In the following, we shall examine these two points. 
Only ‘Tacitus and Suetonius report a second poisoning. 
In Suetonius’ text, we find a hint of the possibility that 
the poison was administered as an enema: 
‘“Etiam de subsequentibus diversa fama est. Multi statim hausto 
veneno obmutuisse aiunt excruciatumque doloribus nocte tota defecisse 
prope lucem. Nonnulli inter initia consopitum deinde cibo afluente 
evomuisse omnia, repetitumque toxico, incertum pultine addito, cum 
velut exhaustum refici cibo oporteret, an immisso per clystera, ut 
quasi abundantia laboranti etiam hoe genere egestionis subveniretur. ”’ 
(Suetonius, Divus Claudius, XLIV, H. Ailloud ed., vol. 2, p. 148) 
**Reports also differ as to what followed. Many say that as soon as 
he swallowed the poison he became speechless, and after suffering 
excruciating pain all night, died just before dawn. Some say that he 
first fell into a stupor, then vomited up the whole contents of his 
overloaded stomach, and was given a second dose, perhaps in a gruel, 
under pretense that he must be refreshed with food after his ex- 
haustion, or administered in an enema, as if he were suffering from 
a surfeit and required relief by that form of evacuation as well.’’ 
(Suetonius, J. Gavorse ed., p. 236) 
This passage tells us that Suetonius himself does not 
believe that he is relating established facts. He remains 
skeptically detached from his own report by explicitly 
stating that he is just reporting rumors and opinions. 
One rumor says nothing of a second poisoning: Claudius 
died from the first poison. The second rumor gives two 
variants: he was indeed administered a second poison— 
according to the first variant, orally in a porridge; accord- 
ing to the second, rectally as an enema. Whatever they 
say, we must discard Suetonius’ rumors as representing 
only hearsay information to which we should not give 
more credit than Suetonius does himself. 
In comparison, Tacitus’ report sounds more reliable. 
The text (Ann., XII, 67) has already been quoted. 
‘Tacitus stresses that the events which happened during 
the memorable banquet became known in every detail 
later on. He refers to writers living at the time of the 
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