Sed Nero nihil ambitu nec potestate senatus opus esse dictitans, se aequum adversum aemulos et religione iudicum meritam laudem adsecuturum, primo carmen in scaena recitat; mox flagitante vulgo ut omnia studia sua publicaret (haec enim verba dixere) ingreditur theatrum, cunctis citharae legibus obtemperans, ne fessus resideret, ne sudorem nisi ea, quam indutui gerebat, veste detergeret, ut nulla oris aut narium excrementa viserentur.
Nero protested, however, that he needed neither private interest nor the authority of the senate'he was meeting his competitors on equal terms, and would acquire an honestly earned distinction by the conscientious award of the judges. He began by reciting a poem on the stage: then, as the crowd clamoured for him to display all his accomplishments (the exact phrase used), he entered the theatre, observing the full rules of the harp'not to sit down when weary, not to wipe away the sweat except with the robe he was wearing, to permit no discharge from the mouth or nostrils to be visible.
final_alignments\Tacitus_Annals_Book16.json