These new regulations having been announced by word of mouth only, many people failed to observe them, through ignorance. At last he acceded to the urgent popular demand, by posting the regulations up, but in an awkwardly cramped spot and written so small that no one could take a copy. He never missed a chance of making profits; setting aside a suite of Palace rooms, he decorated them worthily, opened a brothel, stocked it with married women and boys, and then sent his pages around the squares and public places, inviting all men, of whatever age, to come and enjoy themselves. Those who appeared were lent money at interest, and clerks wrote down their names under the heading ‘Contributors to the Imperial Revenue’.

When Caligula played at dice he would always cheat and lie. Once he interrupted a game by giving up his seat to the man behind him and going out into the courtyard. A couple of rich knights passed; Caligula immediately had them arrested and confiscated their property; then resumed the game in high spirits, boasting that his luck had never been better.

His daughter’s birth gave him an excuse for further complaints of poverty. ‘In addition to the burden of sovereignty,’ he said, ‘I must now shoulder that of fatherhood’—and promptly took up a collection for her education and dowry. He also announced that New Year gifts would be welcomed on 1 January; and then sat in the Palace porch, grabbing the handfuls and capfuls of coin which a mixed crowd of all classes pressed on him. At last he developed a passion for the feel of money and, spilling heaps of gold pieces on an open space, would walk over them barefoot, or else lie down and wallow.

1 Caesonia was Caligula’s fourth and final wife.

THE PUMPKINIFICATION OF EMPEROR CLAUDIUS

Apocolocyntosis

Attr. Seneca the Younger

Translated by Martha C. Nussbaum, 2010

In AD 54, Emperor Claudius died, allegedly after consuming some poisoned mushrooms. The question was, would he be deified after he died? The curious title of this satire, which was in all probability written by Seneca the Younger (4 BC–AD 65), is a play on the words for ‘apotheosis’ and ‘gourd’ or ‘pumpkin’. The story is a parody of the Roman practice of deifying ‘good’ emperors. Claudius was physically disabled but an able ruler who granted Roman citizenship to many peoples overseas.

Claudius began to gasp for breath, but couldn’t find the exit.