The Twelve Caesars - Suetonius

Apparently, parricides in ancient Rome were punished by the culprit being tied in a sack with a dog, a snake, a rooster and a monkey and thrown into the Tiber. Hell of a way to go.

The Twelve Caesars is full of such entertaining detail, being a romp though the biographies of Julius Caesar, Claudius, Nero, Caligula and a whole bunch of less well-known egomaniacal despots. In Robert Graves' translation from the Latin, we are treated to a catalogue of sexual perversion, monstrous brutality and murderous ambition that would put the New South Wales Labor Party to shame. Great fun.