A Brief Titus Petronius Bio

Petronius, called Arbiter (Titus), Roman Epicurean poet at the Court of Nero, in order to avoid whose resentment he opened his veins and bled to death in A.D. 66, conversing meanwhile [255]with his friends on the gossip of the day. To him we owe the lines on superstition, beginning “Primus in orbe Deos fecit timor.” Petronius is famous for his “pure Latinity.” He is as plain-spoken as Juvenal, and with the same excuse, his romance being a satire on Nero and his court.