en masse.  Once he saw a crowd either of prisoners or some other persons and gave orders (in the cant phrase) that they should all be slain from baldhead to baldhead.  Another time he was playing dice and, finding that he had no money, called for the census of the Gauls and ordered the wealthiest of them to be put to death.  Then he returned to his fellow gamblers and said:  “Here you are playing for a few denarii, while I have collected nearly fifteen thousand myriads.”  So these men perished without consideration.  Indeed, one of them, Julius Sacerdos, who was fairly well off but not so extremely wealthy as naturally to become the object of attack, nevertheless fell a victim because of a similarity of names.  This shows how carelessly everything went.

Others who perished I need not cite by name, simply mentioning enough to satisfy the requirements of my record.  One, then, that he killed was Gastulicus Lentulus, a man of good reputation in every way, who had been governor of Germany for ten years; his death was due to the fact that the soldiers liked him.  Another that he murdered was Lepidus, that lover and favorite of his, husband of Drusilla, the man who together with Gaius had maintained criminal relations with the emperor’s other sisters Agrippina and Julia, the man whom he had permitted to stand for office five years earlier than the laws allowed, whom he also declared he should leave to succeed him as emperor.  To celebrate the event he gave the soldiers money, as though he had worsted some hostile force, and sent three daggers to Mars the Avenger in Rome.  His sisters for their connection with Lepidus he deported to the Portian islands, having first written to the senate a great deal of outrageous and brutal comment upon them.  Agrippina was given the victim’s bones in a jar and ordered to keep it in her bosom throughout the entire journey and bring it back to Rome again.  Also, since many honors had been voted to these women on the emperor’s account, the emperor forbade any distinction being awarded to any of his relatives again.

[-23-] He sent to the senate at the time a report of the matter as if he had escaped some great plot, for he was always pretending to be in danger and to be leading a miserable existence.  The senators on being apprised of the facts passed several complimentary votes and granted him a lesser triumph; they sent envoys to announce this, some of whom were chosen by lot, but Claudius by election.  That also displeased the emperor to such an extent that he again forbade anything approaching praise or honor being given to his relatives.  He felt, too, that he had not been honored as he deserved, and indeed he never made any account of the honors granted him.  It irritated him to have small distinctions voted, since that implied a slight, and greater distinctions irritated him because then he was deprived of the possibility of winning still higher prizes.  He did not wish it to seem that anything that brought him honors was in the senators’