Caracalla (188-217). Roman emperor from the Severian dynasty, who ruled from 211 to 217 AD e. In 212 he issued an edict granting the rights of Roman citizenship to the provincials. The policy of pressure on the Senate, the executions of the nobility caused discontent and led to the fact that Caracalla was killed by the conspirators.
Septimius Bassianus, the eldest son of Septimius Severus, was renamed by his father to Marcus Aurelius Antoninus, and went down in history under the name of Caracalla (he wore a robe with that name). His mother Julia Domna is a Phoenician by birth, daughter of Bassian, priest of the Sun. Two years after the birth of the first child named after her grandfather, Julia gave birth to her second son, Geta. Septimius Severus, being governor of Pannonia, commanded the Roman legions stationed on the banks of the Danube and Rhine when he seized imperial power in 193.
196 - his father proclaimed Bassian Caesar and then gave him the name of Marcus Aurelius Antoninus, whom he considered the greatest of the emperors. According to the testimony of the ancient historian Herodian, author of The History of Imperial Power after Mark, both sons of Septimius Severus were spoiled by luxury and a metropolitan way of life, an excessive passion for spectacles, a commitment to equestrian competitions and dancing.
In his childhood, Caracalla was distinguished by his gentle disposition and friendliness, but after leaving childhood, he became withdrawn, sullen and arrogant. From childhood, the brothers were at enmity with each other, and over time, this enmity acquired a truly pathological character.
Septimius Sever married Caracalla to the daughter of his favorite Plavtian. The new princess gave her husband enormous sums of money as a dowry. There were so many of them that, according to statements, so many could have been the dowry of 50 queens.
By the will of the founder of the dynasty, approved by the Senate and recognized by the Praetorian Guard and the legions, both sons of Septimius Severus - the eldest son of Caracalla and the younger Geta - were declared August. This kind of dual power turned out to be fraught with grave consequences and was a definite miscalculation of the experienced Septimius Sever. He believed that the reign of his two sons would be able to strengthen the dynasty, be able to balance the tough and strong-willed character of Caracalla, the gentleness and caution of Geta, but the opposite happened. Immediately, an irreconcilable struggle broke out between the brothers and the court cliques behind them. Attempts by their mother Julia Domna to reconcile the sons-emperors did not lead to anything.
After the solemn funeral of Septimius Severus in Rome, his sons divided the imperial palace in half and “both began to live in it, clogging up tightly all the passages that were out of sight; only the doors leading to the street and the courtyard, they used freely, while each posted his guard. Openly hating each other, each did everything he could, just to somehow get rid of his brother and get all the power into his own hands. For the most part, the Romans were inclined to the side of Geta, because he gave the impression of a decent person: he showed modesty and gentleness in relation to the persons who addressed him. Caracalla, on the other hand, showed cruelty and irritability in everything. Julia Domna was unable to reconcile them with each other.
Having been at odds like this for some time, the brothers were completely about to divide the empire among themselves in order not to harm each other, staying together all the time. They decided that Goethe would withdraw the eastern part of the state with the capital in Antioch or Alexandria, and Caracalla - the western part with the center in Rome. But when Julia Domna was informed about this agreement, she, with her tears and persuasions, was able to convince them to abandon this pernicious undertaking. By this, she, perhaps, saved the Romans from a new civil war, but doomed her own son to death.
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Hatred and rivalry between the brothers grew. According to Herodian, they "tried all kinds of deceit, tried to come to an agreement with the cupbearers and cooks, so that they would plant some kind of poison on another." But they did not succeed, because everyone was on the alert and very wary. In the end, Caracalla could not stand it: incited by the thirst for autocracy, he decided to act with sword and murder. Tragic events unfolded in February 212.
Remembering his mother's passionate desire to reconcile the brothers, Caracalla solemnly vowed to the empress that he would try to do everything possible to live in friendship with his brother. Julia, deceived by the insidious son, sent for Geta, begging him to come to her chambers, where her brother is ready to reveal to him his best intentions and make peace with him. The Empress's chambers, which were considered holy by the laws of the empire, became the site of the bloody massacre of Geta. As soon as he entered the bedroom, people with daggers rushed at him. The unfortunate man rushed to his mother, but this did not help him.
