Revelation 17:10

καὶ βασιλεῖς ἑπτά εἰσιν. “And they [the seven heads] are seven kings”: they have a double significance—standing both for the seven mountains and the seven kings.

Who are these kings? According to the view mentioned on Revelation 13:2, that the Beast is not the Roman Empire, but an embodiment of the worldly imperial spirit, it is plausibly held that the kings are kingdoms or empires (like the “kings of Persia and Grecia” in Daniel 8)—that they are the four kingdoms of Daniel 2:7, together with Egypt and Assyria that came before Babylon, and the kingdoms of modern Europe that come after Rome. On this view, the ten horns are all on one head: it is this ten-horned head which receives the deadly wound of Revelation 13:3 : i.e. the Beast is nearly slain (the Empire as an evil and persecuting power overthrown) by the conversion, first of the later Emperors, and then of the sovereigns of Europe, to Christianity: but he revives—e.g. in Julian after Constantine, and again in the neo-paganism of the Renaissance and the persecutions of the Reformation.

With all the elements of truth that must be acknowledged in this view, it seems hardly possible to doubt that the Beast, so closely united with the City of the Seven Hills, represents the Roman Empire particularly. On this view, the “kings” have been taken to represent forms of government—Rome having been successively governed, it is said, by kings, consuls, dictators, decemvirs, military tribunes, emperors, and Christian emperors (the last being taken, as before, to be the wounded head: some however make the conversion of Constantine a wound to the sixth head, and count the Ostrogoth kings as the seventh). But considering that the dictatorship, the decemvirate, and even the tribunate, were transitory episodes in the Roman government—the first avowedly exceptional, the second both exceptional and ephemeral, and all three, as well as the primitive monarchy, probably unknown to St John’s original readers,—this view does not appear even plausible.

It remains then that the kings be taken as individual Emperors of Rome (it must be remembered that though these were never called “kings” in Latin, the Greek title βασιλεύς was constantly applied to the Emperors: see e.g. 1 St Peter Revelation 2:13; Revelation 2:17). Who then were the first seven Emperors? According to the common reckoning, Julius Caesar, Augustus, Tiberius, Gaius—(often called by modern writers by his nickname Caligula, “Little Boots”): of the twelve Caesars, Julius and Claudius were better known to history by their gentile names; Augustus by his title; Vespasian and Domitian, both younger sons, were known by cognomina formed from the name of their mothers; Titus was known by the praenomen he shared with his father and brother; Tiberius, Gaius and Nero were known by their praenomina, the latter having received a cognomen of Claudius as his praenomen, Galba and Otho by their cognomina (while the elder brother of the latter was commonly known as Titianus, which was a cognomen not inherited from his father),—Claudius, Nero, and Galba. But Julius Caesar, though he received the title of Imperator as the later Emperors did, cannot be considered, and is not by careful historians, as the first of the “Emperors,” if the Empire be spoken of as a settled form of government. His authority in the state, so far as it was constitutional at all, lay in his Dictatorship: which office was legally abolished immediately after his death, and never revived. He was however deified, which marks his recognition as, so to speak, the founder of the dynasty. Augustus, and the later Emperors, ruled not as Dictator, but as Chief of the Senate with the power of Tribune.

οἱ πέντε ἔπεσαν. Augustus, Tiberius, Gaius, Claudius, and Nero. Is then the “one who is” Galba? So he is generally understood by those who adopt this scheme of interpretation: and if so, the date of the vision (see Introduction) is fixed at a time between June A.D. 68, and the 15th of January A.D. 69, when Galba was murdered. He was succeeded by Otho, who certainly “continued a short space,” if he could be said to continue at all: he killed himself, on April 15th, when defeated by the army of Vitellius, who had revolted from Galba a few days before his murder by Otho.

But the rest of the prophecy, on this view, received nothing that can be reckoned as even a typical fulfilment. Vitellius, despite many contemptible vices, was a good-natured man, and not a bad ruler, so far as he had energy to rule at all. He could not be considered as an incarnation of the Antichristian power, nor even as a revival of Nero, though he, as well as Otho, treated Nero’s memory with respect. And considering that Galba had only reigned in Rome for a few weeks before his death (though he had been acknowledged longer), that Otho never had an uncontested title, and Vitellius only from about the end of April to July 1st, it seems likelier that these three are passed over, as claimants of empire (and they had not been the only ones: see on Revelation 17:12) rather than actual emperors. Thus, the sixth king will be Vespasian, who was proclaimed emperor on July 1st, A.D. 69: his troops gained a decisive victory over those of Vitellius late in October, and Rome was taken, and Vitellius killed, on Dec. 21st.

Vespasian reigned well and peaceably, and was succeeded by his elder son Titus, in June A.D. 79: who “continued a short space,” till Sept. 12th, A.D. 81, when he died, aged 40;—murdered, as some said, by his brother Domitian, who succeeded him, and who was regarded, by pagans and Christians alike, as a revival of Nero (Juv. IV. 38; Tert[622] Apol. c. 7). Like Nero, he persecuted the Christians: like Nero, he indulged in the most hideous vices: though unlike Nero, he had a strong sense of decorum, and was fanatically attached to the Roman religion. Further than this, the vision does not follow the fortunes of the Empire in detail. At the point where the type of Antichrist comes into the history, the prophecy introduces Antichrist himself: cf. Daniel 11, as understood by most orthodox interpreters.

[622] Tertullian as quoted by Haussleiter.

ὀλίγον αὐτὸν δεῖ μεῖναι. Both “continue” and “short” seem to be emphatic—his reign is to be short, but not ephemeral. Thus the designation seems more appropriate to Titus than to Otho. St Victorinus (in the present text) applies it to Nerva, who like Titus reigned mildly for under two years. But his successor Trajan (though he to a certain extent sanctioned the persecution of Christianity, and is said himself to have condemned St Ignatius) was anything but an Antichrist. It may seem as though St Victorinus (or his editor) were making a rather clumsy attempt to reconcile the interpretation here given, which he was acquainted with as a tradition, with the general belief that St John was writing under Domitian.