Do they serve
Speaker 1: the needs of the people in power? Miraculously, these societies
Speaker 1: so often had religions that really helped out the guys
Speaker 1: who were in charge, right, So it's a great way
Speaker 1: to test your belief system. Well, that was Rome's belief system,
Speaker 1: you know, all the different all that crap. Well, then
Speaker 1: it comes to Jews in Christians Jews and Christians in
Speaker 1: Rome at this period of time, the Jews were a
Speaker 1: little bit more accepted, but not very much at all,
Speaker 1: for the exact same reason Jews in Christians, their belief system,
Speaker 1: their God, you know, the same God, Yahweh. He is
Speaker 1: outside of and above the Roman system. Initially, for the
Speaker 1: longest time Jews and Christians were persecuted in Rome. It
Speaker 1: wasn't specifically that they had an act to grind with
Speaker 1: Chris or me or Yahweh himself. They had an ax
Speaker 1: to grind with any kind of a belief system that
Speaker 1: was above the Roman system, above and beyond the Roman emperor.
Speaker 1: You know, if you pin Chris down in the alleyway
Speaker 1: and you say, hey, you could choose Yahweh or Nero.
Speaker 1: They need here, They need him to say nero or
Speaker 1: that's a problem. Okay, you understand. So the Jews and
Speaker 1: the Christians were second class citizens is probably the most
Speaker 1: simplistic way I can put it at this time. But
Speaker 1: separate is really what they were. This will come, This
Speaker 1: is going to come into play in a little while. Separate,
Speaker 1: separate meaning we have this whole Roman society, we have
Speaker 1: this whole Roman belief system. But then you have the
Speaker 1: Jews or the Christians. They live around each other, they
Speaker 1: prefer to work around each other. We know their God.
Speaker 1: They consider him above Nero, above the Senate, above Rome.
Speaker 1: They had that. Okay, So remember they're not only fairly
Speaker 1: new as far as being introduced to the Romans go.
Speaker 1: They've set themselves apart from the Roman system. That was
Speaker 1: a problem. Right now, Back to the Nero thing. Nero
Speaker 1: was part of the Julius Caesar line. It's known as
Speaker 1: the Julio Claudian dynasty. Don't worry about that. That's nerding
Speaker 1: out on details. History nerds will nerd out on that.
Speaker 1: Don't worry about that. He was. He was part of
Speaker 1: the line of emperors. Back to Caesar Augustus. Who's Caesar
Speaker 1: Augustus again, don't worry about memorizing all this. Caesar Augustus
Speaker 1: was the one who came after Julius Caesar, who actually
Speaker 1: did take over as the emperor and lived for so
Speaker 1: long and ruled Rome. He was still revered at this time.
Speaker 1: His mother, Nero's mother was actually the descendant of Augustus.
Speaker 1: All right, Now, it was a rough time, and it's
Speaker 1: it's crazy, it's funny, it's awful. There are a bunch
Speaker 1: of words I can use to describe ruling families throughout history.
Speaker 1: We talk a lot about our Kennedys here in the
Speaker 1: United States of America, not just the fact that they've
Speaker 1: been in and around power forever. You know, we got
Speaker 1: Jack as a US ambassador, JFK himself obviously the president,
Speaker 1: our FK. You have all these different Kennedys. There's still
Speaker 1: Kennedy's today, our FK Junior just ran for president. All
Speaker 1: these Kennedys out there, we talk about the power they
Speaker 1: have and what else do we talk about? The tragedy
Speaker 1: and the and the scandal around them all the time.
Speaker 1: Ted Kennedy's killing women with his car. JFK is getting
Speaker 1: shot in Dallas are. It's just been thing after thing
Speaker 1: after thing after thing, and that is a pretty consistent
Speaker 1: thing throughout history. When you get a family, you would
Speaker 1: think it'd be the opposite, at least I would if
Speaker 1: you were to say that Kelly family, we were about
Speaker 1: to become presidents. In fact, I was going to be
Speaker 1: elected president. Haha, that's a real joke. We all know
Speaker 1: that's never happened here anyway. If I was about to
Speaker 1: be elected president, and my son James, he's going to
Speaker 1: be a United States Senator, and my son Luke after
Speaker 1: him is going to be a governor and their sons.
