"The Battle of Camlann ... is a legendary final battle of King Arthur, in which Arthur either died or was fatally wounded while fighting either with or against Mordred, who also perished. The original legend of Camlann, inspired by a purportedly historical event said to have taken place in Britain in 537, appears only in vague mentions found in several medieval Welsh texts dating since around the 10th century." (Wikipedia)
"...The earliest dateable reference to the battle is found in the 10th-century Welsh annals Annales Cambriae. An entry for the year 537 mentions the 'strife of Camlann, in which Arthur and Medraut fell, and there was great mortality in Britain and Ireland.' This is also the first written mention of Medraut (the later Mordred), but it does not specify whether he and Arthur fought on the same side or who won the battle."
"The image of cute little bunny rabbits doing horrible violence to people is strangely adorable – watching the twitchy nosed little guys beat the hell out of people who’d normally have then for dinner with Rosemary, thyme and sage – but it does beg a simple question: what the hell is going on?" Source: Jon Kaneko-James.
Weird images aren't unusual in manuscripts from the Middle Ages.
"Often, in medieval manuscripts’ marginalia we find odd images with all sorts of monsters, half man-beasts, monkeys, and more; even in religious books the margins sometimes have drawings that simply are making fun of monks, nuns and bishops. For example: The monkey is a popular animal to take over the human role in the marginal decorations; but so is the rabbit, along with many other animals." Source: The Digital Medieval Manuscripts blog (the article from which this quote was taken is currently unavailable).
Besides killer rabbits and knights fighting snails, the bizarre images in medieval art also include cats licking their butts, women riding Aristotle like a pony, Moses with horns on his head, Mary Magdalene covered in body hair, bored people getting killed in various violent ways, people flying spaceships and demons with faces on their crotches. And don't forget tubas in people's butts. (Listverse)
These images may have had some kind of symbolic value. There's been a lot of speculation about that, but it's also possible, I guess, that the artists were just flat-out deranged.
If immortality means that people remember your name, then the "mad Roman emperor" Gaius Julius Caesar Augustus Germanicus, more commonly known as Caligula, is definitely immortal. Everybody's heard of him even if they've never cracked a history book, which just goes to show that being a "good ruler" doesn't necessarily guarantee that your name will go down in posterity. Moral, competent leaders come and go, fading into obscurity, but villains like Caligula live on forever in movies, plays, novels and TV productions. The only problem is that most of what we think we know about Caligula -- the long litany of crimes that make him so famous -- probably isn't true.
Caligula is the most notorious Roman emperor, with a reputation for insanity, cruelty and sexual depravity based almost completely on his depiction in the media and in absurd sensationalized films like Bob Guccione's pornographic Caligula, one of the vilest, most degenerate and unhistorical movies I've ever seen. This image of Caligula as an insane emperor is so ingrained in popular culture that most people would automatically reject the idea that it's probably not accurate.
If you're interested in actual history instead of lurid Hollywood pseudo-history, you should read "Caligula: The Corruption of Power" by Anthony A. Barrett. One of the interesting things you'll learn from this fantastic revisionist biography is that everything we know about Caligula is based on just a few biased and generally unreliable ancient sources:
"The quintessential mad despot, Caligula had inspired plays, films, several series for television. Yet while the public at large seems to find him irresistible, academic biographers have tended to give him a wide berth. Nor is this surprising. The loss of the relevant books of the most important ancient commentator on the Julio-Claudian period, the historian Tacitus, means that we have to rely for our information on markedly inferior sources, in particular the late historian Dio and the biographer Suetonius." -- Caligula: The Corruption of Power, Barrett, 1989, p. xv, Forward.
In other words, we don't know nearly as much about Caligula as we think we do. Most of his image is a masturbatory Hollywood concoction based very loosely on a few unreliable ancient sources. If you read those sources, then read Barrett, a hazy but very different picture of who he actually was starts to emerge.
Image based on period portraits and sculpture.
