#nero and poppaea

[suburbanbeatnik]

What are you favourite historical couples?

Ooh, probably Justinian and Theodora. They're probably the only example of "famous lovers" who had long happy lives together and didn't die horrible, tragic deaths (like Antony and Cleopatra, Abelard and Heloise, Paolo and Francesca). I am also fond of Napoleon and Marie Walewska, though their ends were also suitably tragic. Nero and Poppaea had a pretty notable romance (a ancient, beautiful and swoon-worthy poem about Nero and Poppaea, written on Egyptian papyrus, was translated recently), even though she most likely died in childbirth and he was forced to commit suicide.

[heresronnie21]

I don't know how to explain it but I'm disappointed that it wasn't drawn to attention that both apollo and nero killed a pregnant lover

[turtlesallthewaytomgreg]

tomgreg dependent on stress not tomshiv

okay so lil headcannon theory: thinking about how the idea that 'tomgreg only works when tom has someone to take his shiv-related aggression out on' doesn't seem to fully capture their relationship. tom being willing to go to prison for greg, greg not leaking whatever was in the logistics folder, tom taking the fall for boar on the floor, etc. etc.

i'm wondering if their relationship materializes, less out of tom's relationship to shiv and more out of tom and greg's relationship to environmental stressors. when everything's 'good,' their interactions are pretty surface level and or minimal, right? i mean, no reason to scheme, black mail, throw water bottles if there aren't any active shooters, corporate scandals, congressional hearings, etc. etc. but when things are bad? they pull together like magnets. they're the only two who really get what its like to be in that state of being the 'first to go' in the event of a huge stressor/threat to waystar as 'non roy' members of the roy family.

it's well documented that heightened levels of emotional arousal under stressful situations--which involves releasing adrenal into the body--increases the romantic attraction between two individuals. this certainly makes sense in the context of tom and greg's homoerotic build-up in s2/s3. the cruises scandal and threat of going to prison hit their stress response systems like a fucking bullet train (no pun intended). greg's getting a haircut even though he didn't need one because it felt 'soothing,' and the clear, physical and verbal manifestations of anxiety pre- and post- appearing before congress. not to mention tom constantly bringing up the prison blogs with his big sad eyes, months of fear and worry and dysregulation and expectation leading up to the culminating moment of emotional release: learning that he wouldn't be going to prison, waltzing into greg's office, flipping his desk over, beating his chest on top of the filing cabinets, pulling greg into a post-adrenal-fueled haze of a forehead kiss, etc.

s3 already established that tom goes to greg at the height of his emotional dysregulation, and s4 continues to confirm it. logan suddenly and unexpectedly dying? an extremely traumatic/emotional stressor, and tom responds by calling greg? solidifying him not only tom's number one confidant but the person he goes to first when his adrenaline's spiked by stress.

in the first couple of episodes, they didn't have a whole lot of reason to be stressed. they're at logan's birthday party, tom's getting a divorce, pretty standard family dysfunction. but what do we have here, episode three and four? now their sole protector is dead and the new guy, mattson has apparently no qualms about a total and immediate corporate restructure. sure, tom and greg aren't on the kill list for now, but what's actually standing in between them and a total loss of control? i don't know about you but the slow build up of uncertainty/stress within the plot across 4.01-4.04 seems like some pretty solid grounds for some late season romantic ~bonding!~ if you ask me :)

[nymph-of-water]

The fact that in the museum of ancient Olympia (in Greece) they have Agrippina the Younger across from Poppaea Sabina 🤨😐

[garland-on-thy-brow]

Not my period generally, but fascinated by Nero performing as Poppaea after her death and then Otho performing as Nero after his death. Hello? Wild identity exchanges here. Who did Poppaea perform as?

[ancientcharm]

Pompeii Amphitheater, built around 70 BC. It is the oldest and best preserved Roman amphitheater in the world.

