But the greatest damage at the moment, and the greatest
alarm for the future, was caused by a sudden rising of the Tiber.
Immensely swollen, it carried away the bridge on piles,[183] and, its
current being stemmed by the heavy ruins, it flooded not only the
flat, low-lying portions of the city, but also districts that seemed
safe from inundation. Many people were swept away in the streets,
still more were overtaken by the flood in shops or in their beds at
home. The result was a famine, since food was scarce,[184] and the
poor were deprived of their means of livelihood. Blocks of flats, the
foundations of which had rotted in the standing water, collapsed when
the river sank. No sooner had the panic caused by the flood subsided
than it was found that, whereas Otho was preparing an expedition, its
route over the Martian Plain and up the Flaminian Road was blocked.
Though probably caused by chance, or the course of Nature, this mishap
was turned into a miraculous omen of impending disaster.
FOOTNOTES:
[152] Chap. 45.
[153] Cp. note 46.
[154] A much-frequented watering-place on the borders of
Latium and Campania. The hot baths were considered good for
hysteria.
[155] Cp. chap. 7.
[156] Dio and Suetonius both say that Otho offered to share
the empire with Vitellius, and the latter adds that he
proposed for the hand of Vitellius' daughter. Tacitus here
follows Plutarch.
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