Galba

Servius Sulpicius Galba ruled Rome for seven months and was killed in the forum. Born in 3 BC into an ancient and wealthy patrician family, he had a long and entirely respectable career — praetor, consul in AD 33, governor of Aquitania, Upper Germany and Africa, and a proconsulship in Spain that lasted eight years. Augustus is said to have pinched his cheek as a boy and told him that he too would have a taste of imperial power. He was seventy in AD 68, gouty and stiff, when Vindex revolted in Gaul against Nero. Galba declared for the Senate and people of Rome rather than for himself, and when Nero's support collapsed and the praetorians were bought, the Senate recognised him. He then did almost everything wrong. He arrived in Rome having executed senators and officers on the way without trial. He refused to pay the donative that the praetorian prefect Nymphidius had promised the guard in his name, saying that he chose his soldiers and did not buy them — a principled position and a fatal one, since the guard had just sold Nero. He cancelled Nero's grants and pursued recipients for repayment, which offended a wide circle, and relied on three advisers who were universally detested. He then adopted Piso Licinianus as his heir in January AD 69 rather than Otho, who had backed him and expected it. Otho bribed the guard within five days. Galba was carried into the forum in a chair and killed, and Tacitus judged him capable of ruling had he never ruled.

• Lived: 3 BCE – 69 CE
• Nationality: Roman
• Roles: ruler, general