Photo: Ettore Di Caterina

Text:  ancientcharm

In the year 59 AD, in that place there was a violent confrontation with several wounded and dead, between Pompeians and visitors from the neighboring city of Nucería due to a fight between gladiators from both cities. Such a scandal infuriated the young emperor Nero, who as punishment ordered the closure of the amphitheater for ten years but shortly after, upon meeting and falling in love with the Pompeian Poppaea Sabina, the amphitheater was reopened, probably at Poppaea's request.

[neilphen]

mutual 1: he does cocomelon shit to me [photo of bruce springsteen]

mutual 2: go here 👉 [george harrison f1 racetrack interview 360p 27 second video]

mutual 3: just watched this Norwegian horror film from 1917 and it has changed my perception on the oil industry - heres why *read more*

mutual 4: snoopy save me save me snoopy snoopy

mutual 5: estrogen wouldve saved her [photo of john lennon]

mutual 6: [fiona apple song posting] i understand her

mutual 7: *web weaving buster keaton and kafka quotes*

mutual 8: *20th blorbo post in a row* hello is anyone there

mutual 9: the dream man came to me in the night again but this time he spoke to me

mutual 10: what if we brought back feudalism?

mutual 11/12: marc bolan . is anyone else saying this?

mutual 13: help

mutual 14: top surgery scars in the shape of boubas

mutual 15: i have always wante dhim [photo of a rickenbacker 620]

mutual 16: if u think about it neilphen is like eros and psyche . and nashby is nero and poppaea

mutual 17: toxic yaoi save me save me toxic yaoi

mutual 18: *the most jaw dropping heart stopping mind altering drawing of george harrison in a skirt* basic boring sketches :p

[whencyclopedia]

Poppaea Sabina

Poppaea Sabina (30-65 CE) was the wife of Praetorian prefect Rufrius Crispinius and then Marcus Salvius Otho (r. 69 CE) before she became the second wife of Roman emperor Nero (r. 54-68 CE). Considered by ancient sources both attractive and intelligent, she used her beauty and charm, to persuade Nero to divorce Octavia, the daughter of Claudius (r. 41-54 CE) and Valeria Messalina, and marry her.

Continue reading...

[tomwambsmilk]

I really do think that so much of the appeal of Nero and Sporus to Tom comes from the fact that he feels like Sporus in his relationship with Shiv, in the sense that he feels castrated (both in the emasculation sense and in the sense of his pleasure - and by extension his needs and desires - not being prioritized) BUT he doesn’t feel appreciated in the same way that Sporus was. I think he read that story and felt that castration would be a small price to pay if someone loved him the way Nero loved Sporus. And on top of that, given that Sporus was chosen not over and instead of Poppaea but bc Nero regretted killing Poppaea and Sporus looked a lot like her, there’s an additional layer of “I’ve done this terrible thing to you and I regret it so much I’m going to try and bring you back from the dead” that he wishes would apply to the way Shiv understands the relationship.

But obviously he can’t be Sporus with Greg because of the power dynamics inherent to their relationship and to the way Tom understands interactions between men. With Greg he has to be Nero. But “I would castrate you and marry you in a heartbeat” comes out so tender because as batshit deranged as it sounds he’s offering Greg what he wants for himself. Obviously the ideal is for no one to be castrated at all, but in this world someone has to be castrated, and if someone has to be castrated maybe it’s better to be impotent and loved than to be virile and resented.

