When Nero's power was now firmly established, he ran aground upon unholy practices and took up arms against the worship of the God of all things. To write what manner of man he became in his wickedness does not belong to the leisure of the present work.
Since many indeed have handed down the matters concerning him in most accurate narratives, anyone who wishes may from them contemplate the perversity of the man's monstrous madness, in which, without reason, after carrying through the destruction of so many myriads, he was driven to such bloodthirstiness that he did not hold back even from his nearest and dearest, but did away with his mother likewise, and his brothers and his wife, together with countless others belonging to his family, after the manner of foes and enemies, by manifold forms of death.
But amid all this there was still wanting that this also should be inscribed against him: that he should be shown forth as the first of the emperors to be a foe of piety toward the Deity.
Of this, again, the Roman Tertullian makes mention, speaking somewhat thus: "Consult your records; there you will find that Nero was the first to persecute this teaching, when, having subjected the whole East especially, he was cruel toward all in Rome. We even glory in having such a one as the originator of our chastisement; for whoever knows that man can understand that nothing would have been condemned by Nero unless it were some great good."
In this way, then, this man, proclaimed before others as a foremost fighter against God, was urged on to the slaughter of the apostles. It is related that under him Paul was beheaded in Rome itself, and that Peter likewise was crucified; and the appellation "of Peter and of Paul," which has prevailed to this day over the burial-places there, confirms the account.
And no less does an ecclesiastical man, Caius by name, who lived in the time of Zephyrinus bishop of the Romans, confirm it. In a written discussion with Proclus, the champion of the Phrygian heresy, he speaks these very words concerning the places where the sacred remains of the said apostles are laid: "But I can point out the trophies of the apostles.
And that they both were martyred at the same time, Dionysius bishop of Corinth affirms thus in his written correspondence with the Romans: "By so great an admonition you have joined together the planting made by Peter and Paul, both of Romans and of Corinthians. For both of them, having likewise planted us in our Corinth, taught us; and likewise also, having taught together in Italy in the same place, they were martyred at the same time." And let this too serve, that the matters of the history may be still further confirmed.