Editing Messalina (section)

==Downfall==
[[File:Arte romana, Busto con testa di Agrippina Minore già creduta Messalina, 50 ca. 02.jpg|thumb|A bust believed to be of Messalina, in the [[Uffizi Gallery]] in Florence]]
In the year 48, Claudius went to [[Ostia Antica|Ostia]] to visit the [[Portus|new harbor]] he was constructing and was informed while there that Messalina had gone so far as to marry her latest lover, Senator [[Gaius Silius (lover of Messalina)|Gaius Silius]] in Rome. It was only when Messalina held a costly wedding banquet in Claudius' absence that the freedman [[Tiberius Claudius Narcissus|Narcissus]] decided to inform him.<ref name="ReferenceA">Cassius Dio, Roman History. Book LXI.31</ref> The exact motivations for Messalina's actions are unknown{{snd}}it has been interpreted as a move to overthrow Claudius and install Silius as Emperor, with Silius adopting Britannicus and thereby ensuring her son's future accession.<ref name="Levick">{{cite book| title=Claudius| author=Barbara Levick| publisher=Yale University Press| year=1990| pages=64–67}}</ref> Other historians have speculated that Silius convinced Messalina that Claudius' overthrow was inevitable, and her best hopes of survival lay in a union with him.<ref>{{cite book| title=''Claudius: The Emperor and His Achievement''| author=Arnoldo Momigliano| publisher=W. Heffer & Sons| year=1934| pages=6–7}}</ref><ref>{{Cite book| title=The Emperor Claudius| author=Vincent Scramuzza| publisher=Harvard University Press| year=1940| page=90}}</ref> Tacitus stated that Messalina hesitated even as Silius insisted on marriage, but ultimately conceded because "she coveted the name of wife", and because Silius had divorced his own wife the previous year in anticipation of a union with Messalina.<ref>{{cite book| title=Annals| author=Tacitus| page=Book XI.XXVI}}</ref> Another theory is that Messalina and Silius merely took part in a sham marriage as part of a [[Bacchus|Bacchic]] ritual as they were in the midst of celebrating the [[Vinalia]], a festival of the grape harvest.<ref>{{cite book| title=Claudius| author=Barbara Levick| publisher=Yale University Press| year=1990| page=67}}</ref>

Tacitus and Dio state that Narcissus convinced Claudius that it was a move to overthrow him<ref name="ReferenceA"/> and persuaded him to appoint the deputy [[Praetorian Prefect]], [[Lusius Geta]], to the charge of the Guard because the loyalty of the senior Prefect [[Rufrius Crispinus]] was in doubt.<ref name="Barbara Levick 1990"/><ref>{{cite book| title=Annals| author=Tacitus| page=Book XI.XXVII}}</ref><ref name="ReferenceA"/> Claudius rushed back to Rome, where he was met by Messalina on the road with their children. The leading [[Vestal Virgin]], Vibidia, came to entreat Claudius not to rush to condemn Messalina. He then visited the house of Silius, where he found a great many heirlooms of his [[Claudia gens|Claudii]] and [[Drusus (cognomen)|Drusii]] forebears, taken from his house and gifted to Silius by Messalina.<ref>{{cite book| title=Annals| author=Tacitus| page=Book XI.XXXV}}</ref> When Messalina attempted to gain access to her husband in the palace, she was repulsed by Narcissus and shouted down with a list of her various offences compiled by the freedman. Despite the mounting evidence against her, Claudius's feelings were softening and he asked to see her in the morning for a private interview.<ref name="Tacitus">{{cite book| title=Annals| author=Tacitus| page=Book XI.XXXVI}}</ref> Narcissus, pretending to act on Claudius' instructions, ordered an officer of the Praetorian Guard to execute her. When the troop of guards arrived at the [[Gardens of Lucullus]], where Messalina had taken refuge with her mother, she was given the honorable option of taking her own life. Unable to muster the courage to slit her own throat, she was run through with a sword by one of the guards.<ref>{{cite book| title=''Dynasty: The Rise and Fall of the House of Caesar''| author=Tom Holland| year=2015| page=334}}</ref><ref name="Tacitus"/> Upon hearing the news, the Emperor did not react and simply asked for another chalice of wine. The Roman Senate then ordered a ''[[damnatio memoriae]]'' so that Messalina's name would be removed from all public and private places and all statues of her would be taken down.