I don't have the time or space to get into all the details here, but if Barrett is correct, it would appear that Caligula was the victim of an ancient smear campaign designed to justify his assassination to the masses and bolster the reputation of his successor, Claudius. (Note: that's my own conclusion, not Barrett's). For instance, Suetonius' admittedly entertaining biography of Caligula is an obvious hit piece accusing him of the most outlandish crimes and atrocities, including incest with his sister, but as far as that last charge goes, it was common in Roman politics to accuse your political enemies of all kinds of sexual degeneracy. Spreading malicious rumors for political purposes isn't a modern invention.
Even Suetonius' biography isn't completely negative, however. Caligula is described as a fairly competent, though inexperienced, ruler who later turned into a "monster" for some unknown reason. The impression I get from reading Barrett and Suetonius is that Caligula wasn't really interested in running the empire; like Nero, he was much more interested in the arts, especially acting, music and singing, tastes which would have made him appear effeminate and decadent in the eyes of the elite. Early in his reign, he became seriously ill and Suetonius implies that his sickness may have unhinged his mind. Even if that's true, however, many of the crimes he is accused of are unbelievable and almost certainly never happened.
Caligula had his vices, no doubt, but even if they were exaggerated (or concocted) by ancient propagandists like Suetonius, that doesn't mean that he was actually a good emperor living a chaste and moral life. He wasn't, but it's doubtful if he would have been smeared so viciously if something else hadn't been going on. The fact that he was brutally assassinated by his own Praetorians after a few short years in power shows that he had made powerful enemies among the ruling elites.
A coin depicting Gaius Caligula.
Caligula was the victim of a political conspiracy. That's a historical fact. We'll never know for sure because of the scarcity and anecdotal nature of the sources, but it appears that he was murdered because he tried to eliminate the political enemies he suspected (with justification) were trying to get rid of him. In other words, they killed him before he could kill them, a common scenario in ancient and medieval monarchies. If Caligula was paranoid, he probably had good reason.
After his murder, his enemies had to justify his assassination to the people, who apparently had a great deal of affection for this "cruel tyrant:"
"Caligula began his reign as the darling of the masses--Suetonius speaks of the immensus civium amor ('the massive affection of his fellow-citizens'). It also seems clear that he stayed popular with the ordinary people right up to the end, and indeed their reaction to the news of his death seems to have caused the sources some embarrassment." -- Caligula: The Corruption Of Power, Barrett, p. 229
Caligula was popular with the masses (1). This is critical. His murder -- and the murder of his family -- had to be justified to the people and the best way to do that was to portray him as an insane monster who had to be put down like any mad dog. Politics back then wasn't so different than it is now. For example, look at the way Saddam Hussein or Gaddafi were demonized or the way the Germans were portrayed as inhuman baby killers during World War I. These days, the mass media handles the propaganda. Back in ancient Rome, they didn't have television or radio, but that's the only real difference.
(1) "Gaius' accession was greeted with widespread joy and relief, and his civility promised well." (Oxford Classical Dictionary, 3rd ed. revised).
The popular image of Caligula isn't historical. His reputation as an insane monster was first created by ancient writers with a murder to justify and a talent for pandering to the decadent tastes of the mob, tastes that apparently haven't changed at all since the days of ancient Rome. The real Caligula, whoever he was, has been transformed into a sensationalized tabloid demon by the modern media and the mob laps it up, just like it did two thousand years ago.
The ironic thing is that if it weren't for this sensationalized image, most people wouldn't even know Caligula's name. It's one of those bizarre twists of history that his enemies, the very people who worked so hard to destroy him, ended up making him immortal.
"A vast amount has been written about the Roman Empire and its most popular Emperor, Julius Caesar, but very little was recorded about his two invasions of Britain. The only surviving texts from this truly ancient era are the records from Caesar himself, which were written later in Gaul and with the benefit of consideration and hindsight. In ‘De Bello Gallico’ (his account of the Gallic Wars), Caesar states that he was forced to flee Prittan and leave a great deal of booty and many slaves on the beach, due to a ‘threatening and impending storm’. " Source: Historic UK.
