VITELLIUS, Aulus, the ninth of the twelve Caesars, and Roman emperor during the greater part of 69 a.d., was the son of Lucius Vitellius, who had been consul and governor of Syria under Tiberius, and distinguished for his gross and ridiculous flattery under Caius (Caligula) and Claudius, which the senate, who gave him a public funeral, recognized by a statue with the inscription “Pietatis immobilis erga principem.” He was one of the intimate companions of Tiberius at Capreae; he had driven chariots in the circus with Caius, had played dice with Claudius, had induced the young Nero to sing at a public entertainment, and had been a censor once and a consul three times. He had been governor of Africa, and had there, according to Suetonius (Vitellius, 5), acquitted himself creditably. Under Galba, to the general astonishment, he was chosen to command the army of Lower Germany, and here he made himself popular with his subalterns and with the soldiers by an outrageous prodigality and an excessive good nature, which soon proved quite fatal to order and discipline. Far from being an ambitious or scheming man, he was lazy and self-indulgent, fond of eating and drinking, and he was in fact drifted into empire by the promptings of Caecina and Valens, commanders of two legions on the Rhine. Through these two men a military revolution was speedily accomplished, and early in 69 Vitellius was proclaimed emperor at Cologne, or, to speak more accurately, emperor of the armies of Upper and Lower Germany. In fact, he was never acknowledged as emperor by the entire Roman world, though at Rome the senate accepted him and decreed to him the usual imperial honours. But after all he was only emperor in name. It was noted as a bad omen that he received the title of supreme pontiff on the ...