Speaker 1: Their sons are going to be presidents and senators and governors.
Speaker 1: Would you say that we would probably have a good life.
Speaker 1: You would probably say so. I would say so, Wow,
Speaker 1: that sounds pretty cool. Wow, presidents think of all. I
Speaker 1: bet you guys will make a lot of money. I
Speaker 1: bet you it'll be great. Right. But the truth is,
Speaker 1: if you were to present me that opportunity right in
Speaker 1: front of me, right now, God comes down, He hands
Speaker 1: me a piece of paper and says, hey, Jesse, sign
Speaker 1: up for this life of royalty for yourself and your family.
Speaker 1: I don't think I would sign it unless he made me,
Speaker 1: because royal family are a disaster and this dynasty was
Speaker 1: no different. It was murder, intrigue, affairs, it was everything
Speaker 1: you can imagine in high level politics. Family member killing
Speaker 1: family member, a complete disaster. And that brings us to Nero.
Speaker 1: That was not his name originally, but we're not going
Speaker 1: to nerd out on details. Nero. Nero's uncle was Caligula.
Speaker 1: There's only three names you need to learn in this
Speaker 1: whole story. Caligula was his uncle. You already know who
Speaker 1: that is, so that doesn't count. Caligula had a sister.
Speaker 1: Her name, and this one does matter. This is one
Speaker 1: of those women. She had to be a fascinating woman.
Speaker 1: Maybe an evil woman possibly, but had to be a
Speaker 1: fascinating woman. I'd like to meet her, one of those people.
Speaker 1: You'd like to have dinner with her for an hour
Speaker 1: and just see what kind of person she is. Her
Speaker 1: name is Agrippina, and she is going to play a
Speaker 1: central role in the Nero story, a central role in
Speaker 1: our story today. Agrippina is the sister of Caligula. And
Speaker 1: you already know about Caligula and what a disaster he was.
Speaker 1: Eventually he gets displeased with Agrippina, and that's kind of
Speaker 1: where the Nero story begins. So we'll begin there in
Speaker 1: a moment. Before we do that, let's do relief factor.
Speaker 1: I bet you all these people, I bet you there
Speaker 1: would have been less murder if they had relief factor.
Speaker 1: Think about it. What do you do for pain in
Speaker 1: the ancient Rome? Here You're gonna chew on some weird plant,
Speaker 1: go sacrifice a bull or something odd like that, when
Speaker 1: you could just be taking relief factor every single day,
Speaker 1: one hundred percent drug free. It's natural, developed by doctors.
Speaker 1: What is it? It's a it's a daily supplement. You
Speaker 1: take it every day, and your body it's already fighting
Speaker 1: that inflammation that's making your back hurt, that makes your
Speaker 1: knee hurt, your your muscle's hurt. It's already trying to
Speaker 1: fight it. It needs help. That's what relief Factory is.
Speaker 1: It's the help. People talk about their pain disappearing completely.
Speaker 1: Others talk about their pain being turned way down. But
Speaker 1: if you could just take a natural herbal supplement every
Speaker 1: morning and have that, wouldn't you Nineteen dollars and ninety
Speaker 1: five cents buys you three weeks of it. Go get
Speaker 1: some relief Factor dot com or call one eight hundred
Speaker 1: the number four Relief. We'll be back. What Chris, We
Speaker 1: can make jokes. It's fine, we get that right. The
Speaker 1: Jesse Kelly Show is the Jesse Kelly Show on a
Speaker 1: or almost sad a Tuesday on a Wednesday. I remember,
Speaker 1: you can email the show Jesse at Jesse Kellyshow dot com.
