 | Seneca the Younger: Encyclopedia II - Seneca the Younger - Biography
Seneca the Younger - Biography
Born in Cordoba, Hispania (in modern Spain), Seneca was the second son of Helvia and Marcus (Lucius) Annaeus Seneca, a wealthy rhetorician known as Seneca the Elder. Seneca's older brother, Gallio, was proconsul at Achaia (where early Christian documents recall he encountered the apostle Paul about AD 52). Seneca was uncle to the poet Lucan, by his younger brother, Annaeus Mela.
Tradition relates that he was a sickly child, and that he was taken to Rome by an aunt for schooling. He was trained in rhetoric, and studied neo-Pythagorean and, principally, Stoic philosophy. But there is very little 'hard' biographical information available from his own works and where this appears to be the case, one needs to exercise extreme caution as it is invariably misleading, and included simply to illustrate some philosophical idea rather than to impart biographical data. Other historical accounts are written from biased points of view, and make the reconstruction of the original life of Seneca problematic.
Under his father's and aunt's guidance, he established a successful career as an advocate. Around 37 he was nearly killed, as a result of a conflict with the Emperor Caligula, who only spared him because he believed the sickly Seneca 'would not live long', anyhow. In 41, Messalina, wife of the Emperor Claudius, persuaded Claudius to have Seneca banished to Corsica on a charge of adultery with Julia Livilla. He spent his exile in philosophical and natural study, and wrote the Consolations.
In 49, Claudius' new wife, Agrippina, had Seneca recalled to Rome to tutor her son, L. Domitius, who was to become the emperor Nero. On Claudius' murder in 54, Agrippina secured the recognition of Nero as emperor over Claudius' son, Britannicus.
For the first five years, the quinquennium Neronis, Nero ruled wisely under the influence of Seneca and the praetorian prefect, Sextus Afranius Burrus. But, before long, Seneca and Burrus had lost their influence over Nero, and his reign became tyrannical. With the death of Burrus in 62, Seneca retired, and devoted his time to more study and writing.
In 65, Seneca was accused of being involved in a plot to murder Nero, the Pisonian conspiracy. Without a trial, Seneca was ordered by Nero to commit suicide. Tacitus gives an account of the suicide of Seneca and his wife, Pompeia Paulina, who chose to follow her husband in death.
Other related archives37, 370, 4 BC, 40, 41, 42, 44, 49, 52, 54, 56, 62, 63, 64, 65, Achaia, Ad Marciam, De consolatione, Agamemnon, Agrippina, Britannicus, Caligula, Claudius, Cordoba, De Brevitate Vitae, De Providentia, De Tranquillitate Animi, Dritte Stoa, Elizabethan England, Epistulae morales ad Lucilium, Euripides, European, Gallio, Greek tragedy, Hispania, Julia Livilla, Loeb Classical Library, Lucan, Lucilius, Medea, Messalina, Nero, Octavia, Oedipus, Ovidian, Paul, Pisonian conspiracy, Renaissance, Roman, Seneca the Elder, Sextus Afranius Burrus, Silver Age of Latin literature, Spain, Stoic, Tacitus, Thomas von Kienperg, Thyestes, advocate, clemency, cosmology, dramatist, humorist, medieval, meteorological, meteorology, moral, neo-Pythagorean, philosopher, philosophy, praetorian prefect, proconsul, rhetoric, rhetorician, satire, statesman, tragic drama, universities, virtue
 Adapted from the Wikipedia article "Biography", under the G.N U Free Docmentation License. Please also see http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki |
