Nero was the son of Agrippina the Younger and Gnaeus Domitius Ahenobarbus, making Nero a great-great-grandson of the first emperor, Augustus, great-great-nephew of the second emperor, Tiberius, nephew of the third emperor, Caligula, and great-nephew of the fourth emperor, Claudius, all through his mother's side. Gnaeus Domitius died when Nero was three, of edema, leaving Agrippina a widow. After his mother married her Uncle, the Emperor Claudius, in 49 AD, Nero was adopted by Claudius in 50 AD and became the heir apparent over even Claudius's biological son, Britannicus. Claudius had gold coins (aurei) commissioned in honour of the event. Following his adoption, his name changed from Lucius Domitius Ahenobarbus (his birth name) to Nero Claudius Caesar Drusus Germanicus.

In 54 AD, Claudius died after eating a bowl of mushrooms - likely poisoned. Nero became emperor under the guidance of his mother, Agrippina. Nero is reputed to have had many people killed, including his step-brother, first cousin once removed and brother-in-law, the ten 13-year-old Britannicus, in 55 AD. When the relationship with his mother deteriorated, Agrippina followed in 59 AD; stabbed by assassins after a collapsable boat failed to kill her. Before that, she had maintained large influence over Nero's reign.

Initially, Nero's reign was popular, reversing unpopoluar Claudian edicts, and giving the Senate more power, which he did primarily so that he would have more time for his own pleasures. In the later stages, however, Nero's reign was seen as one catastrophe after another. The Piso Conspiracy that saw forty one executed left him paranoid, and the Boudicca Rebellion and other failed revolts in Judea and Gaul added to a sense of instability. The Great Fire of Rome in 64 AD destroyed ten out of the fourteen districts of the city, and while Rome was rebuilt, the treasury was bankrupted. The Senate named Nero an enemy of the public, and he commited suicide in 68 AD, beginning the year of civil war known as 'the year of the four emperors' and ending the reign of the Julio-Claudian Dynasty.

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