Speaker 1: We're discussing some history now. In fact, we're discussing Nero.
Speaker 1: I kinda gave a little bit of backstory. His uncle
Speaker 1: was Caligula. Don't worry about that, but his mother. You
Speaker 1: do need to worry about. Her name was Agrippina, and
Speaker 1: you're gonna hear her name alive today. Agrippina was the
Speaker 1: mother of Nero. Nero his father was and look, you
Speaker 1: never it's hard to psychologize somebody two thousand years later,
Speaker 1: But when you look at how Nero eventually turned out,
Speaker 1: you can really see how his childhood guided him. We'll
Speaker 1: get to the mother's side in a moment. His father
Speaker 1: was a senator, a very important man, but reportedly an
Speaker 1: angry drunk, had a terrible alcohol problem, and was violent
Speaker 1: to the point a fellow senator argued with him on
Speaker 1: the senate floor one day, and he tracked him down
Speaker 1: later and gouged out his eye. Gosh, what's the worst
Speaker 1: you've ever held a grudge? So that was Nero's father.
Speaker 1: His father reportedly murdered some slave boy in traffic because
Speaker 1: there was some kind of a traffic incident or accident,
Speaker 1: and you just got mad and got out, just ed
Speaker 1: him and kept moving on his way. So we're talking
Speaker 1: about a violent, bad person. That's his father. Now his
Speaker 1: father dies, Caligula is in power doing all the horrible
Speaker 1: things Caligula did, most of which are not fit to
Speaker 1: be talked about on a family radio show. So Caligula
Speaker 1: he decides he doesn't like his sister Agrippina anymore, and
Speaker 1: he banishes her her and her son, Nero, her young son.
Speaker 1: So Nero's father is dead, his mother and he have
Speaker 1: been banished to an island. Now remember this, you want
Speaker 1: to talk about how two different lives have well, the
Speaker 1: difference between the two different lives Nero has lived so
Speaker 1: far in Roman society, it was very much a caste system,
Speaker 1: where you would have the ruling elite, and there were
Speaker 1: various levels of society. Nero was born into the Julian
Speaker 1: Claudian dynasty, meaning for however long he had lived, Nero
Speaker 1: would have lived royal life. A royal life so far.
Speaker 1: It would have been the finest foods, the finest horses,
Speaker 1: the comfiest beds. He would have had slaves and servants
Speaker 1: and tutors. He would have had things really, really good.
Speaker 1: And then boom, Uncle Caligila decides he doesn't like mom anymore.
Speaker 1: He banishes you to an island. You're not only banished
Speaker 1: to an island, your tutor. His tutor was a dancer.
Speaker 1: Now that may not sound that extreme, but I need
Speaker 1: to pause Romans. In Roman society, they considered the arts
Speaker 1: theater actors dancers. They considered them to be equal or
Speaker 1: below ladies of the night. Everyone understands what I mean.
Speaker 1: I know there are kids listening. I'm trying to make
Speaker 1: this right. But women who sell things late at night,
Speaker 1: they shouldn't be selling the dudes who are lonely. Roman
Speaker 1: society considered dancers beneath those people actors and that shit.
Speaker 1: This is going to come back in a plane a
Speaker 1: little while too. You have to know that about Roman society.
Speaker 1: The only tutor they gave young Nero was a dancer.
Speaker 1: And what else went into that I don't know. Now.
Speaker 1: Fast forward, Caligula is murdered. Caligula ends up getting murdered.
Speaker 1: It's a very famous story. Caligula had made himself the
Speaker 1: bane of the existence of many, many powerful people. He
Speaker 1: was abusing senators, abusing their wives in front of the senators.
