0:00:06 > 0:00:10It was mid-afternoon on 22nd January, 41 AD.
0:00:10 > 0:00:14In the morning, the Emperor Caligula had been to the theatre,
0:00:14 > 0:00:18but he had a bit of a hangover, so he decided to skip lunch
0:00:18 > 0:00:21and freshen up with a quick bath.
0:00:22 > 0:00:26That's where he was going, all on his own, down a back alleyway
0:00:26 > 0:00:31in the palace compound, when he was jumped by a posse of soldiers.
0:00:33 > 0:00:38The first blow to his neck, or some said to his chin, didn't kill him.
0:00:39 > 0:00:42The next 30 or so did.
0:00:42 > 0:00:47One nasty rumour said that the assassins ate his flesh.
0:00:47 > 0:00:50Caligula was just 28 years old.
0:00:53 > 0:00:56He'd been in power for less than four years.
0:00:58 > 0:01:02It was an extraordinary moment in Roman history.
0:01:02 > 0:01:06Rome's third emperor is Caligula, who has come
0:01:06 > 0:01:11to stand for the corruption, horror and excess of Imperial Rome.
0:01:11 > 0:01:16Psychopath and depraved, he is said to have ruled by the sword,
0:01:16 > 0:01:20to have made his horse into a consul,
0:01:20 > 0:01:24and to have insisted he be worshipped as a living god.
0:01:25 > 0:01:29And ever since, he has become a template for tyranny,
0:01:29 > 0:01:33with chilling echoes right up to our own age.
0:01:33 > 0:01:38One of Caligula's favourite sayings was, "Let them hate me,
0:01:38 > 0:01:40"so long as they fear me."
0:01:42 > 0:01:45But how much of his story is true?
0:01:45 > 0:01:50On the throne for just four short years, Caligula has left us
0:01:50 > 0:01:52little physical evidence.
0:01:52 > 0:01:55And to get behind the myths means a detective hunt
0:01:55 > 0:01:59for clues all over the Roman world.
0:01:59 > 0:02:03From the battlegrounds of his war hero father in Germany
0:02:03 > 0:02:05to the island of Capri,
0:02:05 > 0:02:10where people said he was schooled in the art of imperial power,
0:02:10 > 0:02:13to the astonishing luxury of his life as emperor,
0:02:13 > 0:02:19I'll uncover a Rome full of intrigue, murder and dynastic power
0:02:19 > 0:02:23and come face to face with not just the monster, but the man.
0:02:23 > 0:02:25So who was Caligula?
0:02:25 > 0:02:29And why has he gone down in history as one of Rome's biggest villains?
0:02:50 > 0:02:55The first clear sight we have of Caligula in any historical record
0:02:55 > 0:02:58is a long way from Rome. From about the age of two,
0:02:58 > 0:03:02Caligula spent his childhood on the road,
0:03:02 > 0:03:04on the Empire's northern frontier,
0:03:04 > 0:03:09parcelled round from army camp to army camp with his mum and his dad,
0:03:09 > 0:03:13one of Rome's most charismatic military commanders.
0:03:13 > 0:03:19By now, Rome had been under one-man rule for just 50 years.
0:03:19 > 0:03:22And a generation after the first Emperor Augustus,
0:03:22 > 0:03:26power was in the hands of one family - Caligula's.
0:03:28 > 0:03:30His father was Germanicus,
0:03:30 > 0:03:34the blue-eyed prince of the imperial family,
0:03:34 > 0:03:39the nephew of the Emperor Tiberius, and himself tipped for the throne.
0:03:39 > 0:03:41His mother was Agrippina,
0:03:41 > 0:03:46the granddaughter of the first emperor Augustus,
0:03:46 > 0:03:50who was himself the adopted son of Julius Caesar.
0:03:50 > 0:03:52In the world of Ancient Rome,
0:03:52 > 0:03:55you didn't get more blue-blooded than Caligula.
0:03:58 > 0:04:03He was born Gaius Caesar Germanicus, a name he inherited
0:04:03 > 0:04:08from his father, meaning something like Thrasher of the Germans.
0:04:10 > 0:04:14And these were the family fields of honour, the killing fields
0:04:14 > 0:04:16where Caligula's ancestors
0:04:16 > 0:04:19cemented their reputations and political power.
0:04:23 > 0:04:26Today, the Roman Museum in Xanten has been built
0:04:26 > 0:04:29not far from one of the legionary camps
0:04:29 > 0:04:31where Caligula spent time as a boy.