Mortally wounded Geta, having poured blood on Julia's chest, died. And Caracalla, after the murder, jumped out of the bedroom and ran across the entire palace, shouting that he had barely escaped, having escaped the greatest danger. He rushed to the praetorian camp, where, for his salvation and autocracy, he promised to give each warrior 2,500 Attic drachmas, and also to increase the allowance they received by half. He ordered to immediately take this money from the temples and treasury, and thus in one day ruthlessly squandered everything that Septimius Sever had saved for 18 years. The warriors declared Antoninus the sole emperor, and Geta was declared an enemy.
When Caracalla killed Geta, then, fearing that fratricide would cover him with shame as a tyrant and learning that it was possible to mitigate the horror of such a crime if proclaiming his brother divine, they say, he said: "Let it be divine, if only he was not alive!" He ranked him among the gods, and therefore popular rumor somehow reconciled with the fratricide.
Caracalla cruelly dealt with everyone who could be suspected of sympathy for Goethe. Senators, who were born or richer, were killed for any reason, or for no reason at all - it was enough to declare them followers of Geta. Papinianus, a man of whom the whole empire was proud, this lawyer, an unyielding defender of laws, was also executed for refusing to publicly justify the murder in the Senate.
Soon, all relatives and friends of the brother were killed, as well as those who lived in the palace in its half; all the servants were killed; age, even infancy, was not taken into account. Frankly mocking, the corpses of the dead were carried away together, piled on carts and taken out of the city, where, having piled them up, they burned them, or even simply threw them away as necessary. In general, everyone who Geta knew a little bit perished. They destroyed athletes, drivers, performers of all kinds of musical works - in general, everyone who delighted his sight and hearing.
All representatives of the patrician families were killed from the senators. Antoninus sent his people to the provinces to exterminate the rulers and governors there as friends of his brother. Each night brought with it the murder of a wide variety of people. He buried the Vestals alive in the ground because they allegedly did not respect virginity. It was said that once the emperor was at the races, and it so happened that the people laughed a little at the driver, to whom he was especially disposed; Taking this for an insult, he ordered the soldiers to rush at the viewer, take out and kill everyone who spoke badly about his favorite. Because it was impossible to separate the guilty from the innocent, the warriors mercilessly removed and killed the first who came along. Having embarked on the path of terror, Caracalla even finished with his wife Plavtila; in 205 she was sent into exile, and in 212 she was killed.
After the bloody massacre, the emperor Caracalla continued his father's policy both inside the country and on its borders: feverish attempts to stabilize the difficult financial situation, patronage of the army circles. The difficult economic situation of the Empire was caused by two factors: the ruin of commodity villas and slaveholding farms and huge expenditures on the swelling army, which numbered up to half a million people. At the same time, spending on the army grew in connection with the policy of patronage, which was outlined by the founder of the dynasty.
Under Caracalla, pay was increased again for all categories of the military. Allowing legionnaires to have a legal family, rent land and start a farm, of course, required funds, and the Empire had to provide them. The available receipts to the treasury were no longer enough to pay all budgetary expenses, and the emperor followed the path already outlined under the Antonines and adopted by his father Septimius Sever: he ordered copper to be added to silver in large quantities (up to 80% of the weight). As a result, more coins began to be minted from one quantity of silver, but they practically depreciated.
212 - the imperial edict was promulgated - the constitution of Antoninian (from the official name of Caracalla - Marcus Aurelius Sever Antonin), according to which almost all free inhabitants of the Empire received the rights of Roman citizenship (with rare exceptions). So, Roman citizenship - the most privileged status of a resident of the Empire, for which the Italians, the provincial aristocracy fought for centuries - was granted from above and overnight to almost all free, including the outlying barbarian peoples that had just been incorporated into the Empire.
This decisive step made it possible to solve a number of difficult problems facing the central government - manning a huge army, replenished from Roman citizens, overcoming financial difficulties, because new citizens had to pay numerous taxes. In the end, the gift of Roman citizenship made it possible to unify the entire system of government, legal proceedings, and the application of laws in all links of the vast Empire. As a result, this led to the transformation of a full and privileged Roman citizen into an imperial subject without rights and burdened with various duties and obligations.