[tomwambsgans]

i'm ngl it's because i recently read fight club, But i'm thinking a lot lately about castration and the true/deepest implications of it irt nero and sporus and tom and greg. obviously we've got tom's line about greg being "castrated on pay" and some pretty solid analysis on that being a matter of tom keeping greg dependent on him, but tbh even with said meta posts...

like, i'm sorry, but it's a weak line. it feels just as strangely on the nose as shiv falling down the stairs, and in fact like a line that exists specifically to match shiv falling. it almost even seems like a last-minute rush to complete Following Up The Nero And Sporus Thing, like they did the first part and managed to get all the way to the last episode before realizing they'd forgotten to do the second thing, so they had to reach for anything they could relate castration to without having to film a new scene. this feels especially evident/likely in the fact that there is NO way greg's salary is actually getting docked to the degree that tom implied. it's markedly disappointing, too, in the way that setting it up with shiv literally falling down stairs had the audience looking forward to how the rest of the overt symbolism would play out. castration on pay was the most mundane and least expected possible conclusion, lol. and not at all on par with the literal fall. like if that is the castration we were actually waiting for the whole time...

it's also all overkill, for that matter, considering that the s3 finale fit "pushed his wife down the stairs and married sporus" thing perfectly fine and a perfect amount of vague. like tom ALREADY betrayed shiv, symbolically "killing" her, and had an ancient-roman-wedding-handshake agreement with greg about his soul. even tom and greg's initial dynamic in the final season often feels like that of a married couple. which begs the question: why have the stuff in s4 on top of that? it may very well be simply one of the many marks of s4's drop in quality, caused by a myriad of irl factors. or it could possibly be on purpose to specifically bring home something else about the nero and sporus story. maybe it's to reinforce the tomshiv divorce and also tom and greg's marriage after all the rapid shifts in dynamic. who knows.

but what i DO know is that i wanna get to the bottom (lol) of the castration symbolism/motif. so i'm gonna go through everything that could possibly inform the audience's interpretation.

i'll start with the least significant, which i believe is the reality of castration in ancient rome and in the circumstances around the irl nero and sporus. part of why this falls on the bottom rung is the fact that historical accounts of nero especially with sporus are hotly contested. another reason is that the story tom tells is one that not only omits many details in a technically misleading/recontextualizing way, but also adds details that are present in no known accounts.

so: WHY was sporus castrated? there are 2 main possibilities/reasons.

to maintain his youthful [and therefore feminine] beauty. the real sporus was most likely around 16 when nero had him castrated. and the practice of castration to preserve youth had precedence. basically, twinks were REALLY in. it's alleged that sporus may have already been more effeminate (and sexually attractive) than average. but it's also said that sporus bore an uncanny resemblance to poppaea, which nero chose him for specifically and wanted to maintain.

in order to marry him with legal/social sanction. ancient roman society, rather than being built upon the heterosexual, was more built upon the Top/generally masculine. Eunuch was a gender class/category essentially equivalent with Woman, which allowed sporus to specifically be nero's wife. this didn't mean that his marriage to sporus was necessarily seen as good and normal, only technically acceptable.

and i have a ways more to go with the analysis but i'm gonna say right here that i do not think the first reason bears any significance to tom and greg. firstly due to that there is no textual evidence that tom wants greg to be explicitly feminine, even compared to himself, and a LOT to the contrary. tom consistently invites greg to join him in performing masculinity and gaining power through it, case in point the "let's fight like chickens" scene that directly follows the nero and sporus story. secondly, sporus's possible resemblance to poppaea does not track to greg and shiv more than incidentally; greg being shiv's cousin doesn't directly earn tom anything. but more importantly, imo, is the fact that what would have made nero want sporus to look like poppaea is in direct contrast with both the story tom tells AND the way their arc plays out.

so NOW, to demonstrate this, let's look at the irl poppaea's death/murder, which happened during her second pregnancy. different historians (even those alive at the time) have different theories for how it went down. who knows how much truth they're based in, bc there's a clear heavy bias against nero, but they're all we have anyway and therefore all tom would have had. here they are:

nero kicked her in the stomach in a fit of rage, while she was fighting with him about how much time he spent at the races (main theory/rumor)

nero kicked her in the stomach in a casual outburst

nero "leapt upon her belly" either accidentally or on purpose

nero poisoned her (uncommon rumor, most likely bs)

she died through no fault of nero's at all, simply bc of complications with her pregnancy (this has the most evidence, and is believed by many modern historians)

you'll notice a complete lack of stairs-related death theories, and in fact a near total lack of Nero Purposefully Murdered Poppaea theories. the general idea is that nero deeply mourned poppaea's death (and was remorseful, if it was his own fault), and proceeded to replace her with sporus, even calling him by her name.

which feels like a good segue into the more significant story of nero and sporus to analyze: the one that TOM told.