0:04:33 > 0:04:38Inside, there is a remarkable collection of Roman military gear
0:04:38 > 0:04:40from medals of honour,
0:04:40 > 0:04:45with portraits of Caligula's dad Germanicus and mum Agrippina,
0:04:45 > 0:04:48dished out to soldiers, to what was then
0:04:48 > 0:04:53the most technologically advanced armour and weaponry on the planet.
0:04:53 > 0:04:57There are cavalry helmets and daggers,
0:04:57 > 0:05:01the remains of frighteningly powerful crossbows
0:05:01 > 0:05:04and rainstorms of piercing arrows,
0:05:04 > 0:05:09all of which remind us that Caligula's childhood playground
0:05:09 > 0:05:14was not some cosy peacekeeping mission, but a vicious war zone.
0:05:16 > 0:05:20But perhaps the museum's most intriguing artefact
0:05:20 > 0:05:23is also its most humble.
0:05:25 > 0:05:30This is a perfectly preserved Roman caligae, a standard army issue
0:05:30 > 0:05:35soldier's sandal, made of tough leather with hobnails on the sole.
0:05:35 > 0:05:39If there's one object that's really associated with Caligula,
0:05:39 > 0:05:42it's the caligae.
0:05:42 > 0:05:45The story goes that when he was a boy
0:05:45 > 0:05:48and he was living on military camps with his parents,
0:05:48 > 0:05:50his mum had him dressed up
0:05:50 > 0:05:56in the uniform of an ordinary Roman soldier, right down to the caligae.
0:05:56 > 0:06:02He was a kind of baby squaddie, the legionary mascot.
0:06:02 > 0:06:06And we tend to think of the name Caligula as a rather grand
0:06:06 > 0:06:11imperial name. In fact, it was the little boy's nickname.
0:06:11 > 0:06:17It means little boots, bootykins or the kid in the caligae.
0:06:17 > 0:06:19When he grew up, Caligula hated it.
0:06:19 > 0:06:23It must have seemed as if he was being called Emperor Diddums,
0:06:23 > 0:06:25or something.
0:06:25 > 0:06:28And if you'd have asked him what his name was,
0:06:28 > 0:06:33he would have said, quite correctly, his name was the Emperor Gaius.
0:06:33 > 0:06:38The fact that even now, we still call him Bootykins,
0:06:38 > 0:06:41shows just how successful his enemies were
0:06:41 > 0:06:43in pouring scorn over him.
0:06:43 > 0:06:49He himself would have been horrified to think of us calling him Caligula.
0:06:56 > 0:07:01In the 1960s, in this small hilltop town in Umbria,
0:07:01 > 0:07:05a group of workers dug up an enormous bronze statue
0:07:05 > 0:07:07of Caligula's father, Germanicus,
0:07:07 > 0:07:11that once stood on what was probably an army parade ground
0:07:11 > 0:07:13on the edge of town.
0:07:16 > 0:07:20It shows him in the classic pose of an imperial leader,
0:07:20 > 0:07:24arm outstretched, addressing his troops.
0:07:24 > 0:07:29And standing beneath him, one can't help but sense the status
0:07:29 > 0:07:35and glamour of the man in whose shadow the little Caligula grew up.
0:07:35 > 0:07:38One theory is that the statue was put up by Caligula himself
0:07:38 > 0:07:40after becoming emperor,
0:07:40 > 0:07:43in memory of the event that radically changed
0:07:43 > 0:07:45the course of his life.
0:07:46 > 0:07:50For in 19 AD, when Caligula was just seven,
0:07:50 > 0:07:55Germanicus suddenly died on a mission to Syria, poisoned,
0:07:55 > 0:07:59he claimed from his deathbed, by the Roman Governor Piso,
0:07:59 > 0:08:03even perhaps under the orders of his own uncle, the Emperor Tiberius.
0:08:03 > 0:08:07When the news of Germanicus's death reached Rome,
0:08:07 > 0:08:12there was an absolute explosion of grief. Life stopped, it's said.
0:08:12 > 0:08:15Ordinary people wept in the street.
0:08:15 > 0:08:19They wrote up on the walls, "Give us back Germanicus."
0:08:19 > 0:08:23The only people not grieving were the Emperor and his mother.
0:08:23 > 0:08:25They weren't seen in public
0:08:25 > 0:08:29and they didn't authorise a full state funeral
0:08:29 > 0:08:34when the ashes of Germanicus came home to be put in the family tomb.
0:08:35 > 0:08:37Eventually, Piso was put on trial,
0:08:37 > 0:08:42but a few days in, he conveniently committed suicide and the trial
0:08:42 > 0:08:46was turned into something more like a public inquiry.