The name of the Emperor Caracalla in Rome was preserved by the grandiose baths (luxurious public baths), in which more than 1,600 people could wash at the same time. The Baths of Caracalla, built in 212-216, occupied a large area and were a powerful complex of different rooms for washing and bathing with hot and cold water. The baths also contained libraries, sports grounds and a park; inside the baths were luxuriously decorated with marble and mosaics.
The emperor devoted much time and energy to military activities in Europe and the East. He was not so much a sane general as a hardy warrior. In the spring of 213 he went to Gaul. Arriving there, the emperor immediately killed the Narbon proconsul. Confusing all the rulers in Gaul, he incurred hatred as a tyrant. Having committed many injustices, he fell ill with a serious illness. In relation to those who courted him, he showed extraordinary cruelty. Then, on his way to the East, he stopped in Dacia. Caracalla was the first Roman emperor who, according to Herodian, was stamped with an obvious barbarization.
“He endeared all the Germans to himself and entered into friendship with them. Often, having taken off his Roman cloak, he exchanged it for Germanic clothes, and he was seen in a cloak with silver embroidery, which is worn by the Germans themselves. He put on his blond hair and combed it in German style. The barbarians rejoiced, looking at all this, and loved him extremely. The Roman soldiers also could not get enough of him, especially because of those increases in salary, which he did not skimp on, and also because he behaved just like a warrior: the first dug, if it was necessary to dig ditches, build a bridge over the river or pouring a shaft, and in general he was the first to take on any business that required hands and physical strength."
He ate simple military food and even grinded grain himself, kneaded dough and baked bread. “In campaigns, he most often walked, rarely sat in a cart or on a horse, he carried his weapon himself. His endurance aroused admiration, and how could he not admire, seeing that such a small body was accustomed to such hard work.
Not only in appearance, but also in spirit, Caracalla was a genuine barbarian. He zealously worshiped the Egyptian goddess Isis and built her temples in Rome. "Always suspecting of all conspirators, he incessantly asked the oracles, sent everywhere for magicians, astrologers, fortune-tellers on the insides of sacrificial animals, so that he did not miss a single one of those who undertake this kind of divination."
Fierce, wild and stupid, Caracalla could not keep in his hands the richest heritage of Septimius Severus.
When he managed the camps on the Danube and moved to Thrace, which is adjacent to Macedonia, he immediately began to identify himself with Alexander the Great and ordered to put his images and statues in all cities. His eccentricities reached the point that he began to dress like a Macedonian, wore a wide-brimmed white hat on his head, and put boots on his feet. Selecting the young men and going with them on a campaign, he began to call them the Macedonian phalanx, and handed out the names of Alexander's generals to their commanders.
From Thrace, the emperor crossed over to Asia, stayed for some time in Antioch, and then arrived in Alexandria. The Alexandrians received Antoninus very solemnly and with great joy. None of them knew about the secret hatred that he had long had for their city. The fact is that the emperor was informed of the ridicule with which the townspeople showered him. Deciding to punish them approximately, Antonin ordered the most prosperous youths to gather outside the city, ostensibly for a military review, surrounded them with troops and ordered everyone to be killed. The murder was such that blood flowed in streams across the plain, and the huge Nile delta and the entire coast near the city were stained with blood. Having done this with the city, he returned to Antioch in order to start a war with the Parthians.
In order to better conceal his plans, he wooed the daughter of the Parthian king. Having received consent to marriage, Caracalla freely entered Mesopotamia as a future son-in-law, and then unexpectedly attacked those who came out to greet him. Having killed many people and plundered cities and villages, the Romans returned to Syria with great booty. For this shameful raid Antonin received from the Senate the nickname "Parthian".
In the midst of preparations for new hostilities with Parthiria on April 8, 217, Caracalla was killed by Macrinus, his praetorian prefect (chief of the guard), who seized the imperial power and took his son Diadumenos as co-rulers. Although Macrinus did not stay in power, it became clear that a barbarian and a simple warrior could become an emperor.
In Rome, according to the same Herodian, “not everyone was so happy about the inheritance of power by Macrinus, as everyone rejoiced and publicly celebrated the celebration of getting rid of Caracalla. And everyone, especially those who occupied a prominent position or were in charge of some business, thought that he had thrown off the sword hanging over his head."
S. Mussky