Sporus was a young slave boy. He was Nero's favorite. And, uh... you know what Nero did to him? Well, Nero... pushed his wife... down the stairs. And then he had Sporus castrated and he married him instead. And he gave him a ring. And he made him dress up like his dead wife. ...I'd castrate you and marry you in a heartbeat.

without looking into the actual story, this would sound like nero murdering his wife in order to marry sporus. with bringing up sporus first, it even sounds like nero met sporus and started favoring him prior to killing poppaea. which is also overtly analogous to tom and greg's relationship arc.

despite what tom must have read in his book, and what one could very easily imagine him, a Wife Guy, latching onto in that book... tom isn't telling greg about the tragedy of an emperor who accidentally killed his wife and then had to replace her with a young boy. tom literally invents a method of death that there is NO preexisting source for. furthermore he chooses one that does not sound remotely unintentional. at best he keeps in line with themes that suggest a violent miscarriage. but he removes all notions of an accident. he turns it into an unambiguous, purposeful uxorcide.

so, since all notions of trying to keep sporus looking like poppaea are not only unfitting as potential parallels, but also utterly irrelevant to the version of events that tom tells, and since we know tom twists and omits many other details (like what happens just a year into their marriage) anyway... what reasons DOES tom have for bringing up castration in this story? here's the possibilities i can come up with:

to make it sound less overtly romantic through means of the bizarre. classic diversionary tactic. literally without the castration it would sound undeniably like he's just saying "i read about this ancient roman gay marriage. an emperor murdered his wife so that he could marry a boy. i would like to do that with you also :)"

to make it sound less gay, specifically, because of nero's power in the situation. this of course calls back to that second reason for the actual sporus to be castrated. it's not gay if i've made you a eunuch, greg.

to emphasize the cruelty on nero's end. tom often puts himself in the role of a villain, especially irt his behavior with greg. considering also that this whole scene follows tom talking about how he's going to prison (AND that the next time he calls greg sporus it's in the scripts before the diner scene, where he agrees to sacrifice himself and go down for greg), it would make sense for him to buffer this confession with the caveat of what a bad person he is, like express in SOME way how insane his feelings are and how terrible he knows it is that he feels this way about greg. tom is notoriously unable to make normal apologies either, so. it tracks.

i think all of these are true, and i'm sure most would agree. i'm also sure most who've read this far are in full agreement that tom fixated on the story of nero and sporus in particular because it was a gay relationship with just enough ambiguity that he's able to relate to it without panicking. hell, the "he gave him a ring" line alone doesn't even evoke an ancient roman marriage nearly as much as a modern american one. i can't find even any sources that specifically mention a ring from nero to sporus, so i imagine tom invented that as well.

BUT while i'm here i do still want to mention a couple other queer things about nero to drive home that it's not just incidental gayness but overt homosexual desire being portrayed, as well as to emphasize that second reason that the irl nero may have had to castrate sporus:

prior to knowing sporus, nero had a mock-wedding as part of festive role-reversals during saturnalia. in this wedding he took the role of a bride, marrying a different freedman.

this is apocryphal and practically historical fiction, and may also specifically be due to perceived deviancy in nero, but it's old enough (like 13th century) that it's lowkey in the nero "canon" that he had womb envy and was obsessed with being the one to get pregnant

okay so NOW... how does all this translate into the actual events demanded/foreshadowed/symbolized by this story? if pushing shiv down the stairs is the betrayal that keeps her from being able to block the gojo deal (but also shiv is shown to fall down a couple real stairs)... and marrying sporus is making the "deal with the devil" (AND the sticker on the forehead)... then what's the castration? what was the first, less on-the-nose-and-simultaneously-meaningless castration, at least?

my best answer is that it's tom getting greg to drop his brightstar buffalo plans and follow him instead. because if death is just corporate death, then your testicles/manhood is your independence. tom says you're a joke, you can't function on your own, you need me (i need you). he's insecure that greg will leave if he has the option to do so. fair enough.