Speaker 1: He was signed up for an assassination. Caligula eventually gets
Speaker 1: assassinated and a guy takes over. His name's Claudius. You
Speaker 1: don't have to know that, it's not important for our
Speaker 1: story today, but Claudius takes over as the Roman emperor
Speaker 1: Claudius gets a hold of Agrippina, who's been banished, and
Speaker 1: he says, hey, come on back home. So now Nero
Speaker 1: has grown up his royalty. He got banished to an
Speaker 1: island to live a really, really rough life, and then
Speaker 1: he's just been called back home, back into the arms
Speaker 1: of the new emperor, Claudius, and now he's royalty. Now
Speaker 1: they're not part of the actual you know, Claudius's home yet,
Speaker 1: but Agrippina seems to be working on that. You see,
Speaker 1: Agrippina is married for a while, and then her husband dies.
Speaker 1: You'll notice a lot of people Agrippina, once dead in
Speaker 1: this story end up dying through sometimes mysterious, sometimes fairly
Speaker 1: obvious circumstances. Agrippina totally poisoned her husband. Agrippina's husband dies.
Speaker 1: Claudius he doesn't want to be left out. Remember when
Speaker 1: I told you it's rough light, it's a rough life
Speaker 1: for royal families. He murders his wife as well. Well,
Speaker 1: look at that, Agrippina. And this is a true story. Memory,
Speaker 1: This is not some book we're reading. Now you have Claudius,
Speaker 1: the Emperor of Rome. You have Agrippina, the mother of Nero. Agrippina,
Speaker 1: I'm assuming was a charming woman at least that's like
Speaker 1: how that's how I like to imagine her in my mind.
Speaker 1: They decide they're a really good couple. Hey, look, you
Speaker 1: murdered your spouse and I murdered my spouse. Are we
Speaker 1: made for each other? And they decide to get together.
Speaker 1: But Claudius, Claudius already has a son. He has a son,
Speaker 1: and now he has this new wife, Agrippina. She's bringing
Speaker 1: her son along. Well, this is an awkward situation when
Speaker 1: you are now in an empire where the next emperor
Speaker 1: is oftentimes the son or a relative of the current emperor.
Speaker 1: If you're Claudius, do you pick your biological son or
Speaker 1: this new boy Nero. Well that's where Agrippina again began
Speaker 1: to work her magic. Next is the Jesse Kelly Show
Speaker 1: on a Wednesday. Member. If you miss any part of
Speaker 1: the show, you can go download the podcast. It's free, iHeart, Spotify, iTunes.
Speaker 1: All right, back to our story. We're talking about Nero.
Speaker 1: In case you're just now joining us, you're jumping in
Speaker 1: mid story. Don't worry, Oh, download a podcast if you
Speaker 1: miss the beginning of it. So Nero, Nero's mother, Agrippina,
Speaker 1: she manages to worm her way back into power in Rome,
Speaker 1: and she manages to marry the Emperor Claudius. Well, now
Speaker 1: you have Nero here. Claudius already had a biological son, Agrippina.
Speaker 1: This is a woman who is ambitious, starts working her
Speaker 1: magic and working on Claudius, and she gets him to
Speaker 1: agree to adopt Nero as his official son. Now, let's
Speaker 1: pause really quickly and talk about Roman adoption. Adoption modern
Speaker 1: times one of the most blessed things you could ever
Speaker 1: do for somebody. It's freaking awesome. If you're listening to
Speaker 1: me and you adopt kids, you have so much respect
Speaker 1: from me. If you're a child who's been adopted, I
Speaker 1: know that can be difficult for sure. I have some
Speaker 1: experience in this area. I know that can be difficult.
