Nero: A Roman Surena?

Suetonius preserves two short passages purporting to describe Nero’s extravagant manner of travel. It is argued that they probably relate to the one alleged incident, when Nero was preparing to launch an expedition against Galba in AD 68, and derive from a source that had sought to depict Nero as behaving more like a Parthian noble, particularly the Surena who had defeated Crassus at Carrhae in 53 BC, than a Roman emperor by this point in his career. This seems to have been in response to his settlement with Parthia over Armenia in AD 63 and his execution of his general Corbulo in AD 67.