Epicharis (Pisonian conspirator)

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This article is about an ancient Roman freedwoman. For other uses, see Epicharis.

Epicharis, a freed slave and "heroine" of the Pisonian conspiracy. She was the daughter of a freedman making her a freedwoman. She probably was not a Roman, but a foreigner.

[edit] Life

Tacitus' Annales tells that she tried to kill Nero. She had heard that Lucius Piso was leading some senators and other citizens to conspire to murder Nero. She became impatient as to how long it was taking to complete, so decided to speed up the process. She got the Roman officer Volusius Proculus involved. Volusius was the one who murdered Agrippina, ^[1] Nero's mother. She tried to convince Volusius that he had done Nero a great service by getting rid of his mother. She even went to elaborate means to show Volusius of Nero's eccentricities and crimes.

Then suddenly she changed her mind and instead told Nero of the plot to murder him. She tried to convince Nero that Volusius was the main person behind the plot, thinking that this would put Nero on her side. The outcome didn't go that way however. It so happened that Volusius had already gone to Nero with what Epicharis was plotting. At this point Nero was undecisive as to what to do because when Epicharis told Nero of the plot she left out the names of the other co-conspirators. Epicharis was captured and tortured by Nero's henchmen to reveal other members of the conspiracy. She did not. They then went back a second time and tortured her even more - with nothing from her mouth. They then decided to go back to Epicharis to torture her for the third time when she strangled herself on her restraints. She never did give up the names of the conspirators. Ultimately the conspirators accidentally revealed who they were anyway.