On this date in 37AD the increasingly weird and reclusive Tiberius, Rome's second emperor, choked on his last cookie. Officially the death was of natural causes, however there was a young man present who had enough means, motive, and opportunity to keep people speculating for millennia.
The young man in question had been fairly constantly humiliated by the paranoid, syphilitic codger. His mother and brothers had been imprisoned, exiled, and died from the old coot's creeping paranoia. He had spent six years as a virtual hostage in the hermit emperor's bolthole on Capreae, witness to enough bizarre stuff that Gore Vidal and Bob Guccioni would gross people out with it on the big screen in the hedonistic 1970s. He was named as joint successor in the emperor's will. Oh, yeah, he had motive and to spare...
The young man in question was Tiberius' grand-nephew, son of the rock-star general Germanicus: young Gaius Julius Caesar Germanicus. An army brat, the nickname hung on him as a child by his dad's soldiers has stuck with him to this day: Caligula. He reportedly hated it.
My college history prof described Tiberius thusly: "He would screw anything that moved, provided it held still long enough for him to grab hold. It was a very nervous time around the palace."
ReplyDeleteStupid is as stupid does, they say, but with crazy you're on your own.
All the bizarre stories do make me wonder why anyone would hang around a Roman emperor in those days. I'm guessing every palace functionary inspired betting pools regarding his life expectancy. It would be like being President of Afghanistan, another job I can't believe anyone really wants, but lots of people apparently do.
ReplyDeleteThe Julio-Claudian era really only had three good reigns: Augustus, Claudius, a quarter of Tiberius', a quarter of Caligula's, and every other day of Nero's.
ReplyDeleteWhy did people hang around the Emperor? Same reason they hang around Washington nowadays, money and power. The Emperor could and did hand these out on a whim. If you showed up for roll call, you got a shot at the goodies. If you didn't you wound up being the source of the goodies.
ReplyDeleteJoel, all the bizarre stories make you wonder how Suetonius survived after writing "The XII Caesars". Maybe because everyone he wrote about was long dead?
ReplyDeleteI do believe that "scrupulous" comes from the Latin ...
I've often wondered how biased Suetonius and Tacitus were. Tacitus was still a kid when Nero deprived the world of a great artist, and Suetonius was born after the ascent of the Flavians, so neither were firsthand witnesses to the alleged goings-on in Julio-Claudian days. The Nervan dynasty was still young when both men were writing, and after Domitian, anybody would have looked good.
ReplyDeleteWell, maybe not syphilitic. Syphilis was Atahuallpa's revenge.
ReplyDeleteCharmingly enough, it originated as an STD of llamas (more information than you really wanted to know, right?), and I put together an obscenely obscene song about it one drunk night back in school.
It would also appear thet the Scottish, Irish, and Breton sailors fishing the Grand Banks during the 14th,15th,and 16th centuries went ashore on occasion.
Although syphilis was called the "Spanish Disease", the first documented European outbreak was actually among prostitutes in Hull England in the 1450's. Hull was a major transshipment port for dried Scottish cod.
It would appear ancient Europe had a mild variety of Gonorrhea, but the modern day variety seems to be either an import or a mutation also brought back from the new world.
One imagines sporting patterns in old Rome and Greece might have been a bit different if they had made it to the new world and the west African rain forest.
Reportedly, Caligula awoke from a month-long coma induced by sickness with a penchant for inflicting debauchery and humiliation on the empire and especially the ruling class.
ReplyDeleteIf Barry Soetoro were to undergo a similar experience, would anyone be able to tell the difference?
@ Tam,
ReplyDeleteI've heard that some modern scholars are speculating that Nero, while nuts, maybe wasn't quite as nuts as we're led to believe.
I like the plumbism explanation for Imperial crazyness, m'self.
ReplyDeleteBut not from the water pipes. Lead oxide formed fairly quickly and sealed them.
ReplyDeleteHowever,they sweetened their drinks with lead, and the leaching was accelerated by the acid in the wine..