Caligula was the third Roman emperor, ruling from AD 37 to 41. The first six months of Caligula’s reign were absolutely blissful as he brought forth several reforms and policies that were meant for the benefit of his citizens. However, following his ill health, he became a tyrannical leader. Records depict him as a cruel and unpredictable leader. He restored treason trials and put people to death.
Background
Gaius Caesar Augustus Germanicus was born on August 31, 12, in Antium (modern Anzio and Nettuno), Roman Empire, to Germanicus and Agrippina the Elder. He was the third of the six surviving children of the couple. Gaius had two older brothers, Nero and Drusus, as well as three younger sisters, Agrippina the Younger, Julia Drusilla, and Julia Livilla. Caligula came from a prominent line of Roman leaders. Julius Caesar was his great-great-grandfather, Augustus was his grandfather, and his father Germanicus was one of Rome’s most effective and popular generals.
Education
During his childhood, Caligula's family lived at his father’s posting on the Rhine, where the general’s troops gave the future emperor his nickname "Caligula," meaning "little boot," in reference to the miniature uniform in which his parents dressed him.
After the death of his father, Tiberius took over the throne. Caligula stayed with his mother, great grandmother, and later grandmother. Caligula’s mother and brothers were accused of treason, and all died in prison or exile. Caligula’s grandmother Antonia managed to shield him from these intrigues until Sejanus’ death in 31.
The next year, Caligula moved in with the aging Tiberius, who gleefully indulged his great-nephew’s worst habits, commenting that he was "nursing a viper in Rome’s bosom." Tiberius adopted Caligula and made him and his cousin Gemellus equal heirs to the empire.
Flavius Josephus pointed out that Caligula studied diligently, wanting to please Tiberius, who appreciated a good education. As a result, he studied well not only the subtleties of his native Latin but also the ancient Greek language, which was a mandatory part of education in the Roman Empire.
In March of 37 A.D., Tiberius fell ill. He died a month later, and rumors swirled that Caligula had smothered him. It didn't matter. Romans were ecstatic over his death, in part because the empire now fell into the hands of Caligula, whom citizens believed packed the same qualities as his esteemed late father. The Roman Senate fell right in line, naming 24-year-old Caligula, who had no experience in government, diplomacy, or war, as sole emperor of Rome.
Caligula’s appointment as emperor and his return to Rome was marked with extreme joy, celebration, and ecstasy. The Romans welcomed "their own son" with open arms. His reign as an emperor commenced on a good note. He started off by granting bonuses to military men and city troops. Subsequently, he recalled exiled people by nullifying Tiberius’ treason papers. He even banished certain sexual deviants and helped people affected by the imperial tax system.
Caligula's efforts were met with enthusiasm. He freed citizens that had been unjustly imprisoned by Tiberius and eliminated an unpopular tax. He also staged lavish events, including chariot races, boxing matches, plays, and gladiator shows. However, six months into his rule, Caligula fell severely ill. For nearly a month, he hovered between life and death. In October of 37 A.D., he recovered, but it was quickly apparent that he was not the same person.
After this he restored treason trials, showed great cruelty, and engaged in wild despotic caprice; e.g., he bridged the Bay of Naples with boats from Baiae to Puteoli in the summer of 39. In 38 he executed Naevius Sutorius Macro, prefect of the Praetorian Guard, to whose support he owed his accession, and Tiberius Gemellus, grandson of Tiberius, whom he had supplanted in the succession.
He made pretensions to divinity and showed extravagant affection for his sisters, especially for Drusilla, who on her death (in 38) was consecrated Diva Drusilla, the first woman in Rome to be so honored. Some scholars believe that he intended to establish a Hellenistic-type monarchy after the brother-sister marriages of the Ptolemies of Egypt. Others thought that after his illness he was mad; however, much evidence of this is suspect and some - e.g., that he made his horse consul - is untrue.
Though Caligula was criticized for his executions, he was widely appreciated for his support, generosity, and bounteousness. His extravagance led to the exhaustion of the state treasury. In order to restore state funds, he took desperate measures, including seizure of properties, re-interpretation of Tiberius’ will, levying taxes on the lawsuit, prostitution, false fining, incorrect accusation, and forceful confiscation.
Within a year of his enthronement, he had squandered more than 2.7 billion sesterces that Tiberius had amassed all through. Resultantly, the financial crisis led to a brief famine. However, to tackle the same, he increased grain imports from Egypt.
Despite the financial crunch, Caligula did not compromise with his construction projects. During his reign, he oversaw the construction of various temples, theatres, racetracks, and so on. To improve public transportation, he built new roads and ordered the construction of channels that are considered to be engineering marvels even today. Furthermore, he repaired the city walls and the temples of the gods.