Speaker 1: Show some appreciation for your adoptive parents. It's really awesome
Speaker 1: thing in Roman high society back then. I don't want
Speaker 1: to sit and act like it was quite as as
Speaker 1: benevolent as adoption is today. Oftentimes these adoptions were for
Speaker 1: political reasons and other reasons. But there is something you
Speaker 1: need to know about Roman adoption back then, just like today,
Speaker 1: when a Roman adopted you, if you got adopted by
Speaker 1: a Roman, one of these high society Romans. Then it
Speaker 1: was every bit as official as your biological son. It
Speaker 1: is as if the blood, the genes, the DNA, none
Speaker 1: of that stuff mattered at all. It was not kind
Speaker 1: of okay, we'll adopt them, and he can be kind
Speaker 1: of the side son, just like the adopted families handle
Speaker 1: it today. When you are adopted, you are mine, You
Speaker 1: are my flesh and blood. If that is how it
Speaker 1: was treated Claudius. Because the man I don't know whether
Speaker 1: he just couldn't see straight around Agrippina. I have no
Speaker 1: idea what he was thinking. Claudius adopts Nero as his son. Well,
Speaker 1: now you have an emperor Claudius. He has a wife, Agrippina,
Speaker 1: who has a vested interest in one of the two sons.
Speaker 1: And the one of the two sons, Nero, happens to
Speaker 1: be the oldest son. And that matters a lot, you see,
Speaker 1: because there were rules in Roman society for how old
Speaker 1: you had to be in order to be emperor. And
Speaker 1: actually I did some digging into this last night. When
Speaker 1: I thought about telling you this story, I decided I
Speaker 1: was going to figure out what the rules were. I'll
Speaker 1: be honest, I could never nail it down. I kept
Speaker 1: getting different rules from different sources. Here's what I do
Speaker 1: know this part. I know Nero. Fast forward a little bit.
Speaker 1: I'll come back and explain. But Nero does assume the
Speaker 1: throne at the age of sixteen. Okay, so he's sixteen
Speaker 1: years old, all right. His brother, his stepbrother, I should say,
Speaker 1: did not get the throne because he wasn't considered to
Speaker 1: be old enough, which begs the question how old does
Speaker 1: one have to be to assume the throne? If sixteen
Speaker 1: is old enough and the other age is not old enough.
Speaker 1: Either way, Claudius adopts Nero, and now his mother is
Speaker 1: kind of in a race against time. And I can't
Speaker 1: believe Claudius didn't see this coming. Claudius preferred the other son.
Speaker 1: Obviously he's the son. He knew, he's the son he
Speaker 1: had raised. But Agrippina understood the other son, whom Claudius preferred,
Speaker 1: was too young to be emperor. So she had a
Speaker 1: very slim window, a short time frame, if you will,
Speaker 1: to find a way for Claudius to abdicate the throne.
Speaker 1: If you will, Claudius sits down for dinner one night,
Speaker 1: he is not a stupid man by any stretch of
Speaker 1: the imagination. He is seeing Emperor after Emperor murdered Caliguila
Speaker 1: was just knifed about five minutes before this. He was
Speaker 1: well aware his life would be in danger as an emperor.
Speaker 1: So Claudius had a food taster, well, Agrippina, once again
Speaker 1: the crafty devil she was. Agrippina found a way to
Speaker 1: buy off and manipulate the food taster, and they slipped
Speaker 1: a poisonous mushroom mushroom onto Claudius's table, onto his plate.
Speaker 1: Except they were so worried that everyone would knew he'd
Speaker 1: been poisoned, they chose a slow acting poison. Claudius sits
Speaker 1: down as emperor ingests some mushrooms. Whether it was on
Speaker 1: a pizza or not, I don't know. I like to
Speaker 1: imagine it was. He eats a poisonous mushroom. He got
Speaker 1: drunk a lot, He got hammered that night, and so
Speaker 1: no one thought anything of it. When he got up. Oh,
Speaker 1: I can hardly stand slurring his words, complaining of a
Speaker 1: stomach ache. No big deer, no big deal. The emperor
Speaker 1: has a drinking problem, probably hangs out with Nancy Pelosi.
