Myths, Gods, and Men
Spring 2007 Readings - Week 7
Caligula (2 of 2)
Suetonius - Lives of the Caesars 34, 43, 46, 50, 52, 58, and 59
To be read April 3, 2007 by William Booth.
XXXIV. In his behaviour towards men of almost all ages, he discovered a degree of jealousy and malignity equal to that of his cruelty and pride. He so demolished and dispersed the statues of several illustrious persons, which had been removed by Augustus, for want of room, from the court of the Capitol into the Campus Martius, that it was impossible to set them up again with their inscriptions entire. And for the future, he forbad any statue whatever to be erected without his knowledge and leave. He had thoughts, too, of suppressing Homer's poems: "For why," said he, "may not I do what Plato has done before me, who excluded him from his commonvealth?" 1 He was likewise very near banishing the writings and the busts of Virgil and Livy from all libraries: censuring one of them as a man of no genius and very little learning and the other as " a verbose and careless historian. He often talked of the lawyers as if he intended to abolish their profession. "By Hercules!" he would say, "I shall put it out of their power to answer any questions in law, otherwise than by referring to me!"
XLIII. Only once in his life did he take an active part in military affairs, and then not from any set purpose, but during his journey to Mevania, to see the grove and river of Clitumnus. 1 Being recommended to recruit a body of Batavians, who attended him, he resolved upon an expedition into Germany. Immediately he drew together several legions, and auxiliary forces from all quarters, and made every where new levies with the utmost rigour. Collecting supplies of all kinds, such as never had been assembled upon the like occasion, he set forward on his march, and pursued it sometimes with so much haste and precipitation, that the pretorian cohorts were obliged, contrary to custom, to pack their standards on horses or mules, and so follow him. At other times, he would march so slow and luxuriously, that he was carried in a litter by eight men; ordering the roads to be swept by the people of the neighbouring towns, and sprinkled with water to lay the dust.
XLVI. postremo quasi perpetraturus bellum, derecta acie in litore Oceani ac ballistis machinisque dispositis, nemine gnaro aut opinante quidnam coepturus esset, repente ut conchas legerent galeasque et sinus replerent imperauit, 'spolia Oceani' uocans 'Capitolio Palatioque debita,' et in indicium uictoriae altissimam turrem excitauit, ex qua ut Pharo noctibus ad regendos nauium cursus ignes emicarent; pronuntiatoque militi donatiuo centenis uiritim denariis, quasi omne exemplum liberalitatis supergressus: 'abite,' inquit, 'laeti, abite locupletes.'
L. He was tall, of a pale complexion, ill-shaped, his neck and legs very slender, his eyes and temples hollow, his brows broad and knit, his hair thin, and the crown of the head bald. The other parts of his body were much covered with hair. On this account it was reckoned a capital crime for any person to look down from above as he was passing by, or so much as to name a goat. His countenance, which was naturally hideous and frightful, he purposely rendered more so, forming it before a mirror into the most horrible contortions. He was crazy both in body and mind, being subject, when a boy, to the falling sickness, When he arrived at the age of man hood he endured fatigue tolerably well; but still, occasionally, he was liable to a faintness, during which he remained incapable of any effort. He was not insensible of the disorder of his mind, and sometimes had thoughts of retiring to clear his brain.1 It is believed that his wife Caesonia administered to him a love potion which threw him into a frenzy. What most of all disordered him was want of sleep, for he seldom had more than three or four hours rest in a night; and even then his sleep was not sound, but disturbed by strange dreams, fancying, among other things, that a form representing the ocean spoke to him. Being, therefore, often weary with lying awake so long, sometimes he sat up in his bed, at others, walked in the longest porticos about the house, and from time to time invoked and looked out for the approach of day.
LII. Vestitu calciatuque et cetero habitu neque patrio neque ciuili, ac ne uirili quidem ac denique humano semper usus est. saepe depictas gemmatasque indutus paenulas, manuleatus et armillatus in publicum processit; aliquando sericatus et cycladatus; ac modo in crepidis uel coturnis, modo in speculatoria caliga, nonnumquam socco muliebri; plerumque uero aurea barba, fulmen tenens aut fuscinam aut caduceum deorum insignia, atque etiam Veneris cultu conspectus est. triumphalem quidem ornatum etiam ante expeditionem assidue gestauit, interdum et Magni Alexandri thoracem repetitum e conditorio eius.
LVIII. On the ninth of the calends of February [24th January], and about the seventh hour of the day, after hesitating whether he should rise to dinner, as his stomach was disordered by what he had eaten the day before, at last, by the advice of his friends, he came forth. In the vaulted passage through which he had to pass, were some boys of noble extraction, who had been brought from Asia to act upon the stage, waiting for him in a private corridor, and he stopped to see and speak to them; and had not the leader of the party said that he was suffering from cold, he would have gone back, and made them act immediately. Respecting what followed, two different accounts are given. Some say, that, whilst he was speaking to the boys, Chaerea came behind him, and gave him a heavy blow on the neck with his sword first crying out, "Take this:" that then a tribune, by name Cornelius Sabinus, another of the conspirators, ran him through the breast. Others say, that the crowd being kept at a distance by some centurions who were in the plot, Sabinus came, according to custom,.fr. the word, and that Caius gave him "Jupiter," upon which Chaerea cried out, "Be it so !" and then, on his looking round, clove one of his jaws with a blow. As he lay on the ground, crying out that he was still alive,1 the rest dispatched him with thirty wounds. For the word agreed upon among them all was, "Strike again." Some likewise ran their swords through his privy parts. Upon the first bustle, the litter bearers came running in with their poles to his assistance, and, immediately afterwards, his German body guards, who killed some of the assassins, and also some senators who had no concern in the affair.
LIX. Vixit annis uiginti nouem, imperauit triennio et decem mensibus diebusque octo. cadauer eius clam in hortos Lamianos asportatum et tumultuario rogo semiambustum leui caespite obrutum est, postea per sorores ab exilio reuersas erutum et crematum sepultumque. satis constat, prius quam id fieret, hortorum custodes umbris inquietatos; in ea quoque domo, in qua occubuerit, nullam noctem sine aliquo terrore transactam, donec ipsa domus incendio consumpta sit. perit una et uxor Caesonia gladio a centurione confossa et filia parieti inlisa.