Tiberius Julius Caesar Augustus was the second Roman emperor. He ruled ancient Rome from AD 14 to AD 37. Tiberius ruled in succession to his stepfather Augustus. He continued the work of Augustus, establishing stability, but was no comparison to his powerful stepfather. .
Tiberius's mother, Livia, brought her son into her marriage to Augustus in 38 BC. Tiberius was brought up as Augustus's stepson, and he was expected to devote his life to serving his stepfather's interests.
As a young man, Tiberius became an especially smart general. With his brother, Drusus, he helped carry out the expansion of the Roman Empire for Augustus. The empire now reached along the Danube River and into Germany. After the death of Agrippa, a friend of Augutus, Tiberius was forced in 11 BC to divorce his wife Vipsania, Agrippa's daughter, and marry Agrippa's widow Julia. At the same time he was made to adopt Gaius and Lucius, the two sons of Agrippa and Julia. These were Augustus's grandsons and intended successors. Due to his personal life, Tiberius retired to Rhodes in 6 BC. He was called back to Rome, however, in AD 2, and, in AD 4, with Augustus's grandsons Gaius and Lucius both dead, Tiberius was adopted as the legal son of Augustus. .
Tiberius succeeded Augustus in AD 14. When Tiberius came to power, the empire was in a poor financial condition and the army was suffering from a shortage of manpower due to the Varian disaster that occurred in AD 9. Tiberius also had to control the mutinies that broke out when the Roman people found out that Augustus had died. This led him to build little and provide few games for the people to enjoy. Tiberius's unpopularity contrasted greatly from that of the popular Germanicus, his expected successor. When Germanicus died in AD 19, many of the Romans believed that Tiberius poisoned him so that his own son, Drusus, would succeed. Drusus died, however, in AD 23, opening up the question of who would rule Rome after Tiberius.