For his personal gains, Caligula expanded the palace. He supervised the construction of a temporary floating bridge to be built using ships as pontoons from the resort of Baiae to Port of Puteoli. He got two large ships constructed for himself. The two ships are considered amongst the largest vessels in the ancient world; one of them being nothing less than a floating palace.
In 39 A.D., a feud arose between Caligula and the Roman Senate that deteriorated their relations. Upon reviewing Tiberius’ treason trials, he concluded that many senators were not trustworthy. As such, he ordered a fresh set of investigations and trials. He replaced the consul and put several senators to death.
On the eastern front, Caligula, along with Herod Agrippa, suppressed several riots and conspiracies that rose from tension due to the spread of Greek culture, Roman law, and the rights of the Jews in the empire. Flaccus, who served as the perfect, ordered the installation of statues of the emperor in Jewish synagogues. This move caused a major riot which led to Flaccus’ removal from the post and his subsequent execution. In 40 A.D., riots broke out between Jews and the Greeks; the Jews were accused of not honoring the emperor. Resultantly, Caligula ordered the erection of a statue of himself in the Jewish Temple of Jerusalem. The order was later revoked as it conflicted with Jewish monotheism.
In 40 A.D., he expanded the Roman Empire into Mauretania. The annexation had both personal and political motives; to suppress the pressing military and economic needs and to curb down potential future threats. He also attempted the expansion of his empire into Britannia, but the annexation was only realized by his successor. Some of the most outlandish claims by Caligula came when he introduced religion into his political role. He not just referred to himself as God but also dressed like one. He replaced the heads of various statues of gods with his own, and stated his wish to be worshipped as "Neos Helios" or the "New Sun." He further ordered Roman senators to worship him as a tangible, living god.
In 40 A.D., Caligula claimed that he would leave Rome and move to Alexandria, Egypt permanently. He made this announcement, hoping that he would be revered as a living God in Egypt. Rome soon grew to hate its leader, and citizens began a secret push to get rid of him. On January 24, 41 A.D., Caligula was attacked by a group of guardsmen, following a sporting event. During the assassination, Caligula was stabbed 30 times and killed. His body was dumped into a shallow grave, and his wife and daughter were murdered.
Caligula's death pushed the Senate to immediately order the destruction of his statues in hopes of eradicating him from Rome's history. Still, more than two millennia since his rule, Caligula's legacy is deemed a fascinating piece of Roman history. He was succeeded as emperor by his uncle Claudius.
Caligula began his reign by repealing the repressive and unpopular measures of his predecessor. Caligula supervised the abolishment of certain taxes, helped better Roman infrastructure and public transportation, and aided those harmed by natural calamities or mean rules. He significantly increased the expenses of the state and imperial treasury by organizing large-scale construction and expensive performances. In less than four years of his reign, Caligula annexed Mauretania, personally conducted maneuvers in Germany, and planned an invasion of Britain.
Caligula lavished large sums on aqueducts, harbors, theatres, and temples in his name. Although his excessive architectural ambitions ran Rome into debt, he successfully oversaw the completion of important Roman buildings. They include the Temple of Augustus, Pompeii’s Theatre, the rebuilding of the walls in the temples of Syracuse, and the Roman city in the Alps.
Religion
Caligula's religious policy was a firm departure from the policy of his predecessors. Under Augustus, the Cult of the Deified Emperor had been established and promoted, especially in the western empire, and was generally the first organization established in any new Roman colony. Augustus proclaimed on multiple occasions that he was not himself personally divine; instead, the Cult centered around his numen, his personal spirit, and gens, the collective spirit of his family and ancestors.
After Augustus, Tiberius seems to have had little interest in the Cult, and its promulgation and expansion seem to have been on a local level and driven by local magistrates, rather than from a central organizational structure. Caligula expanded this Cult on an unprecedented scale. The temple of Castor and Pollux on the Forum was linked directly to the Imperial residence on the Palatine and dedicated to Caligula himself; he would appear here on occasions, dressed and presenting himself as a god, and demanding that those in his presence adopt sycophantic methods of acknowledging him. The nature of the Cult of the Deified Emperor changed from honoring the spirits around the Emperor to direct worship of Caligula himself.
Likewise, Caligula's policies affected religious practice in the whole of the Empire, not just those practices associated with the Cult. The heads of the statues of many of the gods throughout Rome and the empire were replaced with Caligula's head, including many of the female statues, and Caligula demanded that he be worshiped as an embodiment of these gods, similar to the Hellenistic ruler-cults.
