From May to October 2016, the Rheinisches Landesmuseum, the Stadtmuseum Simeonstift Trier and the Museum am Dom Trier will present the grand exhibition project Nero – Emperor, Artist and Tyrant.
It was especially his last years in power that have formed the “modern” image of Nero as a tyrant, persecutor of Christians, arsonist and that of a Roman emperor whose megalomania and cruelty knew no boundaries.
This firmly fixed image rose primarily from the writings of ancient authors such as Tacitus, Suetonius and Cassius Dio, members of the Senatorial aristocracy, whose way of thinking Nero was ignorant of.
The exhibition follows the aim of employing the latest scholarly findings and by means of available sources from archaeology, epigraphy, numismatics as well as ancient literature to view Nero in a new light.
Based on the latest research results in archaeology and studies in ancient history, a unique exhibition, never seen before in Germany, has been planned concerning Nero as emperor, artist and tyrant.
The Stadtmuseum Simeonstift will devote its exhibition to the fascinating reception history surrounding Nero’s person from the Middle Ages to the present, with the title Lust and Crime. Nero – The Myth in Art.
The Roman Emperor Augustus founded Augusta Treverorumin 17 BC. Thus Trier is the oldest city in Germany and was of enormous importance in Late Antiquity as an imperial residence of the Western Roman Empire. World - renowned archaeological remains testify to the city’s preeminence.
Source: Rheinisches Landesmuseum [April 03, 2016]