The Histories

The murder of Vitellius had stopped the war but had not brought about peace. The victorious Flavians began hunting Vitellian supporters down in Rome. Violence escalated as people ignored the difference between enemies and civilians. Those enslaved to Romans would seemingly denounce their enslavers, giving Flavian soldiers a pretext to break into their homes and rob them. Tacitus describes the Flavian generals as keen to ignite a civil war but incapable of controlling it once they did. He goes further by specifically criticizing Domitian’s conduct in the aftermath of Vitellius’s death, saying that he “was already playing the part of an emperor’s so by his rapes and adulteries” (181).

Supreme control of Rome ultimately rested with Primus, who helped himself to money from the imperial palace. The Senate then met and gave Vespasian the imperial title. Most felt optimistic that the civil wars were finally over. The wars had spread across the empire, purging all the provinces, and they had finally now run their course. They felt confirmed in this belief by a letter that Vespasian sent to the Senate in which he presented himself well.

In the Senate, a man named Helvidius Priscus became an influential figure, and Tacitus says that he would eventually form an important part of the opposition to Flavian rule.