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A listener note, this episode contains adult content and is not suitable for everyone.

Please be advised. In the

era of the Roman Empire,

the provinces under Rome's control were no strangers to capital punishment.

In fact, it was common practice for what they deemed the most heinous of crimes.

Of course, murder was considered one of the worst, along with robbery and treason.

But not all of these crimes led to certain death.

If you were an elite, you would likely face a more lenient punishment, like exile or a fine.

But the crime that almost guaranteed a punishment of death was parasite, the murder of a parent or close family member.

The Romans valued two things over all others, the state and the family.

They viewed them as parallels to each other.

Familial bloodlines determine class and status,

which were at the time key elements of establishing. and

who could do the status, which were at the time key elements of establishing how society was operated and

who could do the operating.

By killing someone in your own family, you were destroying the very fabric of Roman society,

and they reserved the most brutal methods of the death penalty for anyone who did it. The subject of today's episode,

...