The forgotten statue of Nero at the Isthmus of Corinth is a relic of the time the Roman emperor granted freedom to a part of ancient Greece.
It is also a testament to the man who ordered that the Corinth Canal be built. This enormous project allows ships to circumnavigate the Peloponnese on their way to the Ionian Sea and vice versa. However, there are no historical records of who the actual creator was or when the monument of Nero on the rock was sculpted.
The Isthmus of Corinth has been known since ancient times as the dividing line between the Peloponnese and mainland Greece. A manmade waterway there would directly connect the Aegean Sea to the Ionian.
In the 1st century AD, geographer Strabo pointed out a stele on the Isthmus of Corinth, bearing two inscriptions. One pointed East towards Megara of Attica. It said: “That is not Peloponnese, but Ionia.” The other pointed West towards the Peloponnese and read: “That is Peloponnese, not Ionia.”
On his way to Athens, Plutarch, a historian and traveler, attributed the erection of this column to the Attica hero Theseus. The idea of a shortcut so that sailing vessels would not circumnavigate the Peloponnese had been considered for a long time by the ancient Greeks. Yet, it was such a difficult and costly project that it was abandoned due to the specifics.
The Corinth Canal, across the Isthmus of Corinth in Greece, did not materialize until the end of the 19th century.
Roman Emperor Nero Starts Construction of the Canal
The first attempt to open a canal in Corinth was made by the Corinth tyrant Periander in the 7th century BC. However, he soon abandoned the project due to technical difficulties. Instead, he ordered a simpler and less expensive land-based stone ramp, called “diolkos,” a type of passageway.
The passageway was paved with porous blocks and had two grooves in the middle at a distance of 1.5 meters (4.92 feet) between them. Barges were pulled from one point to the other. Remains of the passageway exist to this day next to the modern canal.
When the Romans took control of Greece in 146 BC, several different solutions were proposed and attempted. Julius Caesar foresaw the benefits of a Peloponnese-mainland union for his newly founded Corinth, referred to as Colonia Laus Iulia Corinthiensis.
In 32 AD, during the reign of Tiberius, engineers began digging a canal but soon gave up due to lack of modern equipment. Instead, they built an ancient Egyptian mechanism. The boats rolled across the isthmus upon tree trunks, just as the Egyptians used to roll huge blocks of granite to build their pyramids.
In 67 AD, Philhellene Roman Emperor Nero ordered six thousand slaves to dig a canal with shovels. The historian Josephus writes that the slaves were mostly Jewish pirates captured by Vespasian during the Jewish wars.
The emperor himself began working on this, giving the first blow to the land of the isthmus with a golden pickaxe on November 28, 67 AD. According to Pliny the Elder, construction progressed in four stages, covering about 700 meters (2,296 feet). The following year, Nero died, and his successor Galvas abandoned the project as too costly.
Nero Grants Freedom to Achaea
In ancient Greece, Achaea included the whole of the Peloponnese and the southern part of modern-day Central Greece. Corinth was an important part of the region, as it was the connecting point between the two.
In 146 BC, following the Battle of Corinth, the city was sacked by the legions of Roman General Lucius Mummius. All men were killed, and women and children were enslaved. This was in retaliation for Corinth participating in the Achaean League that opposed Roman rule.
About two centuries later, when Nero was emperor of Rome, he visited Greece in 66 to 67 AD. He was a philhellene but also liked spectacles and games, as well as narcissistic exhibitions of his emperor status.
Other than commencing the building of the canal, Nero assembled the Greeks at Corinth and granted liberty to Achaea. To compensate the Roman Senate for their loss of revenue from the province of Achaea, he gave them Sardinia as a senatorial province.
Emperor Nero’s Edict
The inscription containing Nero’s edict was discovered in Karditsa, Greece in 1887.
Since it is my desire to requite most glorious Hellas for its loyalty and respect toward me, I bid all persons of this province, so far as possible, to assemble at Corinth on November 29.
When the people had gathered in an assembly, Nero delivered the following oration:
I bestow upon you, men of Hellas, a gift such as you never hoped for, even though my generosity knows no bounds, a gift so great that it never occurred to you to ask for it. All Hellenes living in Achaea and what until now has been known as the Peloponnesus, receive your liberty and freedom from taxation, a freedom which you never had even in your most glorious days, for you were subject either to foreigners or to one another. Would that I could have conferred this boon when Hellas was in her prime, that greater numbers might enjoy this favor; and for that reason I find fault with the age, in that it already has minimized the extent of my grant. And now I bestow this boon not from pity, but from good will, and I am requiting your gods, whose constant care for me I have experienced both by land and by sea, that they have granted to me to confer such benefits. Other princes have given cities their freedom; Nero alone has set free an entire province.
However, Emperor Vespasian (69-79 A.D.) withdrew the grant.
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