"Caesar’s trite explanation of the failure of that first invasion is biased and deeply suspicious in this writer’s humble opinion, so I set out to study this mystical period in our history and some of the ancient tales associated with the Roman wars. I discovered that in later Welsh manuscripts, the age-old oral tradition of this period had been written down by the old Bards and recorded for posterity. Whether fact or fiction, these ancient Welsh texts paint a very different and vivid picture of Caesar’s invasions and I found the narrative completely fascinating. So much so, I decided to research the events properly."
Comment: This Historic UK article is worth reading despite the Welsh author's anti-Roman bias and his tendency to romanticize pre-conquest Britain. For instance, he describes the Roman invasions by saying that "a cynical, technological age had come to replace a mythical, magical era and nothing in Britain would ever be the same again but hey, at least the roads got sorted out!"
Note: In The Conquest of Gaul, Book 4, and apparently in his reports to Rome, Caesar claimed that he "made active preparations for an expedition to Britain" -- the first invasion -- "because he knew that in almost all the Gallic campaigns the Gauls had received reinforcements from the Britons." That may have been true to some extent, but Caesar wasn't exactly an objective historian. The Conquest of Gaul was, after all, a work of self-promoting propaganda.
The Book of Revelation is thought to have been written during the reign of the Roman emperor Domitian (81-96 AD). Many Christians believe the author was the apostle John, but the consensus among scholars is that the book was written by an unknown author they call John of Patmos, who either lived on the Greek island of Patmos or was exiled there during one of Domitian's alleged persecutions of the early Christians.
Note:According to Christian sources, Domitian carried out several harsh persecutions, especially towards the end of his reign, but "some historians ... have maintained that there was little or no anti-Christian activity during Domitian's time." (Wikipedia) "The lack of consensus by historians about the extent of persecution during the reign of Domitian derives from the fact that while accounts of persecution exist, these accounts are very cursory or their reliability is debated." (That's a polite way of saying that a lot of the Christian stories about how they were persecuted in the ancient world are myths.)
It's commonly believed that the Book of Revelation describes Armageddon, the end of the world, but it seems more likely that its author was prophesying the fall of the hated Roman empire:
"Many people look to the Book of Revelations for signs of the apocalypse," according to a now-defunct source I found a while ago. "This event represents the cumulative battle between good and evil, ends the world, ushers in the Age of God. The Book of Revelations was written during a trying time in Christian and Jewish history. The book’s target was not necessarily Satan, but Rome. As a result, the final battle and victory of God over Satan was actually predicting the fall of the Roman Empire and the rise of Christianity."
According to biblical scholar L. Michael White, "most scholars now think that the issue revolved around the inauguration of the Flavian imperial cult in Ephesus ... Our clearest indication of how this is reflected in Revelation is seen in the description of the two 'beasts' from Rev. 13. The first is called 'the beast from the sea' who is given his power by Satan himself. He is described as having 'seven heads and ten horns,' and people worshiped him (Rev. 13.1-4). Then there is a second, 'the beast from the land' who makes everyone worship the first beast and its 'image' (Rev. 13.11-18). The 'image' (13.14-15) and the mysterious number '666' (13.18) refer to statues and coins or inscriptions with the emperor's image and titles. The 'beast from the land' probably referred to either the provincial governor of Asia or to the high priest of the imperial cult, who jointly would have overseen the temple and its festivals in Ephesus at just this time."
In other words, the apocalypse predicted by the Book of Revelation actually refers to the hoped-for collapse of Rome. If this view is correct, then all the millennial cults and end-times Christians who are waiting for Armageddon based on their reading of Revelation are actually waiting for an event which happened almost 1500 years ago. But the strange truth of all of this is that the Roman empire was already Christian when it collapsed in the west. Gibbon was at least partially right when he blamed the fall of Rome (partly) on "barbarians and Christianity."
It's strange and revealing that the New Testament, a collection of books about peace, love and redemption, should end with the apocalyptic bloodbath of Revelation. One minute, you have Jesus blessing the little children and talking about forgiving your enemies, then, the next minute, a beast with seven heads is slaughtering millions of sinners in a river of blood. That's quite a story arc, to say the least.
