Tag Archives: Top Tens

Top Tens – History (Rome): Top 10 Best Roman Emperors (Special Mention) (2) Tiberius

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Dovahhatty – Unbiased History of Rome X: The Mad Emperors

 

(2) TIBERIUS –
JULIO-CLAUDIAN DYNASTY
(14 – 37 AD: 22 YEARS 5 MONTHS 17 DAYS)

Like Claudius, you could arguably swap Tiberius into the top ten, albeit probably with more protest than for Claudius as some people – including contemporary Roman historians – seem to rank Tiberius among the worst. Even the Senate denied him the posthumous divine honors it gave Augustus and Claudius.

Those people are wrong. Indeed, it was a close call for me whom I ranked higher out of Claudius and Tiberius. As we’ve seen, ultimately I ranked Claudius higher, primarily because he inherited the empire from its worst emperor rather than its best – and because he was thrust into the position by the Praetorian Guard without any choice or preparation on his part.

Not that Tiberius was any happier to be emperor, although at least he had been nominated as heir in advance. “At the age of 55. Tiberius seems to have taken on the responsibilities of head of state with great reluctance…He came to be remembered as a dark, reclusive and sombre ruler who never really wanted to be emperor; Pliny the Elder called him ‘the gloomiest of men'”.

The problem for Tiberius is that he was overshadowed by Augustus as his predecessor, even in his own eyes. Perhaps foremost for his contemporaries was his absence of conquests as emperor, accustomed as they were to measuring an emperor by this criterion.

In my eyes, the prudence of Tiberius was exactly what the doctor ordered to consolidate the empire of Augustus – effectively Tiberius was the Hadrian to Augustus’ Trajan, but without withdrawing from any territory.

“Rather than embark on costly campaigns of conquest, he chose to strengthen the existing empire by building additional bases, using diplomacy as well as military threats, and generally refraining from getting drawn into petty squabbles between competing frontier tyrants. The result was a stronger, more consolidated empire, ensuring the imperial institutions introduced by his adoptive father would remain for centuries to come”.

This also overlooks that Tiberius had proved himself under Augustus as “one of the most successful Roman generals: his conquests of Pannonia, Dalmatia, Raetia, and (temporarily) parts of Germania laid the foundations for the empire’s northern frontier”.

It also overlooks an even better part of his prudence, though not unrelated to his prudence with respect to avoiding costly military campaigns – his financial prudence, rare among Roman emperors, such that he left the imperial treasury in huge surplus. Even Suetonius begrudged him that. While Suetonius notes that his successor and worst emperor Caligula squandered this, one wonders if the empire would have survived Caligula’s financial depredations otherwise – or whether the empire would have weathered its crisis of the first century, also known as the Year of the Four Emperors, quite so well but for the part Tiberius played in the empire’s military and financial consolidation.

Of course, it wasn’t just Augustus who overshadowed Tiberius, but Tiberius himself – particularly the latter part of his reign, after he retreated into isolation in Capri from 26 AD and his reign descended into despotism and depravity, albeit both overstated by Roman historians. The former accompanied the rise and fall of his Praetorian prefect Sejanus who effectively ruled Rome in his absence, while the latter was attributed to him in Capri by Suetonius. Let’s just say the less said about his little fishes the better – personally, I think it was just tabloid gossip made up or passed on by Suetonius. He’d probably be in a shoo-in for top ten if he’d died about halfway through his reign.

And like Claudius, when it came to a successor, he chose…poorly.

RATING: 4 STARS****
A-TIER (TOP TIER)
EMPIRE BASER

Top Tens – Top 10 Mythologies (Special Mention) (17) Earth Mysteries

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(17) EARTH MYSTERIES –
ATLANTIS, BERMUDA TRIANGLE & TUNGUSKA

“The time when the oceans drank Atlantis”

Atlantis – myth, allegory, Egyptian priestly gossip…

Not to mention empire of so-called Earth mysteries – that modern mythology of beliefs about geographical locations or monumental architecture and their “energy”. Ley lines, megaliths, pyramids, Stonehenge. Geomancy and feng shui.

But back to Atlantis, it is representative not only of ‘earth mysteries’ but of all mythic lost or sunken continents, lands and kingdoms, including phantom islands and even hollow earth or subterranean realms.