......and yet i come back to my initial disappointment, because that is barely different than the pay castration. and it's redefining greg's symbolic testes to something that tom gave him in the first place, thus practically retconning the first castration. but if that's it, does shiv's literal fall also replace her kick out of the company? that would sure be stupid! is the point of rehashing the symbolism to be stupid? to have meaningless stuff follow up the more significant events? even if that was the case, wouldn't you at least be doing it to give a visual element to the symbols? if shiv gets actual stairs, WHERE are greg's actual balls? or ANY balls!!!! greg even started wearing grey suits which he hadn't done before (but shiv had), and got a "ring" in his final scene. where's the FUCKING balls, huh?????

(anyway)

occam's razor, i think, may be that the meaninglessness of the castration specifically is the point. tom's insecurity that greg will leave if he has the option to (that greg would never actually want him but only need him), has been present for basically the duration of the show. it's just a character trait, and thus doesn't even work as foreshadowing when that just means "he's gonna keep doing what he's been doing." then, take that second reason--the purely pragmatic, not based in heterosexual-adjacent desire reason--for nero to castrate sporus. aka the only reason that makes sense for the way tom spins the story.

(it's also a motivation that leaves room for not even actually doing it. sporus wasn't going through rapid masculinization or anything. and they only lived another year. you could get away with just claiming that you did it for a while, probably.)

i should say there IS technically a third reason, postulated by modern scholars, for sporus's castration: to intentionally humiliate a potential rival for the throne. imagine if tom had told greg about nero and sporus upon first meeting. obviously things changed very quickly, but if all castration is here is tom keeping greg on a tight leash, then it works. and if the castration is nothing, then greg nearly tanking tom's plan out of naivety can be a nothing version of sporus wanting revenge. and shiv falling down real stairs can, instead of actually intending to set up a meaningful castration, be a red herring in that regard and simply foreshadow her pregnancy.

and that could be it. but... i've got One More Thing. maybe the most significant of all. lightning round:

who or what, in modern day where tom and greg live, actually IS castrated?

animals

specifically dogs

hmmmmmm

and why are DOGS castrated?

to reduce sexual and territorial aggression

reduce other unwanted behaviors

to keep them from breeding

okay. think greg's newfound sexual confidence in s4 and tom's distaste for it. tom's continued anxiety that greg's independence might lead him to leave him. think greg being tom's attack dog and how that nearly backfires at the very end. greg approaching tom at the end like a begging puppy.

think full circle: who's the rescue pup, i'll take care of you, i've got you...

i feel justified in recontextualizing all of this, and i come back to fight club:

Valley of the Dogs. Where even if they don't kill you, if someone loves you enough to take you home, they still castrate you.

[thewaitisogre]

tom and shiv + stairs motif

a staircase represents a journey since stairs are in between the starting point and the destination. symbolically, stairs tell you that where a character is ascending or descending to emotionally.

tom and shiv are often seen around stairs and when they are on stairs they are descending. this represents the downward direction of their marriage. it could also represents their class difference, with shiv being the daughter of a billionaire and tom being the son of midwestern lawyers. the class inequality puts a strain on their relationship.

nero and poppaea

nero was the 5th emperor of rome known for his cruelty and debauchery. it is speculated he killed his wife poppaea and their unborn child in an outburst of rage. here is how tom retells it:

“nero pushed his wife down the stairs. and he had sporus castrated and he married him instead. and he gave him a ring. and he made him dress up like his dead wife.”

stairs might be connected to the version of the story that tom tells. he might have meant he wanted to push her down the metaphorical staircase of the company and gain back the upper hand in their relationship.