Speaker 1: Let's not stretch it. He goes off to his room,
Speaker 1: continues to get sick, but he's not dying. Agrippina's in
Speaker 1: the palace starting to get understandably concerned. Learned because he
Speaker 1: is not dying. And if the emperor does survive, he
Speaker 1: is going to know he's been poisoned because those mushrooms, Ah,
Speaker 1: they did taste a little bit funny. So what does
Speaker 1: she do again? This woman must have been look, you
Speaker 1: don't want to make in your dinner, but she must
Speaker 1: have been an impressive human being. She scrambles. She gets
Speaker 1: to another person who she's manipulated and bought off. This
Speaker 1: person happens to be the palace freaking doctor. And what
Speaker 1: she do? She gets the palace doctor to take a feather.
Speaker 1: The feather is dipped in a fast acting poison. This
Speaker 1: time the doctor brings it in too. Claudius says, oh,
Speaker 1: I heard you're sick. Here's a solution. Tickle the back
Speaker 1: of your throat with this feather. It'll make you throw up.
Speaker 1: You'll feel better. Claudius says, sounds good. Give me the feather,
Speaker 1: grabs the feather, Come on, is it down? Lays over
Speaker 1: dies right then and there and now you're Agrippina. You're
Speaker 1: looking around, and this all has worked out quite well
Speaker 1: for you, hasn't it. You went from being the banished
Speaker 1: sister of Caligula, banished to a tiny, crappy island. Your
Speaker 1: emperor husband just keeled over dead, Your son freshly adopted
Speaker 1: by a miracle, Your son freshly adopted, appears to be
Speaker 1: the only one of the two boys who can take
Speaker 1: over the throne. And wow, look at how well things
Speaker 1: have worked out for you. Like I said, Agrippina was
Speaker 1: a woman to be reckoned with. There's no question about it.
Speaker 1: She was a woman to be reckoned with all right. Now,
Speaker 1: after Claudius dies, this this stuff always gets ugly. There's
Speaker 1: all of fratricide and things going on. But Nero is
Speaker 1: eventually made emperor. Part of the reason Nero was made
Speaker 1: emperor is I know you're gonna find this shocking. Stop
Speaker 1: me if you've heard this one before. His mother managed
Speaker 1: to buy off the manipulate the right people, who were
Speaker 1: the right people, well, the Praetorian Guard. We have to pause,
Speaker 1: actually everything in our story for a few minutes, and
Speaker 1: we have to discuss the Pretorian guard in Rome and
Speaker 1: what it was. You see you weren't allowed to carry
Speaker 1: arms in Rome. You weren't allowed to have a military
Speaker 1: in Rome. But they wanted some sort of a law
Speaker 1: enforcement really emperor protection unit, and they created one and
Speaker 1: it was known as the Pretorian Guard. It ended up though,
Speaker 1: being a huge, huge problem because well, people back then,
Speaker 1: just as now, we didn't always understand power. So let's
Speaker 1: discuss the Petorium Guard and power in nero in more
Speaker 1: in just a moment. Before we do that, all this
Speaker 1: Roman history probably has your testosterone levels already going through
Speaker 1: the roof. That's the good news. The bad news is
Speaker 1: that's going to fade away as soon as I stop
Speaker 1: talking about Rome, and we'll go back to drinking estrogen
Speaker 1: and we'll have no tea levels left and society will collapse, unless,
Speaker 1: of course, we start taking male vitality stacks from chalk.
Speaker 1: You see twenty percent increase in your testosterone in ninety
Speaker 1: days with natural herbal supplements. Ladies, they have a female
Speaker 1: vitality stack made special for you. Don't worry. Your testosterone
Speaker 1: levels aren't going to go through the roof. They have
Speaker 1: chalk lit powder. I start out every day with chocltpowder.