All of which could readily round out their own top ten – Lemuria or Mu, Hyperborea or Thule, Ys or Lyonesse, Agartha, Avalon or Tir Nan Og, Eldorado, Hy-Brasil, Shambhala or Shangri-La.

And they’re just the big names, although the biggest name of all in lost lands is course Atlantis itself, thanks to Plato. Ironically, Plato used Atlantis as a minor allegory (and counterpoint to Athens), set 9000 years or so before his time, one which concludes with “Atlantis falling out of favor with the deities and submerging into the Atlantic Ocean”, but it subsequently assumed a mythic significance after him.

“Atlantis has become a byword for any and all supposed advanced prehistoric lost civilizations and continues to inspire contemporary fiction”. To its mythic archetype of lost continent or land, one might also add its fantasy role as sunken, submerged or submarine kingdom – with the Atlanteans adapting to their new marine habitat.

Foremost in Atlantean mythology, at least as my personal favorites, are the so-called “location hypotheses” – the historical (or pseudohistorical) speculations as to the location of Atlantis, if only as possible sources of inspiration for Plato’s allegory.

Although not as wild as they used to be – with modern understanding of continental drift and plate tectonics putting paid to any actual lost continent (foremost among them Ignatius Donelly’s nineteenth century revival of the Atlantis myth) – there are still some wild theories proposed for America or even Antarctica as Atlantis.

Personally, I’d like to see more speculation for the United States as Atlantis – not as an allegory by Plato but a premonition (or both, the United States kinda fits the Atlantis allegory as well). Not to mention the Atlantean cold war against Lemuria-Mu.

Seriously, however, I lean more towards Plato creating a mostly fictional account, from more plausible sources of inspiration from the Mediterranean – my favorite being the volcanic eruption on Thera and the fall of Minoan civilization on Crete, although close runner-up is more contemporary (and personal) events to Plato in Sicily.

And then there are the more literary influences or interpretations – from utopias (or dystopias), including the definitive Utopia of Thomas More, to the lost land of Atlantis as metaphor for something no longer obtainable

Or again, personally I’d like to see more speculation for Atlantis as premonition by Plato, not to the future but as deep atavistic memory to the distant prehistoric past, when we were all happy little trilobites in Pangaea, or Gondawana, or whatever prehistoric supercontinent it was back then

“We can’t tell where we are… everything is… can’t make out anything…It looks like we are entering white water… We’re completely lost.”

The Bermuda Triangle is one of my personal favorite modern myths – hence its inclusion as earth mystery in this special mention – despite it being, you know, complete crap.

Firstly, it’s a pretty loose triangle, often more of a Bermuda Trapezoid, even extending as far as Ireland in some variations – although it usually includes the Sargasso Sea, which I find almost as fascinating.

Secondly, the idea of the area as uniquely prone to disappearances is only recent, arising in the mid-20th century, albeit with a bang with my favorite myth within the myth, the disappearance of Flight 19 quoted above. (It happened, but not as part of any larger triangular mystery).

Thirdly and most fundamentally, there’s no mystery. “The number of ships and aircraft reported missing in the area was not significantly greater, proportionately speaking, than in any other part of the ocean” – and “the number of disappearances that did occur were, for the most part, neither disproportionate, unlikely, nor mysterious”.

Also the claims of writers who contributed to the Bermuda Triangle legend, Charles Berlitz foremost among them for me, “were exaggerated, dubious or unverifiable” – including just straight out misreporting accounts of meteorological conditions or omitting the belated return to port of ships reported missing.

But who cares about all that – it’s just fun, particularly in fantasy, where the underlying reason for the mystery usually “will turn out that something really weird is involved with the area, such as aliens, paranormal activity, Eldritch Abominations, Atlantis, or something even weirder”. Perhaps Cthulhu or other dimensions. Even if human activity is involved, it’s some ancient conspiracy or cult.

Also this entry is intended to be representative of mysterious disappearances and “vile vortices” in general. There’s the similar Devil’s Sea (or Dragon’s Triangle) near Japan, as well as a few other triangles. The lost colony of Roanoke. The Mary Celeste. Ambrose Bierce. Amelia Earhart

And there’s also my personal Bermuda Triangle, because whenever I lose things, they vanish completely from the face of the earth – perhaps into Charles Fort’s Super-Sargasso Sea.

