Extract

Octavia, the one extant fabula praetexta, dramatizes in 983 lines the fate of Nero's neglected empress (see claudia octavia). It is generally doubted that L. *Annaeus Seneca(2), who is brought in as a character trying to restrain Nero's cruelty with Stoic advice, can be its author. Style and metrics, though different in several respects from Senecan practice, do not yield conclusive evidence about the author. Moreover, *Iulia Agrippina's ghost foretells Nero's doom in words so true that they were probably written after Nero's death in 65. Specifically Senecan features, however, are clearly visible in the structural organization of the play, and especially in the portrayal of Nero as a cruel tyrant who embodies the opposite of the ideal Stoic ruler set forth in Seneca's own De clementia; see kingship.