0:08:46 > 0:08:52And this is a copy of the record of that public inquiry,
0:08:52 > 0:09:00the formal report inscribed in bronze, dated 10th December 20 AD.
0:09:00 > 0:09:06Basically, the message is - the only person guilty here was Piso,
0:09:06 > 0:09:08conveniently dead.
0:09:08 > 0:09:10But the most extraordinary bit of the document,
0:09:10 > 0:09:13and its real point, is down here,
0:09:14 > 0:09:19where it says that one of these reports
0:09:19 > 0:09:25is to be inscribed in the chief city of every province
0:09:25 > 0:09:29and that it is to be inscribed in hibernis,
0:09:29 > 0:09:36in the winter quarters, of each legion, cuiusque legionis.
0:09:36 > 0:09:39This is mass communication, Roman style.
0:09:39 > 0:09:45It's a major attempt to get the official message across everywhere.
0:09:45 > 0:09:51It's hard not to think it all might not have been too little, too late.
0:09:53 > 0:09:56The suspicions circling around Germanicus' death
0:09:56 > 0:10:00would mark the start of an increasingly bitter feud
0:10:00 > 0:10:04between Caligula's mother Agrippina and the Palace.
0:10:12 > 0:10:16Convinced that Agrippina and her sons were plotting against him,
0:10:16 > 0:10:21Tiberius banished her to a remote island off the coast of Italy.
0:10:21 > 0:10:25And shortly afterwards, in 31 AD, he summoned the young Caligula,
0:10:25 > 0:10:30aged 19 or so, to the island of Capri in the Bay of Naples.
0:10:35 > 0:10:40This was the seat of Tiberius' power away from Rome.
0:10:40 > 0:10:43It was from here that he ruled the empire by proxy,
0:10:43 > 0:10:49from a whole suite of imperial villas built high into the cliffs.
0:10:49 > 0:10:52Tucked away in a museum on the island
0:10:52 > 0:10:55is one small trace of Caligula's stay here.
0:11:01 > 0:11:03This may not look very much,
0:11:03 > 0:11:06just like a bit of old Roman brick stuck in a wall,
0:11:06 > 0:11:11but actually, it's the only physical evidence that we have
0:11:11 > 0:11:13of Caligula's presence on Capri
0:11:13 > 0:11:18because it's got his name stamped across it, Gaius Caesar.
0:11:18 > 0:11:22And that raises the question of what he was doing here and why
0:11:22 > 0:11:26Tiberius brought him, and there have been all kinds of theories.
0:11:26 > 0:11:29Was he here to be under surveillance?
0:11:29 > 0:11:32Was he here because Tiberius liked the kid?
0:11:32 > 0:11:34Or was he here to be groomed to be Emperor
0:11:34 > 0:11:38and learn to start building like an Emperor should?
0:11:41 > 0:11:47Away from prying eyes, it was here, Roman writers later surmised,
0:11:47 > 0:11:51that Tiberius schooled the young Caligula in the dark arts
0:11:51 > 0:11:53of tyranny and excess.
0:11:53 > 0:11:57The stories they told of what Tiberius got up to
0:11:57 > 0:12:01here are all fantastical sex and violence.
0:12:04 > 0:12:09Those people he wanted to get rid of, he had chucked over the cliffs.
0:12:09 > 0:12:13And he'd stationed a platoon of sailors in boats at the bottom
0:12:13 > 0:12:16to finish them off with their oars if they weren't yet dead.
0:12:21 > 0:12:25And for poolside fun, he had a troupe of little boys -
0:12:25 > 0:12:28his little fishes, he called them.
0:12:28 > 0:12:31They'd been specially trained to swim between his thighs
0:12:31 > 0:12:35while he was in the pool and nibble his genitals.
0:12:35 > 0:12:38Whatever Tiberius really got up to,
0:12:38 > 0:12:42we do know that Caligula's time in his charge was defined
0:12:42 > 0:12:48by remarkable brutality, much of which was aimed at his own family.
0:12:48 > 0:12:52For while Caligula was living in the lap of luxury,
0:12:52 > 0:12:55his mother Agrippina was beaten up.
0:12:55 > 0:12:58She lost her sight in one eye, she went on hunger strike,
0:12:58 > 0:13:02was force-fed, until finally, she starved to death.
0:13:02 > 0:13:07Not only that, both his brothers came to violent ends.
0:13:11 > 0:13:15One by one, Caligula had lost his father and his mother
0:13:15 > 0:13:18and his two elder brothers.
0:13:18 > 0:13:21He and his sisters were the only ones in the family left.
0:13:25 > 0:13:28It's a chilling reminder that in Rome,
0:13:28 > 0:13:33the closer you were to power, the harder it was to survive.