Caligula even planned to place a statue of himself as Zeus in the Holy of Holies in the Jewish Temple in Jerusalem; the Jews had been granted religious rights and freedom by Julius Caesar and were generally treated as being outside the scope of Roman religious law. This attempted was delayed for years by the governor, Publius Petronius, and finally ended due to the intervention of Herod Agrippa, a personal friend of the Emperor and King of Judea.
Politics
At the beginning of the reign, Caligula abolished Octavian Augustus's law on insulting majesty (Latin lex de maiestate; lex maiestatis), which Tiberius used to fight real and imaginary opponents. The new emperor had personal grounds for abolishing this extremely unpopular law, since his selective use of Tiberius led to the exile and, in the future, the death of the mother and brothers of Caligula.
In 38, Caligula returned to the people the right to elect some magistrates, which Tiberius passed to the senate (a purely ceremonial function of formal affirmation of the appointments remained for the people's assembly). Various reasons are mentioned, which could encourage Caligula to return to the republican election system.
Competition between applicants for high posts could be thought of by the emperor as an incentive for candidates to perform various entertainment events, which could shift part of the burden from the treasury to the shoulders of individuals. However, the practical significance of this measure was small, since the emperor retained the right to nominate candidates and to vouch for candidates for posts. As a result, the practice of allocation of seats, in which all candidates for magistrates in the required number were approved in advance, was retained.
The return to the traditional order of elections was not supported by senators who were used to managing the approval of magistrates and therefore sabotaged the reform. The popular vote did not take root in the new conditions, and already in 40, Caligula returned to the system of approval of magistrates in the Senate. The final abolition of the election of magistrates showed the political flexibility of the emperor, who was not afraid to cancel the failed reform.
Caligula undertook several other measures concerning the Senate. The emperor enshrined the traditional order of the order of statements in the Senate vote, as modified by Tiberius. The reasons for this reform are unclear. The point of view of Dione Cassius, who believed that Caligula wanted to take away the right of the first vote from Mark Yuni Silan, was not supported.
The liberalization of domestic politics at the beginning of Caligula's rule affected other spheres of public life - as a rule, he abolished the repressive measures taken by Tiberius. The writings of Titus Labienus, Cremucia Corda, and Cassius Severus, banned by Tiberius, were not only permitted but were also supported by the emperor in the distribution of the few remaining copies.
Some of the activities of Caligula led to the revival of the economy. So, large-scale construction works pumped up the economy with money and created new jobs. Trimalchion from the Satyricon Petronia allegedly became rich in the rule of Caligula, when "wine was valued on a par with gold," which, apparently, has a real prototype in the growth of demand for luxury goods.
The coinage under Caligula's reign underwent several changes. Apparently, it was his initiative to close small mints in Spain. The main mint was moved from Lugdunum to Rome, which increased the influence of the emperor on coinage. Apparently, coins were minted most actively at the very beginning of Caligula's rule to ensure mass distribution. In addition, for some obscure reason, in the year 38, neither gold nor copper coins were minted, and later there were relatively few gold and silver coins.
Views
Quotations:
"Let them hate me so that they will but fear me."
"I have existed from the morning of the world and I shall exist until the last star falls from the night. Although I have taken the form of Gaius Caligula, I am all men as I am no man and therefore I am a God."
"Would that the Roman people had but one neck!"
Personality
Many historians noted the incredible cruelty of Caligula. It’s said that whenever Caligula would get bored at the gladiatorial games, he would order his soldiers to throw in the arena a dozen people from the crowd. The Emperor loved all kinds of entertainment. He liked to play dice, watch gladiatorial battles, and hunting. When one day five gladiators with special cruelty killed five surrendered colleagues, the emperor expressed discontent with both their actions and the violent reaction of the crowd, who enjoyed the blood; in this, they see evidence of the absence of a special inclination of the emperor to cruelty in comparison with his contemporaries.
Tortured by headaches, Caligula wandered the palace at night. He abandoned the customary toga for silken gowns and often dressed as a woman. In addition, Caligula flaunted his power, eliminating his political rivals and forcing parents to watch the executions of their sons. Most egregious, however, was Caligula's declaration that he was a living God, ordering a bridge to be built between his palace and the Temple of Jupiter so that he could have consultations with the deity. Not even marriage and the birth of a daughter seemed to change him.
During his reign, he is said to have slept with the wives of many men. He was also accused of forcefully prostituting his sisters. It is said that Caligula turned his palace into a brothel.