Speaker 1: Again today, when I was walking out the door. I
Speaker 1: had to leave early for something. Ob had made me
Speaker 1: a smoothie chalk lit powder boom. I take off like
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Speaker 1: heye death threat. You're welcome to complain about history. We're
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Speaker 1: it whenever I feel like it. All right, back to
Speaker 1: back to our history. We're talking about Nero. We're setting
Speaker 1: aside politics for a little while today. We're doing some
Speaker 1: Nero talk. Nero just took power. He's now the young Emperor.
Speaker 1: He's sixteen years old. He took power in large part,
Speaker 1: honestly one hundred percent because of his mother, Agrippina, who
Speaker 1: managed to poison and slither her way into power, gets
Speaker 1: yourself right next to the emperor, kills him too, allegedly,
Speaker 1: and now Nero takes over. Now let's pause on all
Speaker 1: that and talk about the Praetorian Guard quickly. We already
Speaker 1: talked about the Petorian Guard. Roam didn't allow arms inside
Speaker 1: the city, no military units inside the city. So the
Speaker 1: Praetorian Guard was created to protect the Emperor and enforce
Speaker 1: some things inside the city. But this, of course, look,
Speaker 1: it goes to the mindset of the average American communists today.
Speaker 1: It's just a lack of understanding about power. I should say,
Speaker 1: you're liberal and peggy when she talks about guns, get
Speaker 1: the guns off the street. It's just a lack of
Speaker 1: understanding about power. You see, you banished all the guns,
Speaker 1: you banished all the swords, and then you created a
Speaker 1: unit and they're the only ones that have swords and spears. Well,
Speaker 1: they're the only ones with power. Then instead of everyone
Speaker 1: having power, they're the ones with the true power. It's
Speaker 1: like that story I told you a little while ago
Speaker 1: about these uber rich guys who are creating bunkers for themselves,
Speaker 1: apocalypse bunkers, and they're hiring a bunch of merks. Navy
Speaker 1: seals and these types to go work security for it.
Speaker 1: You don't have a bunker. The navy seal team you
Speaker 1: hired has a bunker, and they're just gonna shoot you
Speaker 1: in the face the second the apocalypse comes and throw
Speaker 1: your body in a ditch. And now they have all
Speaker 1: your supplies. That's how that works. That's how power actually works. Well.
Speaker 1: The Praetorian Guard looked around one day and they figured out,
Speaker 1: wait a minute, we're the only ones with swords and
Speaker 1: shields and spears. We can do whatever we want. The
Speaker 1: Praetorian Guard wasn't some secret service style police force. They
Speaker 1: were the sword of the Roman elite now, and you
Speaker 1: had to buy them off. Agrippina's mother bought off the
Speaker 1: head of the Petorian Guard. Now you're young, Nero, sure, sixteen,
Speaker 1: you're inexperienced. Sure, there's a lot of people who are
Speaker 1: angry about how you got to the throne, Did mom
Speaker 1: kill Claudius? What's going on there? But really the question
Speaker 1: is what you're gonna do about it? Because you have
Speaker 1: the Praetorian Guard with you. So Nero has the Praetorian
Speaker 1: Guard with him, he also has You don't have to
Speaker 1: memorize this name. I don't want to give you too
Speaker 1: many names. I don't like doing that, but maybe you're
Speaker 1: a detail in there. The name would matter. Seneca was
Speaker 1: his name. Who was Seneca? Uh? A philosopher is the
Speaker 1: best way I could put it. But when I say philosopher,
Speaker 1: I didn't want to put it that way because that
Speaker 1: sounds so unimportant to us today. A philosopher, Oh, who
Speaker 1: gives a crap? Can you name me a single modern philosopher?
Speaker 1: That's just it doesn't It doesn't drive home for you
Speaker 1: or for me how important that was back then. Seneca
Speaker 1: was a really, really, really big deal back then he Uh, Oprah,
Speaker 1: No Oprah. Obviously everyone knows who Oprah is. I don't
Speaker 1: like Oprah, She's a dirty COMI whatever, But everyone knows
Speaker 1: who Oprah is. And let's be honest. She may not
Speaker 1: matter to you or matter to me personally, but when
Speaker 1: Oprah says jump, there are a lot of people who
Speaker 1: say how high? Because of the level of influence she has.