Revelation has always been my favorite book in the Bible because of its hallucinatory weirdness. This is one thing I share with Hunter Thompson:
"I have stolen more quotes and thoughts and purely elegant little starbursts of writing from the Book of Revelation than anything else in the English language-and it is not because I am a biblical scholar, or because of any religious faith, but because I love the wild power of the language and purity of the madness that governs it and makes it music." -- Generation of Swine, Introduction, Hunter S. Thompson.
Considering the Book of Revelation's surrealistic content, I've always wondered if John -- assuming that was his real name -- happened to stumble across some funny plants or mushrooms during his exile on Patmos, which, incidentally, was listed by Forbes (in 2014) as "modern Europe's most idyllic place to live." This has probably changed dramatically with the "refugee" invasion of the Greek islands, which has been an absolute disaster. The island probably wasn't that idyllic back in John's day, either, but the views, at least, must have been spectacular.
Note: The rest of this 5-part series can be found here. Scroll down to "Uploads" section.
"The Voyage of Argo," aka The Argonautica, by Apollonius of Rhodes (3rd cent. BC) is one of my favorite books from the ancient world. The story of Jason and the Argonauts and their quest for the Golden Fleece is one of the greatest adventure stories ever told and reading its descriptions of battles and monsters and sacrificial rites is like traveling thousands of years back in time. If you're interested in this classic story, I can recommend the Penguin Classics edition (1959,1971), translated by E.V. Rieu, which is particularly clear and easy to follow. The book is full of luminous scenes like this one where the Argonauts, having just landed on the island of Thynia after passing through the Clashing Rocks, see Apollo pass to the north:
"But at that time of day when heavenly light has not yet come, nor is there utter darkness, but the faint glimmer that we call twilight spreads over the night and wakes us, they ran into the harbour of the lonely isle of Thynias and went ashore exhausted by their labours. Here they had a vision of Apollo on his way from Lycia to visit the remote and teeming peoples of the North. The golden locks streamed down his cheeks in clusters as he moved; he had a silver bow in his left hand and a quiver slung on his back; the island quaked beneath his feet and the sea ran high on the shore. They were awe-struck at the sight and no one dared to face the god and meet his lovely eyes. They stood there with bowed heads while he, aloof, passed through the air on his way across the sea." -- The Voyage of Argo, Book II, pp. 89-90.
"They urged Jason to kill the best of their sheep and hold it out to the god with words of praise. Jason hastily selected one, lifted it up and killed it over the stern, praying in these words: 'God of the sea, you that appeared to us on the shore of these waters, whether the Ladies of the Brine [Nereids?] know you as that sea-wonder Triton, or as Phorcys, or as Nereus, be gracious and grant us the happy return that we desire.
"As he prayed he slit the victim's throat and threw it into the water from the stern. Whereupon the god emerged from the depths, no longer in disguise but in his own true form, and grasping the stem of their hollow ship drew her on towards the open sea."
Great stuff. Highly recommended. The 1963 movie with stop-motion effects by Harry Harryhausen is a classic. The scene where Talos wakes gave me the shivers when I first saw it as a kid.
The Book of Hours is a devotional book popular with Christians in the Middle Ages. According to Wikipedia, these are the most common type of surviving illuminated manuscripts from the period:
"Like every manuscript, each manuscript book of hours is unique in one way or another, but most contain a similar collection of texts, prayers and psalms, often with appropriate decorations, for Christian devotion. Illumination or decoration is minimal in many examples, often restricted to decorated capital letters at the start of psalms and other prayers, but books made for wealthy patrons may be extremely lavish, with full-page miniatures."
These fantastic illuminated books are valuable collector's items today. "As a group, Books of Hours are arguably the most beautiful of all books," according to one source I found. "They are also some of the most expensive, with modest examples starting in five figures. One of the finest Book of Hours -- the richly illuminated Rothschild Prayerbook -- sold for a record $13.5 million (£8.6 million) in 1999."
