Reasons For Agrippinas Death

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Agrippina The Younger, a sister, mother, niece and wife of three separate Roman Emperors had numerous reasons behind her death in AD 59, all of which stemmed from the deterioration of her relationship with her son Lucius Domitius Ahenobarbus (Nero), the emperor of Rome during Agrippina’s downfall. Agrippina The Younger played a crucial role in Nero’s ascension on October 13th, AD64, her marriage to Emperor Claudius allowing her to pursuer her major ambition of securing Nero’s ascension to the throne, and thus, achieve a seemingly limitless power as chief advisor and mother to a young emperor upon Nero’s ascension in AD54. Upon his ascension to the throne, Nero made his first act, a speech at the Guards’ camp at which he gave the Praetorian Guard password, “optima mata”, meaning “the best of mothers”. It is from this that the personal relationship between Agrippina and Nero is evident, yet as Nero’s reign continued, the mother-son relationship slowly began to deteriorate. The reasons for Agrippina’s death began when her influence on Nero became challenged from every angle. The first of these instances is seen through the Senate’s changing of Claudian legislation, and despite Agrippina’s open protest, quaestors were dismissed from holding gladiatorial games and Claudius’ maximum fee charged by advocates to the senate was dismissed, despite it being enshrined in law by emperor Claudius. Furthermore, at Nero’s Armenian Delegation, Agrippina attempted to mount the dias and position herself next to the emperor, until Seneca intervened, advising Nero to step down to meet his mother and, as Tacitus described it; “avoid a scandal”. It is here that Seneca’s influence over Nero began to be publicly noticed, and as Seneca and Burrus replaced Agrippina as Nero’s chief advisors and administrators of affairs, Agrippina became increasingly frustrated at her son ands their
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