Tiberius

(in full, Tiberius Claudius Nero), the second Roman emperor, successor of Augustus, who began to reign A.D. 14 and reigned until A.D. 37. He was the son of Tiberius Claudius Nero and Livia, and hence a stepson of Augustus. He was born at Rome on the 18th of November, B.C. 45. He became emperor in his fifty-fifth year, after having distinguished himself as a commander in various wars, and having evinced talents of a high order as an orator and an administrator of civil affairs. He even gained the reputation of possessing the sterner virtues of the Roman character, and was regarded as entirely worthy of the imperial honors to which his birth and supposed personal merits at length opened the way. Yet, on being raised to the supreme power, he suddenly became, or showed himself to be a very different man. His subsequent life was one of inactivity, sloth and self-indulgence. He was despotic in his government, cruel and vindictive in his disposition. He died A.D. 37, at the age of 78, after a reign of twenty-three years. Our Saviour was put to death in the reign of Tiberius.

the son of Tiber

TIBERIUS, CLAU'DIUS NERO (full title), Luke 3:1, was the

step-son and successor of Augustus, Luke 2:1, and, though with some apparent virtues, was one of the most infamous tyrants that ever scourged the empire of Rome. All the events of Christ's manhood took place during this reign. He began well, but quickly "degenerated into a gloomy despot." Madness was probably the excuse for his cruelties. He began his reign a.d. 14, reigned during the eventful period of the succeeding twenty-three years, and was finally murdered by suffocation.