Pax Romana, Caligula: Fiend, Monster, or Baddie?

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Ny Carlsberg Glyptotek, København's photo: A marble bust of Caligula (right) with traces of original paint and a plaster replica (left) approximating the polychrome traditions of ancient sculpture.

Caligula is currently famous, or infamous, for being a stark-raving-mad monster with no redeeming qualities. Although scholars have been acknowledging that we don't actually know much about him.

I'm not about to try rehabilitating Caligula's image. But I've got suspicions about what the third Roman emperor was really like. I'll get back to that.

But first, I'll take a brisk slog through some of what Tacitus and Suetonius had to say about Caligula; followed by a bit about statues, art and post-Renaissance preferences.

And finally, what folks like Caligula and Nero were doing in the Pax Romana.

That's the idea, at any rate. More at A Catholic Citizen in America.

(Looking at ancient Roman politics, what we do and do not know, seeing Caligula from a provincial perspective; and restoring color to ancient statues.)

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