And then there’s the third of my holy trinity of Earth mysteries – the Tunguska Event. Although I feel a little trepidation ranking the Tunguska Event with the Bermuda Triangle and Atlantis – because unlike those latter two, the Tunguska Event is more grounded, less earthly or mysterious.

It’s also a less enduring phenomenon – an explosion in Siberia usually reckoned at 10-15 megatons on 30 June 1908. As to what caused the explosion – there’s the mystery, but again it’s usually reckoned to be a meteorite. The only catch is that an impact crater or meteorite has never been found, so the leading hypothesis is that it exploded as an air burst rather than from direct impact.

If so, it was a lucky day for St Petersberg at the same latitude, as a few hours difference might have made it the site rather than a remote and sparsely populated region of Siberia.

However, that doesn’t stop wilder hypotheses, ranging from the still relatively mundane such as a comet or exploding leak of subterranean natural gas, to the bizarre – “a deuterium-rich meteorite causing an all-natural thermonuclear explosion; a chunk of antimatter; a miniature black hole passing through the Earth; an alien spacecraft crashing or discharging some kind of superweapon; psychic experiments or magic rituals gone wrong”.

RATING: 4 STARS****
A-TIER (TOP TIER)

 

Top Tens – History (Rome): Top 10 Best & Worst Roman Emperors (7)

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Dovahhatty – Unbiased History of Rome XII: The Five Good Emperors

 

(7) BEST: MARCUS AURELIUS –

NERVA-ANTONINE DYNASTY / FIVE GOOD EMPERORS

(161 – 180 AD: 19 YEARS 10 DAYS)

 

Best known as the Stoic philosopher-emperor and for his Meditations, lending him an aura that sees him as one of the best known Roman emperors in popular culture and public consciousness, as well as one of the best. It’s a rare list of top Roman emperors that does not include him.

And I’m not here to argue otherwise. He was the last of the line nominated as the Five Good Emperors (in what is often styled as the Nerva-Antonine dynasty or perhaps more aptly the Trajanic-Antonine dynasty) , last emperor of Rome’s golden age and victor of the Marcommanic Wars – the most serious incursion into the empire and Italy itself for over two centuries.

The Marcomannic Wars were not the first threat to the empire he had to face – once again the Roman Empire faced the usual tag team of Persians and Germans, fighting the Roman-Parthian War of 161-166 AD with a revitalized Parthian Empire and a rebellious kingdom of Armenia that usually went hand in hand with any conflict with Persia.

The Romans won, with Marcus taking the title Parthicus Maximus – although it was primarily his adoptive brother and co-emperor Lucius Verus and the latter’s generals that had led the campaigns.

However, the Roman-Parthian War also brought something else – the Antonine Plague, originating in Mesopotamia and extending throughout most of the reign of Marcus Aurelius, from 165 AD to 180 AD, estimated to have killed about 10% of the empire’s population but which was particularly destructive to its army.

Ancient chroniclers depicted the impact of the plague on the army as one that saw it “reduced almost to extinction”, which compounded the impact of stripping legions from the Rhine or Danube for the war against Parthia and opened the empire up to the Marcomannic Wars. Marcus Aurelius led the Roman forces against the various invading German tribes through 166 AD to 180 AD, successfully repelling their invasions and restoring the borders of the empire (complicated by the revolt of a major usurper, Avidius Cassius in the eastern empire in 175 AD).

The death of Marcus Aurelius marked the end of Rome’s golden age – or as Roman historian Cassius Dio wrote, the point at which “our history now descends from a kingdom of gold to one of iron and rust”. Most of that was of course Marcus Aurelius’ heir and successor to the empire, his son Commodus – who remains something of a black mark on Marcus Aurelius.

How much blame fairly falls on Marcus Aurelius for his son’s character is another matter, as well as what realistic prospects there were for some alternative succession without civil war, but it was probably best summed up by writer Iain King – that the emperor’s “stoic philosophy – which is about self-restraint, duty, and respect for others – was so abjectly abandoned by the imperial line he anointed on his death”.

(By the way, if I was to add Roman emperors after 476 AD, I’d probably substitute Justinian for Marcus Aurelius, given the parallels of the Justinian Plague and a reign that saw the golden age of the eastern Roman empire only to fall apart shortly after, particularly with a less capable successor).

