You probably heard about Elagabalus in the entry about the worst emperors, but I've been reading about him in more detail now. Some of it's pretty disturbing, so I don't plan on relating that, but there were some other more appropriate things about him. The difference between Elagabalus and one of the "Five Good Emperors" (Nerva, Trajan, Hadrian, Antoninus Pius, and Marcus Aurelius) is so colossal, it's sometimes hard to imagine they are part of the same empire.
Before we get started dissing Elagabalus, I should mention he had one serious agenda, otherwise ruling the Empire didn't matter at all to him. You may have read before he was trying to reestablish the worship of the Sun-God, Heliogabalus (that's how he got his nickname "Elagabalus" if you caught that connection (oddly like Amenhotep IV changing his name to "Akhenaten" after his fanatical obsession with Aten)). But as far as a political schedule went, it was just that. He actually banned all other cults besides Heliogabulus' and the worship of the Great Mother (Cybele, also earlier discussed (with the creepy, cutting followers)) if that tells you anything about his lovely personality.
He had a lot of different homosexual antics that I won't go into, but just know it wasn't pleasant and that he was definitely wasted the years he reigned doing a bunch of stuff he shouldn't have been!
His second wife was a Vestal Virgin (gasp!). If you don't know about the Vestal Virgins, they served 30 years worshipping Vesta in the Hall of Vesta near the Forum. They were ruthlessly punished by being burned alive and buried in an unmarked grave if they lost their virginity. This was especially unfair when they were raped, but it did happen! The people (obviously) made him divorce her though.
As far as extravagances go; he had his bath perfumed with saffron, his couches made of silver with cushions stuffed with rabbit fur and patridge feathers, lions and leopards for pets, drove chariots pulled by exotic animals, such as elephants, stags, tigers, and lions among others, wore clothes of pure silk, never wore the same shoes twice (I officially dedicate that fact to Katharine!), sometimes invited eight men with the same disability to dinner, such as eight deaf men, eight one-eyed men, or eight bald men.
You can tell he was obviously loved by the people! Actually he and his mother were killed and their bodies dragged around Rome before being thrown in the Tiber. No other emperor before him had been humiliated like that before, however degenerate they may have been!
A coin depicting Elagabalus -
A very random picture of my manikin head wearing the Atef Crown.
2 comments:
well thats.. odd.
what a creep.
oh & nice spelling of mannequin.. =P
Ya, really!
And by the way, you can spell it both ways! I made sure to check in the dictionary before I wrote it! =P
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