Agrippina the Younger Paulina did not receive a hearing. Her property was confiscated. She left Italy and, on Agrippina's orders, committed suicide. In the months leading up to her marriage to Claudius, Agrippina's maternal second cousin, the praetor Lucius Junius Silanus Torquatus, was betrothed to Claudius' daughter Claudia Octavia. This betrothal was broken off in 48, when Agrippina, scheming with the consul Lucius Vitellius the Elder, the father of the future Emperor Aulus Vitellius, falsely accused Silanus of incest with his sister Junia Calvina. Agrippina did this hoping to secure a marriage between Octavia and her son. Consequently, Claudius broke off the engagement
Otto III, Holy Roman Emperor years old and had reigned as an independent ruler for just under six years, having nominally reigned for nearly 19 years. The Byzantine princess Zoe, second daughter of the Emperor Constantine VIII, had just disembarked in Apulia on her way to marry him. Otto III's death has been attributed to various causes. Medieval sources speak of malaria, which he had caught in the unhealthy marshes that surrounded Ravenna. Following his death, the Roman people suggested that Stefania, the widow of Crescentius II, had made Otto III fall in love with her and then poisoned him. The Emperor's body was carried