Comment: Considering all the time, money and painstaking craftsmanship that went into creating these masterpieces, it's obvious that they weren't just simple prayer books. Books of Hours -- the more lavishly illustrated ones, at least -- are classic examples of conspicuous consumption. Back in the medieval world, they were a display of affluence, of discretionary economic power and the political influence that goes along with it. As hyper-expensive collector's items, they're still symbols of wealth, sometimes massive wealth as in the case of the Rothschild Prayer Book. This is more than a little ironic considering their content and Jesus' teachings about the "poor in spirit," but this tension between spirituality and earthly power runs all through the history of the Christian church.
These are beautiful books, works of art, but they're too safe, too harmless to be really interesting. Nobody would have gotten into trouble for owning a Book of Hours containing devotions presumably authorized by the church. I like my medieval books to be more dangerous than that. The most interesting ones were the grimoires and banned Bible translations that had to be hidden away on pain of death or banishment. Handcrafted books gave their contents a kind of magical power, especially in an age of widespread illiteracy, and the most powerful books were full of forbidden knowledge. Books are mass-produced today, but we still have forbidden books that can't be found in mainstream bookstores and have to be read more or less in secret. The public denunciations and rituals of secrecy surrounding these books give their contents an aura of dark energy that you'll never find in a mass market paperback.
Note: Catherine of Alexandria probably never existed:
"Donald Attwater (English Catholic author, 1892-1977) dismisses what he calls the 'legend' of Saint Catherine, arguing for a lack of any 'positive evidence that she ever existed outside the mind of some Greek writer who first composed what he intended to be simply an edifying romance.' Harold Davis writes that 'assiduous research has failed to identify Catherine with any historical personage' and has theorized that Catherine was an invention inspired to provide a counterpart to the story of the slightly later pagan philosopher Hypatia of Alexandria (c. 350–370 – 415 CE)." (Wikipedia)
According to the UNESCO World Heritage List, "The [Greek Orthodox] monastery of St Catherine stands at the foot of Mount Horeb where, the Old Testament records, Moses received the Tablets of the Law. The mountain is known and revered by Muslims as Jebel Musa. The entire area is sacred to three world religions: Christianity, Islam, and Judaism." The monastery is controlled by "the autonomous Church of Sinai."
Even though St. Catherine's was named after a (probably) fictitious saint, this is still a remarkable and very old institution:
"Built between 548 and 565, the monastery is one of the oldest working Christian monasteries in the world. The site contains the world's oldest continually operating library [next video], possessing many unique books including the Syriac Sinaiticus and, until 1859, the Codex Sinaiticus."
The incredible library filmed on a potato.
Note: The manuscript shown in the video above is the Ashtiname of Muhammed, "also known as the Covenant or Testament (Testamentum) of Muhammad (the Islamic Prophet) ... a document which is a charter or writ ratified by the Islamic Prophet Muhammad granting protection and other privileges to the followers of Jesus the Nazarene, given to the Christian monks of Saint Catherine's Monastery. It is sealed with an imprint representing Muhammad's hand."
The manuscript may be inauthentic. According to Wikipedia, "Since the 19th century, several aspects of the Ashtiname, notably the list of witnesses, have been questioned by scholars. There are similarities to other documents granted to other religious communities in the Near East. One example is Muhammad's alleged letter to the Christians of Najran, which first came to light in 878 in a monastery in Iraq and whose text is preserved in the Chronicle of Seert." It doesn't really matter, though, because even if the Ashtiname is a forgery -- something I don't think anyone is claiming -- it's still a priceless artifact from the period.
Recently renovated, the library at St. Catherine's was re-opened in 2017.
The manuscripts and books in the monastery's library go way back:
"When Egeria visited the Sinai in 383-384, she wrote approvingly of the way the monks read to her the scriptural accounts concerning the various events that had taken place there. Thus we can speak of manuscripts at Sinai in the fourth century. It is written of Saint John Climacus that, while living as a hermit, he spent much time in prayer and in the copying of books. This is evidence of manuscript production at Sinai in the sixth century. The library at the Holy Monastery of Sinai is thus the inheritor of texts and of traditions that date to the earliest years of a monastic presence in the Sinai. In earlier times, manuscripts were kept in three different places: in the north wall of the monastery, in the vicinity of the church, and in a central location where the texts were accessible." Source: The Sinai Monastery website.