 

RATING: 4 STARS****

A-TIER (TOP TIER)

 

MAXIMUS:

Relatively modest with titles of Armeniacus, Medicus, Germanicus, and Sarmaticus – went all maximus for Parthicus Maximus.

DEIFIED:

Of course – also virtually a stoic saint!

EMPIRE SAVER:

Yes – I’m giving him this one for the Marcomannic Wars

SPECTRUM RANKING COMPARISON:

I rank him just one place lower, as Spectrum ranked him in sixth place.

Top Tens – History (Rome): Top 10 Best & Worst Roman Emperors

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Dilettantes think about the Roman Empire. True Roman connoisseurs rank the Roman emperors.

I owe my own rankings to the influence and inspiration of truer Roman connoisseurs than me. You don’t get more of a true Roman connoisseur than the Youtuber and X-Twitter account Daily Roman Updates, named for his updates on the Roman Empire (“It’s gone”) – and I’m prompted by his joke about asking favorite Roman emperors as an icebreaker at dates or parties, despite his inner voice repeatedly pleading with him not to say to say it.

 

 

Of course, any such ranking is subjective opinion, although there does appear to be some broad consensus (or consensuses?) about the good or better Roman emperors. You don’t get such common labels as “the five good emperors” (which I understand to have originated with Machiavelli and been advanced by Gibbon) without some consensus.

Or the phrase used by the Roman Senate itself in the inauguration of later Roman emperors, invoking two emperors as the paragons of Roman emperors. Don’t be surprised if the emperors from either the five good emperors or the Senate’s inauguration phrase feature prominently in my top ten.

And again I am influenced in my rankings by truer Roman connoisseurs. I’ve seen a post by Daily Roman Updates of his top five Roman emperors, which is largely the same as my own but for one notable exception (which we’ll get to shortly).

Similarly, the Youtuber Spectrum has ranked the Roman emperors in videos and my rankings echo his in many respects, although I dissent in others.

While the Youtuber Dovahhatty – whose Unbiased History of Rome videos are probably my single biggest influence for Roman history on Youtube but who now sadly appears to be inactive there and on X-Twitter – does not actually rank the emperors, he does depict them by meme cartoon figures as being (good) chads or (bad) virgins, with the occasional (good or bad) wojaks. Of course, his tongue is firmly in his parody cheek, such as when he depicts some of the worst Roman emperors as the chads they proclaimed themselves to be.

Of course, by definition I am only ranking my top ten Roman emperors, but I do rank the balance of ‘good’ Roman emperors in my special mentions. And because you can’t rank the best Roman emperors without also ranking the worst Roman emperors as well – primarily because the worst Roman emperors are legendary in their cruelty and depravity – I rank my ten worst Roman emperors with the balance similarly in their own special mentions.

As for any matter of subjective opinion, my criteria for ranking my top emperors are somewhat loose, but primarily might be stated to be their effectiveness in managing or maintaining the empire – which may give rise to some moral dissonance as to what we might look for in leaders of modern democratic states today, given that the lifeblood of empire was brutal war or conquest, “they make a desert and call it peace”.

Conversely, my criteria for the ranking of the worst emperors might be stated to be their ineffectiveness, often characterized by imperial defeats and usually combined with that aforementioned legendary cruelty and depravity.

As for the ground rules for whom I rank, my primary rule is that I am only ranking Roman emperors until 476 AD, when the last western Roman emperor Romulus Augustulus was deposed (with the exception I do not include eastern emperor Zeno, who reigned briefly in 474-475 AD before returning for a longer second reign from 476 onwards).

That’s really just a matter of brevity and also that I am more familiar with the ‘classical’ Roman emperors. I know that is short-changing the eastern Roman emperors, particularly as they had a millennium of imperial history after that and probably had more basic competence or effectiveness on average, or at least not the same depths of legendary cruelty and depravity as their worst counterparts in the classical empire.

So yes – sorry Byzantine bros, I am not ranking any eastern Roman emperors from 476 AD onwards in my top ten. Instead, they will get their own special mentions, good and bad, in which I will effectively rank my top best and worst eastern Roman emperors, just only against each other and not among Roman emperors as a whole.

Oh well, what the hell – you can have a ranking of eastern Roman emperors for my top ten as a treat. I rank Basil II (the Bulgar-Slayer) as the best eastern Roman emperor and he would easily rank in my top ten if it extended to 1453 AD. (He was that notable exception for Daily Roman Updates’ top five emperors as against my own, although I’m not sure I’d rank him quite as high).