[suburbanbeatnik]

I have a bunch of favorite Roman/Byzantine couples, ranging from Factual to Probable to Crackship. Which do you like best? (There’s no other option. You Must Choose)

[blueiskewl]

Roman Coin - Gold Aureus of Nero C. AD 64-65

Obverse: portrait of Nero, NEO CAESAR AUGUSTUS. Reverse: The Temple of Janus, the Roman god of beginnings and endings. Traditionally, the temple was open during times of war and closed when peace was restored. Nero celebrates this rare occurrence by depicting the temple with closed doors.

Nero Claudius Caesar Augustus Germanicus (15 December AD 37 – 9 June AD 68) was the fifth Roman emperor and final emperor of the Julio-Claudian dynasty, reigning from AD 54 until his death in AD 68.

Nero was born at Antium in AD 37, the son of Gnaeus Domitius Ahenobarbus and Agrippina the Younger, a great-granddaughter of the emperor Augustus. When Nero was two, his father died. His mother married the emperor Claudius, who adopted Nero as his heir. When Claudius died in AD 54, Nero became emperor with the support of the Praetorian Guard and Senate. In the early years of his reign, Nero was advised and guided by his mother Agrippina, his tutor Seneca the Younger, and his praetorian prefect Sextus Afranius Burrus, but soon sought to rule independently and rid himself of restraining influences. His power struggle with his mother was eventually resolved when he had her murdered. Roman sources implicate Nero in the deaths of both his wife Claudia Octavia – supposedly so he could marry Poppaea Sabina – and his step brother Britannicus.

During Nero's reign, the general Corbulo fought the Roman–Parthian War of 58–63, and made peace with the hostile Parthian Empire. The Roman general Suetonius Paulinus quashed a major revolt in Britain led by queen Boudica. The Bosporan Kingdom was briefly annexed to the empire, and the First Jewish–Roman War began. When the Roman senator Vindex rebelled, with support from the eventual Roman emperor Galba, Nero was declared a public enemy and condemned to death in absentia. He fled Rome, and on 9 June AD 68 committed suicide. His death sparked a brief period of civil war known as the Year of the Four Emperors.

[fragonreal]

These globules are surrounded by membranes made of phospholipids (fatty acid emulsifiers) and proteins, which prevent the fat in milk from pooling together into a single mass. Butter is produced by agitating cream, which damages these membranes and allows the milk fats to conjoin, separating from the other parts of the cream. Variations in the production method will create the general populace and only really disliked by the aristocracy. Early in his reign, he was heavily advised, but he slowly became more independent. In AD 59, encouraged by his mistress Poppaea, Nero murdered his mother Agrippina. His leading adviser, Seneca, was discharged and forced to cloak themselves with their black, cape-like membranes. When night falls, they will remain hanging silently until prey wander by. Then, they swoop down and grasp their victims with their tails before biting their necks to inject a paralyzing venom. Gliscor will then apologise for sending this to you. April Fools. :D

"I agree." Red Swatch replied, seemingly knowing every word with understanding. He nodded respectfully and pranced away.

[kaursblog11]

Nero used to hit Poppaea before he killed her too, but he actually killed her while she was pregnant, and he didn't marry sporus until she was well and truly gone

Tom has only hurt Shiv with his betrayal but he hasn't killed her–killed her career or her reputation–he's only hurt her emotionally. What I think is coming up is the actual death of Poppaea(Shiv) and Nero(Tom) is entering the best position to do it.

[ancientcharm]

House of Menander (view of the Peristyle) Pompeii. Discovered in 1926. In the sixties, a seal was found inside the house that identifies the owner: a Pompeian magistrate named Quintus Popeus Sabinus, probably a relative of Nero's second wife, Poppaea Sabina.

Photography by Silvia Vacca