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(TITUS FLAVIUS VESPASIANUS).
Roman Emperor, b. at Reate (nowRieti), the ancient capital of the Sabines, 18 Nov., A.D. 9; d. there, 23 June, 79. His father was a prosperous tax-gatherer and moneylender, while the fact that his mother's brother was a senator may have at least encouraged him to enter the public service. Early in his career he had opportunities to become familiar with conditions in the Levant, where he served as quaestor; before entering his thirty-fourth year he had filled still more important magistracies. After serving with the army inGermany, he made a successful expedition into Southern Britain in command of the Second Legion, and attained consular rank in A.D. 51. Ten years later he was proconsul inAfrica. He first appears in history as a member of the imperial suite when he accompaniedNero on a tour through Greece; but Vespasian was evidently a very poor courtier, for it is said that he fell asleep inNero's presence while the emperor was reciting one of his own poems. In spite of this offensive conduct, and either becauseNero could be sensible enough to forget personal animosities when reasons of state demanded, or because no one else could be found who was not still more objectionable, Vespasian was appointed to conduct thewar against theJews-an appointment whichproved the immediate cause of his elevation to the purple.
Brutal oppression by successive Roman governors, culminating in the atrocities of Gessius Florus, had stirred theJews to an insurrection in which the Roman garrison ofJerusalem was slaughtered. Many considerationsobliged the Roman Court to take a serious view of this disturbance, not the least being the widespreadbelief that a new power originating inJudea was destined to supplantRome in the mastery of the world. Taking with him his son Titus, Vespasian, in 66, invadedJudea, entering upon the lastwar in which theJews were to take part as a nation. The siege ofJerusalem, in which more than half a million of the inhabitants perished, was conducted by Titus, and ended in the fall of the city (2 Sept., 70), and the final destruction of the Temple. In the meantimeNero's career had ended insuicide, his successor, Galba, had been killed by Otho, and Otho, in his turn dethroned by partisans of Vitellius, had followedNero's last example. While the Jewishwar was still in progress the soldiers inEgypt proclaimed Vespasian emperor (1 July, 69), and their comrades inJudea confirmed the choice. Ostensibly, at least, he had made no bid for the diadem, but his soldiers were sincerely attached to him, and the debauchee Vitellius,Nero's parasite and favourite, whom the legions inGermany had proclaimed, was as unpromising from a military point of view as he was morally worthless. Vespasian remained at his post inJudea, while his lieutenant, Antonius Primus, with the armies of Pannonia and the Balkan Peninsula, invadedItaly, routed the Vitellian forces nearCremona, and stormedRome, which was defended by the Praetorian Guard and the populace (20 Dec., 69). It was not until the following summer that the new emperor left the conduct of affairs in Palestine to his son Titus and entered the city to receive confirmation at the hands of the Senate.
Vespasian's assumption of the imperial authority ended one of those spasms of civilwar which had shakenRome at intervals ever since the days of Marius and Sulla. His reign was distinctly an era of reform. Titus, who was to become one of the most beneficentpagan rulers in history, was associated as Caesar in hisfather's administration. The dignity of the Roman Senate was revived, largely by elimination of the disreputable elements; thelaw of treason, an odious legal cloak for tyranny, was abrogated; the courts of law were reformed; military discipline was placed upon a fairly secure basis. Vespasian, who was a master of financial administration,knew how to lavish his wealth in adding to the splendour of the imperial city, and it was in his reign that the Colosseum was begun. Abroad, the final conquest ofJudea was followed by the suppression of a serious rising inGaul and the consolidation of Roman authority in Britain by Cneius Agricola, who built the chain of forts between the Firths of Clyde and Forth. Still more important to the subsequent progress of civilization was the period of tranquility for the infant Church which began in this reign. The official classes ofRome then regarded theChristians vaguely as a Jewishsect, and as such the latter was subject to the impost of half a shekel for rebuilding the Capitoline temple, which had been destroyed whenRome was stormed for Vespasian; but this tax does not seem to have been the occasion of any general harsh treatment.Tertullian (Apologia) andEusebius (Church History) agree in acquitting Vespasian ofpersecution.St. Linus, thepope whose death occurred during this period, cannot beproved to have sufferedmartyrdom, while St. Apollaris ofRavenna, though amartyr, may very well have suffered at the hands of a local mob.
The character of this emperor showed very little, if anything, of thepagan tyrant. Though himself a man of no literary culture, he became the protector of hisprisoner ofwar, the Jewish historianJosephus, a worshipper of theOne God, and even permitted him the use of his own family name (Flavius). While this generosity may have been in some degree prompted byJosephus's shrewd prophecy of Vespasian's elevation to the purple, there are other instances of his disposition to reward merit in those with whom he was by no means personally sympathetic. Vespasian has the distinction of being the first Roman Emperor to transmit the purple to his own son; he is also noteworthy in Roman imperial history as having very nearly completed his seventieth year and died a natural death: being in feeble health, he had withdrawn to benefit by the purer air of his nativeReate, in the "dewy fields" (rosei campi) of the Sabine country. By his wife,Flavia Domitilla, he left two sons, Titus andDomitian, and a daughter,Domitilla, through whom the name of Vespasian's empress was passed on to a granddaughter who is revered as a confessor of the Faith.
TACITUS, History; SUETONIUS, Lives of the Twelve Caesars: Vespasian; JOSEPHUS, De bello jud.; TERTULLIAN, Apologia, V; ALLARD, Hist. des persecutions pendant les deux premiers siecles (Paris, 1892); IDEM, Le Christianisme et l'Empire Romain (Paris, 1898); MERIVALE, Hist. of the Romans under the Empire (London, 1865); HENDERSON, Civil War and Rebellion in the Roman Empire, A.D. 69- 70.
APA citation.Macpherson, E.(1912).Vespasian. InThe Catholic Encyclopedia.New York: Robert Appleton Company.http://www.newadvent.org/cathen/15379a.htm
MLA citation.Macpherson, Ewan."Vespasian."The Catholic Encyclopedia.Vol. 15.New York: Robert Appleton Company,1912.<http://www.newadvent.org/cathen/15379a.htm>.
Transcription.This article was transcribed for New Advent by Michael T. Barrett.Dedicated to the Poor Souls in Purgatory.
Ecclesiastical approbation.Nihil Obstat. October 1, 1912. Remy Lafort, S.T.D., Censor.Imprimatur. +John Cardinal Farley, Archbishop of New York.
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