February 12

in History

Rome, Roman EmpireClassical

Britannicus Was Born

An imperial heir doomed by a poisoned cup

Britannicus was born to Emperor Claudius and Empress Messalina, a prince whose very name commemorated his father's conquest of Britain. Yet his birthright would prove a death sentence. When Claudius was poisoned and replaced by Nero, the young Britannicus became a rival too dangerous to tolerate. At a palace dinner, Nero had him poisoned. The boy who should have been emperor died at fourteen, a casualty of Rome's most ruthless dynasty.

41 AD

Utah, United StatesEarly 20th Century

1900

Roger Traynor Was Born

A jurist who reshaped California law

Roger John Traynor was born in Utah, destined to become one of the most influential jurists in American legal history. As Chief Justice of California, he authored groundbreaking opinions that transformed tort law, tax law, and criminal procedure. His intellectual rigor and progressive vision helped make the California Supreme Court one of the most respected and innovative courts in the nation during the mid-twentieth century.

1900 AD

Soviet-Russian author and dissident (1918–2008)Late 20th Century

1974

Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn

Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn, winner of the Nobel Prize in Literature in 1970, is exiled from the Soviet Union.

Aleksandr Isayevich Solzhenitsyn was a Soviet and Russian author and dissident who helped to raise global awareness of political repression in the Soviet Union, especially the Gulag prison system. He was awarded the 1970 Nobel Prize in Literature "for the ethical force with which he has pursued the indispensable traditions of Russian literature". His nonfiction work The Gulag Archipelago "amounted to a head-on challenge to the Soviet state" and sold tens of millions of copies.

1974 AD