0:13:33 > 0:13:38In the vaults of the British Museum is one macabre memento from Capri
0:13:38 > 0:13:41that sums up the young Caligula's life in the Emperor's court.
0:13:42 > 0:13:46Looks like a real skull, but actually,
0:13:46 > 0:13:50it's an extraordinarily lifelike work of art made of marble.
0:13:50 > 0:13:53This must have made a stunning centrepiece
0:13:53 > 0:13:55on the imperial dining table.
0:13:55 > 0:13:58Rich Romans loved the idea of eat, drink and be merry,
0:13:58 > 0:14:00because tomorrow you'll die.
0:14:01 > 0:14:05But if you put it back in the context of the imperial court,
0:14:05 > 0:14:07there are more sinister messages.
0:14:07 > 0:14:11For a start, there's the violence of the Emperor himself.
0:14:11 > 0:14:15Anyone sitting round this at the imperial dining table
0:14:15 > 0:14:20must have been aware that their lives hung on a knife edge,
0:14:20 > 0:14:25that they could be flavour of the month one minute, and dead the next.
0:14:25 > 0:14:28The best advice was never to let your feelings show.
0:14:28 > 0:14:29Keep poker-faced.
0:14:29 > 0:14:33There's a horrible story of an imperial princess
0:14:33 > 0:14:36who's dining one evening with her brother.
0:14:36 > 0:14:40He keels over, dead, probably poisoned. What does she do?
0:14:40 > 0:14:45What all good imperial princesses should do. She just goes on eating.
0:14:48 > 0:14:51In fact, we're told that when Caligula was on Capri
0:14:51 > 0:14:53and his relatives were being bumped off one by one,
0:14:53 > 0:14:57he learned never to show any emotion at all.
0:14:58 > 0:15:03Underlying all this nastiness was an issue that the Roman Empire
0:15:03 > 0:15:05always struggled to work out,
0:15:05 > 0:15:07the problem of succession.
0:15:09 > 0:15:12Even though Roman power had now become a family business,
0:15:12 > 0:15:15since the founder of the dynasty, Augustus, there was
0:15:15 > 0:15:19no fixed system for passing the power on -
0:15:19 > 0:15:23a fatal flaw that colours the whole Caligula story.
0:15:23 > 0:15:26Succession posed a problem for the Romans for two reasons.
0:15:26 > 0:15:29First, the Emperor isn't a real job.
0:15:29 > 0:15:32It's supposed to be just a bundle of personal powers,
0:15:32 > 0:15:35so you couldn't pass those on in a normal way.
0:15:35 > 0:15:36But the other problem is that
0:15:36 > 0:15:39Augustus and Livia didn't have children with each other
0:15:39 > 0:15:41even though each had children with other people,
0:15:41 > 0:15:45and what that means is, there isn't a clear line of succession.
0:15:45 > 0:15:48A son to follow a father, a grandson to follow a son.
0:15:48 > 0:15:53So when an Emperor begins to seem a bit sick or unreliable or gets old,
0:15:53 > 0:15:55all sorts of groups begin to jockey for power.
0:15:55 > 0:15:57There's the legions in the provinces.
0:15:57 > 0:16:00There's the imperial bodyguards in Rome. You've got the courtiers.
0:16:00 > 0:16:02You have the ex-slaves in the palace
0:16:02 > 0:16:04who want to know who's going to own them next
0:16:04 > 0:16:07and then you've got various imperial women
0:16:07 > 0:16:09trying to get their sons into power.
0:16:09 > 0:16:12So it's a very, very unstable situation.
0:16:12 > 0:16:16Is it that instability and the uncertainty of it all
0:16:16 > 0:16:18that both produces real violence
0:16:18 > 0:16:21and also allegations and rumours of violence?
0:16:21 > 0:16:23That's right.
0:16:23 > 0:16:26The first thing that Tiberius does when he succeeds Augustus is,
0:16:26 > 0:16:29he sends a boat to an island on which one of his relatives has been
0:16:29 > 0:16:32kept in exile for decades to have the boy killed
0:16:32 > 0:16:35because he could have been an alternative.
0:16:35 > 0:16:38And what does Caligula do when he takes power?
0:16:38 > 0:16:41One of the first things he does is, he has his cousin,
0:16:41 > 0:16:43a little boy named Tiberius Gemellus,
0:16:43 > 0:16:47murdered because he's somebody else who could have been Emperor.