Otherwise, I’d rank Justinian (narrowly missing out in a close call for best eastern Roman emperor) and Heraclius in my top ten emperors if extended to 1453 AD – probably also Alexios I Komnenos, although he illustrates the further problem of scale between the eastern Roman empire and the classical empire in comparing the emperors of both together. That is, he was operating on a far smaller scale than the emperors of the classical empire – although that also cuts both ways in that he overcame the greater challenges of fewer resources against more powerful enemies posing a genuine existential threat.

As for top ten worst Roman Emperors, I’d easily rank the eastern Roman emperor (and usurper) Phocas among them, pronouncing judgement in the same terms as Heraclius “Is this how you have ruled, wretch?”

On that note, I acknowledge my hubris from my armchair of hindsight in judging people, the least of which has ruled far more than anything I ever have (as in anything at all) – although I’d like to think that I’d have done a better job than the worst of them. Oh, who am I kidding? I’d be partying it up to legendary depravity as well.

My ground rule still leaves the issue of which emperors to rank prior to 476, given the list of claimants to that title – a list that as historian Adrian Goldsworthy points out is likely never to be complete or exhaustive, given the paucity of the contemporary historical record and that we are still finding ‘imperial’ coins minted in the name of new or unknown claimants.

So I’ve gone by Wikipedia’s list of Roman emperors, although I reserved the right to consider their entries noted to be of more dubious legitimacy in further honorable (or dishonorable) mentions.

Finally, in addition to my usual star and tier-rankings (which, given that I’m also ranking the worst emperors, goes all the way down to 1 star and F-tier rankings), I also have some other rankings for emperors:

MAXIMUS

The clearest ranking, since it’s the victory titles awarded to or claimed by Roman emperors (setting aside of course the title of emperor or imperator itself) for victories in battle against adversaries or opponents, which I’ll extend to include literal triumphs (for their triumphal processions in Rome)

DEIFIED OR DAMNED

Again a relatively clear ranking (albeit not always), for emperors who were deified after their deaths (I’ll allow this to include sainted) or damned – that is the subject of a damnatio memoriae, or cancelled posthumously to use the modern term. Of course, deification became a little like the Roman currency in the later empire – so routine that it became debased.

EMPIRE MAKER / SAVIOR OR EMPIRE BREAKER / DEBASER (DEBAUCHER)

Exactly what it says on the tin – my own particular (and hence subjective) distinction for those (good) emperors that made or saved the empire – or the (bad) emperors that broke or debased it (bonus points for debauching it as well). Debased the empire that is, not the currency – all emperors did the latter, with a few exceptions, although I will point out those worthy of particular mention

SPECTRUM RANKING COMPARISON

Because of the influence of Spectrum’s rankings for me, I’ll compare them to my own. I’ll also note Dovahhatty’s chad/virgin/wojak rankings here.

Top Tens – Mythology: Top 10 Books (Special Mention) (16)

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(16) JAN HAROLD BRUNVAND – URBAN LEGENDS

 

Jan Harold Brunvand is a retired American folklorist best known as a prolific popularizer of that modern folklore par excellence, urban legends – in a series of books from The Vanishing Hitchhiker: American Urban Legends and their Meanings in 1981 onwards.

The titles of the books often included an archetypal or iconic urban legend – from The Vanishing Hitchhiker itself through The Choking Doberman to the Mexican Pet. They also extended to books collecting urban legends with the thematic focus of being lusty (and it is surprising how many urban legends involve sex) or scary (which is less surprising), with perhaps the perfect storm of urban legends involving both.

“Many urban legends are framed as complete stories with plot and characters. The compelling appeal of a typical urban legend is its elements of mystery, horror, fear, or humor. Often they serve as cautionary tales. Some urban legends are morality tales that depict someone acting in a disagreeable manner, only to wind up in trouble, hurt, or dead.”

“Urban legends will often try to invoke a feeling of disgust in the reader which tends to make these stories more memorable and potent. Elements of shock value can be found in almost every form of urban legend and are partially what makes these tales so impactful. An urban legend may include elements of the supernatural or paranormal”.

 

RATING: 4 STARS****

B-TIER (HIGH TIER)