Research has also revealed that some of the manuscripts in the library contain "hidden manuscripts" which were erased in order to reuse the parchment they were written on.
"The Sinai manuscripts comprise the oldest and most important Christian monastic library collection. Of its 3,300 manuscripts, two-thirds are in Greek. The rest are principally in Arabic, Syriac, Georgian, and Slavonic, through there are other manuscripts in Polish, Hebrew, Ethiopian, Armenian, Latin, and Persian. The New Finds correspond to these languages, and are stored adjacent to the library. The library also contains an important archive, containing letters, account books, charters, and other documents." Source: The Sinai Monastery website.
"...The most famous manuscript is the fourth century Codex Sinaiticus, of which the monastery retains twelve pages and some twenty-four fragments."
Comment: I'm not a Christian, but St. Catherine's and its library are priceless historical treasures which must be protected at all costs. The monastery has already been the target of an attempted terrorist attack back in 2015 and as far as I can tell the Islamic State vermin are still waging a sporadic insurgency in the Sinai. I hate to say it, but if the situation deteriorates the Church of Sinai (which controls the monastery) should consider moving the library to a safer location, preferably somewhere out of the country.
"Archaeologists have found evidence of an earthquake that hit the City of David in Jerusalem about 2,800 years ago and that could be a major event described in the Hebrew Bible." Source: Live Science.
"During their excavations, the archaeological team, from the Israel Antiquities Authority, discovered a layer of destruction dating to that time in the City of David National Park. Inside the layer was 'a row of shattered vessels, including bowls, lamps, cooking utensils, storage and storage jars, which were smashed as [a] building's walls collapsed,' the archaeological team said in a statement from the IAA. Archaeologists also found no signs of a fire, and they are doubtful that the city was attacked by an invading force."
Note: The archaeologist's conclusion here is plausible, but still speculative as far as I can tell. According to Live Science, "Scholars not involved with the team's research were cautiously supportive of the team's conclusions. 'The interpretation of the archaeologists sounds possible,' said Israel Finkelstein, a professor emeritus of archaeology at Tel Aviv University in Israel."
More solid evidence is needed. I don't know if geologists could verify that an earthquake occurred in the area that long ago, but I have read that "scientists have developed a 'fossil seismograph,' which examines geological formations to find historical patterns of earthquakes reaching far back into the ancient past." (Science Daily, 2011).
Was Caligula A Victim Of Ancient Propaganda?
If immortality means that people remember your name, then the "mad Roman emperor" Gaius Julius Caesar Augustus Germanicus, more commonly known as Caligula, is definitely immortal. Everybody's heard of him even if they've never cracked a history book, which just goes to show that being a "good ruler" doesn't necessarily guarantee that your name will go down in posterity. Moral, competent leaders come and go, fading into obscurity, but villains like Caligula live on forever in movies, plays, novels and TV productions. The only problem is that most of what we think we know about Caligula -- the long litany of crimes that make him so famous -- probably isn't true.
Caligula is the most notorious Roman emperor, with a reputation for insanity, cruelty and sexual depravity based almost completely on his depiction in the media and in absurd sensationalized films like Bob Guccione's pornographic Caligula, one of the vilest, most degenerate and unhistorical movies I've ever seen. This image of Caligula as an insane emperor is so ingrained in popular culture that most people would automatically reject the idea that it's probably not accurate.
If you're interested in actual history instead of lurid Hollywood pseudo-history, you should read "Caligula: The Corruption of Power" by Anthony A. Barrett. One of the interesting things you'll learn from this fantastic revisionist biography is that everything we know about Caligula is based on just a few biased and generally unreliable ancient sources:
"The quintessential mad despot, Caligula had inspired plays, films, several series for television. Yet while the public at large seems to find him irresistible, academic biographers have tended to give him a wide berth. Nor is this surprising. The loss of the relevant books of the most important ancient commentator on the Julio-Claudian period, the historian Tacitus, means that we have to rely for our information on markedly inferior sources, in particular the late historian Dio and the biographer Suetonius." -- Caligula: The Corruption of Power, Barrett, 1989, p. xv, Forward.