Physical Characteristics:
Caligula was tall, pale and so hairy that he made it a capital offense to mention a goat in his presence. He worked to accentuate his natural ugliness by practicing terrifying facial expressions in a mirror.
Quotes from others about the person
"I am nursing a viper for the Roman people, and a Phaëthon for the whole world." - Tiberius
"But the madness and frenzy to which he gave way were so preposterous, and so utterly insane, that he went even beyond the demigods, and mounted up to and invaded the veneration and worship paid to those who are looked upon as greater than they, as the supreme deities of the world, Mercury, and Apollo, and Mars." - Philo
Interests
playing dice, watching gladiatorial battles, hunting
Sport & Clubs
Chariot racing
Connections
Caligula was married four times. His first wife was Junia Claudilla, daughter of Tiberius's friend Mark Junius Silan. The wedding took place, probably, in 33, in Ancy. A few years later, Junia, according to Suetonius, died during childbirth. At the beginning of the reign, Caligula married Livia Orestilla, the bride of Gaius Calpurnius Piso. A few days later, Caligula divorced her, which was not uncommon in the first century.
In the autumn (probably in September-October), 38, Caligula married Lollia Paulina, who was married to Publius Memmius Regulus. The Emperor divorced Lollia in the spring or early summer of 39. In 39, soon after the divorce from Lollia, Caligula married for the fourth time. His new wife was the married Milonia Caesonia, the mother of three, who was seven years older than the emperor. His fourth wife and his daughter, who was his only child, were murdered at the same time as he was.
Father:
Germanicus
Mother:
Agrippina the Elder
Unlike her weasely son, Caligula’s mother Agrippina the Elder was a famously tough and courageous woman. She went out on campaigns with his father, the beloved general Germanicus, and served as his advisor.
late wife:
Junia Claudilla
Claudilla became the first wife of Caligula on the island of Capri, at the urging of Tiberius. Following Junia Claudilla's death, Caligula married Livia Orestilla.
ex-wife:
Livia Orestilla
Caligula married Livia after forcing her to annul her marriage to Gaius Calpurnius Piso. Caligula divorced her the next day, prohibiting her from having a relationship with Piso. Livia Orestilla and Piso were eventually banished for adultery.
ex-wife:
Lollia Paulina
Known for her dazzling beauty, Lollia Paulina was taken from her husband Memmius Regulus by Caligula and briefly reigned as his third wife from 38 to 39.
Wife:
Milonia Caesonia
Milonia Caesonia was the fourth wife of Emperor Caligula. She was several years his senior. Initially, Caesonia lived with Caligula as his mistress. He later married her during the summer of 39 AD. She bore him a daughter a month later who was named Julia Drusilla, in honor of his dead sister. Caligula appears to have been at last devoted to someone, but time was running out.
Daughter:
Julia Drusilla
Brother:
Nero Julius Caesar
Brother:
Drusus Caesar
Sister:
Agrippina the Younger
After Agrippina’s plot to kill her brother collapsed, Caligula showed her what might have been his last shred of mercy. Instead of killing his sister, he only stripped her of all worldly possessions and exiled her to the remote Pontine Islands.
Sister:
Julia Drusilla
Caligula’s favorite sister Julia Drusilla died of an unknown illness just a year after he came to the throne. Caligula took the loss very badly, and reportedly even refused to leave her corpse or let anybody touch it. Besides his sanity, Drusilla’s death also drained him of any fondness for his other sisters.
Sister:
Julia Livilla
After watching her brother Caligula spiral into madness, Julia Livilla and her sister, Agrippina, conspired to kill him and install a new emperor in his place.
References
Caligula: A Biography
The infamous emperor Caligula ruled Rome from A.D. 37 to 41 as a tyrant who ultimately became a monster. An exceptionally smart and cruelly witty man, Caligula made his contemporaries worship him as a god. He drank pearls dissolved in vinegar and ate food covered in gold leaf. He forced men and women of high rank to have sex with him, turned part of his palace into a brothel, and committed incest with his sisters.
2003
Legends of the Ancient World: The Life and Legacy of Caligula
Throughout the history of the Roman Empire, many rulers held the reins of ultimate power. Some of them, like Octavian, Trajan, Hadrian, Constantine, and Marcus Aurelius, are still celebrated and considered among antiquity’s great statesmen, generals, and thinkers. But the Roman Empire also had its fair share of notorious villains, from the sadistic Nero to the debauched Commodus. And yet, all of Rome’s poor rulers pale in comparison to the record and legacy of Gaius Julius Caesar Augustus Germanicus, a young man remembered by posterity as Caligula.
2013
Emperor Caligula: Man, Monster, Myth
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