The Great Fire of Rome: The Fall of the Emperor Nero and His City

Acclaimed author Stephen Dando-Collins sifts facts from myths of the great calamity that beset Rome in 64 A.D. and uncovers the truth behind the legend that Nero fiddled while Rome burned. In A.D. 64, on the night of July 19, a fire began beneath the stands of Rome's great stadium, the Circus Maximus. The fire would spread over the coming days to engulf much of the city of Rome. From this calamity, one of the ancient world's most devastating events, legends grew: that Nero had been responsible for the fire, and fiddled while Rome burned, and that Nero blamed the Christians of Rome, burning them alive in punishment, making them the first recorded martyrs to the Christian faith at Rome. The Great Fire of Rome opens at the beginning of A.D. 64 and follows the events in Rome and nearby as they unfold in the seven months leading up to the great fire.