In other words, we don't know nearly as much about Caligula as we think we do. Most of his image is a masturbatory Hollywood concoction based very loosely on a few unreliable ancient sources. If you read those sources, then read Barrett, a hazy but very different picture of who he actually was starts to emerge.
Image based on period portraits and sculpture.
I don't have the time or space to get into all the details here, but if Barrett is correct, it would appear that Caligula was the victim of an ancient smear campaign designed to justify his assassination to the masses and bolster the reputation of his successor, Claudius. (Note: that's my own conclusion, not Barrett's). For instance, Suetonius' admittedly entertaining biography of Caligula is an obvious hit piece accusing him of the most outlandish crimes and atrocities, including incest with his sister, but as far as that last charge goes, it was common in Roman politics to accuse your political enemies of all kinds of sexual degeneracy. Spreading malicious rumors for political purposes isn't a modern invention.
Even Suetonius' biography isn't completely negative, however. Caligula is described as a fairly competent, though inexperienced, ruler who later turned into a "monster" for some unknown reason. The impression I get from reading Barrett and Suetonius is that Caligula wasn't really interested in running the empire; like Nero, he was much more interested in the arts, especially acting, music and singing, tastes which would have made him appear effeminate and decadent in the eyes of the elite. Early in his reign, he became seriously ill and Suetonius implies that his sickness may have unhinged his mind. Even if that's true, however, many of the crimes he is accused of are unbelievable and almost certainly never happened.
Caligula had his vices, no doubt, but even if they were exaggerated (or concocted) by ancient propagandists like Suetonius, that doesn't mean that he was actually a good emperor living a chaste and moral life. He wasn't, but it's doubtful if he would have been smeared so viciously if something else hadn't been going on. The fact that he was brutally assassinated by his own Praetorians after a few short years in power shows that he had made powerful enemies among the ruling elites.
A coin depicting Gaius Caligula.
Caligula was the victim of a political conspiracy. That's a historical fact. We'll never know for sure because of the scarcity and anecdotal nature of the sources, but it appears that he was murdered because he tried to eliminate the political enemies he suspected (with justification) were trying to get rid of him. In other words, they killed him before he could kill them, a common scenario in ancient and medieval monarchies. If Caligula was paranoid, he probably had good reason.
After his murder, his enemies had to justify his assassination to the people, who apparently had a great deal of affection for this "cruel tyrant:"
"Caligula began his reign as the darling of the masses--Suetonius speaks of the immensus civium amor ('the massive affection of his fellow-citizens'). It also seems clear that he stayed popular with the ordinary people right up to the end, and indeed their reaction to the news of his death seems to have caused the sources some embarrassment." -- Caligula: The Corruption Of Power, Barrett, p. 229
Caligula was popular with the masses (1). This is critical. His murder -- and the murder of his family -- had to be justified to the people and the best way to do that was to portray him as an insane monster who had to be put down like any mad dog. Politics back then wasn't so different than it is now. For example, look at the way Saddam Hussein or Gaddafi were demonized or the way the Germans were portrayed as inhuman baby killers during World War I. These days, the mass media handles the propaganda. Back in ancient Rome, they didn't have television or radio, but that's the only real difference.
(1) "Gaius' accession was greeted with widespread joy and relief, and his civility promised well." (Oxford Classical Dictionary, 3rd ed. revised).
The popular image of Caligula isn't historical. His reputation as an insane monster was first created by ancient writers with a murder to justify and a talent for pandering to the decadent tastes of the mob, tastes that apparently haven't changed at all since the days of ancient Rome. The real Caligula, whoever he was, has been transformed into a sensationalized tabloid demon by the modern media and the mob laps it up, just like it did two thousand years ago.
The ironic thing is that if it weren't for this sensationalized image, most people wouldn't even know Caligula's name. It's one of those bizarre twists of history that his enemies, the very people who worked so hard to destroy him, ended up making him immortal.
Posted at 07:00 AM in Ancient Literature, Caligula, Commentary, Culture, Rome, Videos | Permalink