The character of Nero plays the lyre as Rome burns. Peter Ustinov plays Nero in Quo Vadis, 1951. Everyone from Barack Obama to Gordon Brown and Donald Trump has had the Nero treatment. When they want to show a politician not caring about some national disaster, they dress him up in a toga, put a laurel wreath on his head and a lyre in his hands, with flames behind. It remains a favourite with modern cartoonists. This is the most famous story about him: as Rome blazed, the emperor enjoyed the spectacle while he played his lyre (his 'fiddle' as later ages put it). Did Nero really 'fiddle while Rome burned'? © Roma, Sovrintendenza Capitolina ai Beni Culturali. Roma, Musei Capitolini Archivio fotografico dei Musei Capitolini. Marble, AD 50–100 (with later restorations). It skillfully translates them into a compelling but misleading image of Nero as a tyrant. However, only a small part of the face is ancient, the rest of the sculpture is a restoration from the 1660s, relying on hostile accounts by ancient writers.
Famous for centuries, this is still the most-illustrated portrait of Nero.
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