To put it bluntly, Caligula was one bad mother fucker. Actually sister fucker would be the more appropriate term. He is known for his incestual relationship with his sister, Dursilla and wanting to appoint his horse as a consul. He did everything a person gone mad with power would do. Some historians state that he wasn’t crazy, but screwing around with the senators. Caligula’s reign is one of the most fascinating stories in all of human history.
Caligula was born August 31, 12 AD. His actual ridiculously long name was Gaius Caesar Augustus Germanicus. Caligula was his nick name that stuck with him. Caligula means “little boots”. He got the nickname when he was three years old when he wore a miniature soldiers uniform. The soldiers thought he looked cute and gave him the name Caligula. Caligula soon hated this name. It is tough to come across as a bad ass Emperor when your name reminds people of the cute little monkey companion from “Dora the Explorer”.
Caligula’s father, Germanicus was a Roman senator. He was killed, most likely by poisoning set up by Tiberius, the current emperor at the time. Tiberius was axing off Caligula’s family one by one. However, he decided to spare Caligula, possibly because he liked him. Granted you think Tiberius should have known it is not the best idea to kill someone’s family and leave that person alive, giving them time to plot their revenge. Seriously, this is like Zeus overthrowing Cronus, Tiberius should have seen his death coming.
(Bust of Tiberius)
On March 16, 37 AD, Tiberius died either from natural death or suffocation by Caligula or an ally of Caligula named Marco. Caligula officially became emperor on March 28, welcomed by the people of Rome. They had hated Tiberius. Everything went well in the first seven months of Caligula’s reign until he fell ill. His health recover from it, but his mind did not. He went insane like Charlie Sheen. He had the remaining family members of Tiberius executed, except he kept his uncle, Claudius alive. Ironically, Claudius would become the next emperor. It’s like emperors kill off everybody, except for the guy that will actually take their place.
Anyway, in 39 AD, Rome was in a bit of a financial crisis because of Caligula’s lavish life style and parties. He gained the money back by raising taxes, raising prices, murder, and theft. Imagine if the bankers of Wall Street broke into your house and stole your stuff to get the money they lost back. It should be noted that Caligula was actually popular among the people despite his actions and his main haters were senators.
Caligula wanted to show off is awesomeness through construction. A lot of his projects did benefit Rome, but some were just built for his ego. Caligula built a floating bridge, which was basically platforms on boats that stretched two miles from Baiae to the port of Puteoli. He then crossed the bridge wearing the breastplate of Alexander the Great, while riding on his horse, Incitatus. This stunt was a big F.U. to Tiberius’ soothsayer who said Caligula had, “no more chance of becoming emperor than of riding a horse across the Bay of Baiae”. Also I suspect that the bridge was also Caligula’s representation of him bragging that he had a big cock. Caligula also built two of the biggest ships in ancient times. One ship was dedicated to Diana. The other ship was a palace at see or to put in simple terms, a party boat.
(Caligula’s Party Boat)
The craziest thing Caligula did was when he led an army during his campaign to take Britain. However, he aborted the campaign and instead had his soldiers pick up sea shells. This gave birth to the phrase, “Sally collects sea shells by the sea shore”.
In 40 AD, Caligula declared himself as a god. He wanted to have temples dedicated to him that people would use to worship him. Caligula wanted to have a giant statue of him built in Jerusalem.
Later that year Caligula announced he would be moving to Alexandria, Egypt to be worshipped as a god there. This plan would take power away from the Senate, the Praetorian Guard, and Rome. The Senate would not allow this, so they conspired to kill Caligula. On January 24, 41 AD, Caligula was assassinated by being stabbed to death by members of the Senate and the Praetorian Guard.
This has been the second installment of Interesting Biographies. Please follow my blog for more posts like this in the future. Also check out the previous blog I did on William Bradford. Leave a comment if you have someone you want me to do a humorous biography on.
Blake Bradford 