Caracalla

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Caracalla
Emperor of the Roman Empire
Reign	209 - February 4, 211 (with Severus & Geta); February - December 211 (with Geta); December 211 - 8 April 217 (alone)
Full name	Marcus Aurelius Antoninus Caracalla
Born	April 4, 186
	Lugdunum
Died	April 8, 217
	Near Harran
Predecessor	Septimius Severus (alone)
Successor	Macrinus
Wife/wives	Fulvia Plautilla
Dynasty	Severan
Father	Septimius Severus
Mother	Julia Domna

Roman imperial dynasties
Severan dynasty

The Severan Tondo
Septimius Severus alone
Children
Geta
Caracalla
Septimius Severus, with Geta and Caracalla
Geta and Caracalla
Caracalla alone
Interlude, Macrinus
Elagabalus
Children
Alexander Severus, adoptive
Alexander Severus

Caracalla (April 4, 186 – April 8, 217) was Roman Emperor from 211 – 217.

[edit] Life

Caracalla and Geta by Lawrence Alma-Tadema. 1907.

Caracalla was the son of the later Emperor Septimius Severus and Julia Domna. He was born in Lugdunum, Gaul, and his full name at birth was Lucius Septimius Bassianus, which was changed to Marcus Aurelius Antoninus at the age of seven, to solidify connection to the family of Marcus Aurelius. He was later given the nickname Caracalla, which referred to the Gallic hooded tunic he habitually wore and which he made fashionable. He is generally considered amongst the most brutal and murderous of Roman emperors.

[edit] Rise to power

Denarius issued in the name of Fulvia Plautilla, wife of Caracalla.

Severus, who had taken the imperial throne in 193, died in 211 while visiting Eboracum (York), and Caracalla was proclaimed co-emperor with his brother Publius Septimius Antoninius Geta. Caracalla, however, wanted to be the sole ruler. He had Geta, his own father in law Gaius Fulvius Plautianus and wife Fulvia Plautilla (also his paternal second cousin) assassinated. He persecuted Geta's supporters and ordered a damnatio memoriae against his brother. When the inhabitants of Alexandria heard Caracalla's claims that he had killed Geta in self-defense, they produced a satire mocking this claim, as well as Caracalla's other pretensions. Caracalla responded to this insult savagely in 215 by slaughtering the deputation of leading citizens who had unsuspectingly assembled before the city to greet his arrival, then unleashed his troops for several days of looting and plunder of Alexandria. According to historian Cassius Dio, over 20,000 people were killed.

During his reign as emperor, Caracalla raised the pay of an average legionnaire to 675 denarii and lavished many benefits on the army which he both feared and admired, as instructed by his father Septimius Severus who had told him to always mind the soldiers and ignore everyone else.

Three things stand out from his reign: the edict of 212 (Constitutio Antoniniana) granting Roman citizenship to freemen throughout the Roman Empire in order to increase taxation; debasing the silver content in Roman coinage by 25% in order to pay the legions their bounties; and the construction of a large thermae outside Rome, the remains of which, known as the Baths of Caracalla, can still be seen.

[edit] Fall

Caracalla coin. On the reverse, Circus Maximus, with the obelisk and the spina, restored by the emperor.

Caracalla had effectively become a military dictator, and was consequently very unpopular except with the soldiers. Ironically while travelling from Edessa to begin a war with Parthia, he was assassinated while urinating at a roadside near Harran on April 8, 217 by Julius Martialis, an officer in the imperial bodyguard. Herodian says that Martialis' brother had been executed a few days earlier by Caracalla on an unproven charge; Cassius Dio, on the other hand, says that Martialis was resentful at not being promoted to the rank of centurion. The escort of the emperor gave him privacy to relieve himself, and Martialis ran forward and killed Caracalla with a single sword stroke. He immediately fled on horseback, but was killed by a bodyguard archer. Caracalla was succeeded by the Praetorian Prefect of the Guard, Macrinus who almost certainly was part of the conspiracy against the emperor.

[edit] Source of his nickname

According to Aurelius Victor in his Epitome de Caesaribus, the cognomen Caracalla refers to a Gallic cloak that Caracalla adopted as a personal fashion, which spread to his army and his court.^[1] This interpretation of the name is also borne out by Spartian and Jerome.^{[citation needed]}

[edit] Legendary king of Britain

Bronze sesterce from Tarsus (Cilicia) with bust of Caracalla (211-217) on the obverse, and god Sandan on the reverse.

Geoffrey of Monmouth's legendary History of the Kings of Britain makes Caracalla, under the name Bassianus, a king of Britain. After Severus's death the Romans want to make Geta king of Britain, but the Britons prefer Bassianus because he had a British mother. The two brothers fight a battle in which Geta is killed, and Bassianus succeeds to the throne. He rules until he is betrayed by his Pictish allies and overthrown by Carausius, who according to Geoffrey is a Briton, rather than a Menapian Gaul as in reality.^[2]

[edit] Trivia

The city of Caracal in Romania bears his name.

[edit] See also

• Severan dynasty family tree

[edit] References

[edit] External links

• Media on Caracalla in the Wikicommons.
• Life of Caracalla (Historia Augusta at LacusCurtius: Latin text and English translation)