Speaker 1: Seneca's endorsement was Oprah's endorsement. That's the best way I
Speaker 1: can describe it. It was a big deal that Nero
Speaker 1: had Seneca and Nero had the praetorian guard. What that
Speaker 1: essentially gave Nero was control of power. He had the
Speaker 1: philosopher one that people loved, he had the praetorian guard.
Speaker 1: Now Nero begins to rule. How involved was Agrippina. Well,
Speaker 1: I'll put it to you this way. Emperor's had a
Speaker 1: habit of mincing their own coins with their own faces
Speaker 1: on it. That's awesome, Chris, we need to do that
Speaker 1: for the show. But the emperors had a habit of
Speaker 1: mincing their own coins with their own faces on them,
Speaker 1: and the Roman Republic was quite old by this point
Speaker 1: in time. Up to this point, no woman had ever
Speaker 1: been pictured on the same side of the coin as
Speaker 1: a man. Certainly not the emperor, but ever, that had
Speaker 1: never happened in the history of Rome. You can go
Speaker 1: look him up right now. Agrippina Nero coins, they were
Speaker 1: the first ones they minted. Where she's sitting there, Her
Speaker 1: face is just as large as he is, on the
Speaker 1: same side of the new coins they minted. This is
Speaker 1: a woman. She didn't just saunter into power and then say, ah,
Speaker 1: I'm so proud of my boy. No, she was knee
Speaker 1: deep involved, all right, So her end is magnificent. I
Speaker 1: should note. I'll get to that in a moment. Nero,
Speaker 1: what's he do right away? Well, he has Seneca in
Speaker 1: his corner. Seneca was reading You never know, it's two
Speaker 1: thousand years ago, a pretty solid human being who had
Speaker 1: really solid ideas of what needed to be done for Rome,
Speaker 1: what needed to be done for the people, how an
Speaker 1: emperor should act. And there are a lot of people
Speaker 1: who give him credit for what I'm about to say next.
Speaker 1: But you want to hear something, something you never heard
Speaker 1: about Nero before the first five years of Nero's reign
Speaker 1: takes over at sixteen might be the best five years
Speaker 1: of any five year period in the history of the
Speaker 1: Roman Empire. He was that incredible, insanely popular. He gets
Speaker 1: in there immediately and he's doing things that He's cutting taxes.
Speaker 1: This is a sixteen year old boy. He just took
Speaker 1: over as emperor. He starts giving power back to the Senate.
Speaker 1: He starts giving up his power, giving power back to
Speaker 1: the Senate. He walks in, he ends capital punishment. Oh,
Speaker 1: here's this one for Nero. Look, we all think he's
Speaker 1: the Antichrist, right, here's this one for Neiro. Slaves. You
Speaker 1: know what Roman slavery was like or what it could
Speaker 1: be like. We all talk about the salt mines and
Speaker 1: how too terrible it was, and that was part of
Speaker 1: it for sure. But you could also, as a slave
Speaker 1: in Rome, have a life of a rich person. Essentially,
Speaker 1: you'd be a tutor of a senator's son, probably live
Speaker 1: a life of luxury, wonderful food, you know. So we
Speaker 1: could run the gamut. It could be the worst existence
Speaker 1: in the history of the world. Or slave doesn't even
Speaker 1: really count as what you are. You're practically a step
Speaker 1: brother in the house, you know. So we could run
Speaker 1: the gamut. But Nero, freaking Nero, you know, the guy
Speaker 1: who fiddled while Rome burned. Will come back to that.
Speaker 1: Nero expanded slaves rights, had a heart for slaves again.
Speaker 1: First five years went well, ah man it then it
Speaker 1: kind of went sideways. This has been a podcast from
Speaker 1: Double U O R