0:16:47 > 0:16:51What's amazing is that, for the first 100 years of the Empire,
0:16:51 > 0:16:53there's not a single Emperor
0:16:53 > 0:16:57about whose death there isn't some kind of allegation
0:16:57 > 0:16:59that he was bumped off,
0:16:59 > 0:17:01that the poisoned mushrooms had done him in.
0:17:01 > 0:17:07There is that story of Caligula who, some people said,
0:17:07 > 0:17:13had actually smothered Tiberius when he was asleep
0:17:13 > 0:17:15in order to take power himself.
0:17:15 > 0:17:16And the other story is,
0:17:16 > 0:17:19he got the captain of the Praetorian Guard to do it for him
0:17:19 > 0:17:22because Emperors have people to do the smothering for them.
0:17:28 > 0:17:32However Tiberius really died, two days after his death
0:17:32 > 0:17:35on March 18th, 37 AD,
0:17:35 > 0:17:39the Senate declared Caligula Rome's third Emperor.
0:17:39 > 0:17:41He could now triumphantly return to Rome
0:17:41 > 0:17:44as the ruler of the known world.
0:17:44 > 0:17:47He was just 24 years old.
0:17:48 > 0:17:51At the time, he must have seemed the best choice.
0:17:51 > 0:17:54As the childhood mascot of the troops
0:17:54 > 0:17:58and the son of the great Germanicus, he had the support of the army.
0:17:58 > 0:18:00And, as the great-grandson of Augustus,
0:18:00 > 0:18:04he could claim a direct blood line back to the founder of the dynasty.
0:18:06 > 0:18:08And to the adoration of the crowds,
0:18:08 > 0:18:10one of Caligula's first acts as Emperor
0:18:10 > 0:18:13was to make a huge play of these family connections.
0:18:15 > 0:18:19Braving the stormy seas, he made a great song and dance of bringing
0:18:19 > 0:18:24the ashes of his dead mother back to Rome, burying her with his own hands
0:18:24 > 0:18:28here in the enormous family tomb, built by his great-grandfather,
0:18:28 > 0:18:31the Mausoleum of Augustus.
0:18:31 > 0:18:34BELL TOLLS
0:18:37 > 0:18:39At the Capitoline Museums in Rome,
0:18:39 > 0:18:44the whacking tombstone Caligula put up to his mother still survives
0:18:44 > 0:18:48and it's so much more than just a grave marker.
0:18:48 > 0:18:50It starts by saying OSSA.
0:18:50 > 0:18:54These are the bones, in fact the ashes of Agrippina,
0:18:54 > 0:18:57the daughter of Marcus Agrippa,
0:18:57 > 0:19:01the grand-daughter, NEPTIS DIVIAVG
0:19:01 > 0:19:04of Augustus, the first Emperor,
0:19:04 > 0:19:07who's now a god, a Dyeus.
0:19:07 > 0:19:11And she's the wife, the UXOR of Germanicus Caesar,
0:19:11 > 0:19:13the golden boy of the Empire
0:19:13 > 0:19:16and she's the mother, MATRIS,
0:19:16 > 0:19:21of Gaius Caesar Augustus Germanicus,
0:19:21 > 0:19:25PRINCIPIS, the Emperor Caligula.
0:19:25 > 0:19:29In a way, it says just as much about Caligula.
0:19:31 > 0:19:35This is his manifesto to his right to imperial rule.
0:19:37 > 0:19:40But there was another way in which Caligula could get
0:19:40 > 0:19:44the message across about who was now in charge,
0:19:44 > 0:19:47by the money he minted, stamped with his portrait,
0:19:47 > 0:19:50on which he showered down on the people of Rome.
0:19:50 > 0:19:55Caligula is supposed to have been absolutely spectacularly generous.
0:19:55 > 0:19:59He's said on some occasions to have gone up to the first floor
0:19:59 > 0:20:02of a building in the Forum and actually thrown money,
0:20:02 > 0:20:05thrown coins at the crowd.
0:20:05 > 0:20:09They would have got some good cash to take home
0:20:09 > 0:20:15but, more important in a way, you'd also go home with a message
0:20:15 > 0:20:18because one of the ways that Emperors could
0:20:18 > 0:20:20get their version of events
0:20:20 > 0:20:23and their slogans across to the Roman people at large,
0:20:23 > 0:20:25was to put them on the coins,
0:20:25 > 0:20:30so you literally carried around the imperial propaganda in your pocket.
0:20:32 > 0:20:37In Caligula's case, they hammer home the point about the royal blood
0:20:37 > 0:20:38flowing through his veins.
0:20:40 > 0:20:42This one shows Caligula on one side,
0:20:42 > 0:20:45his father, the great Germanicus, on the other.
0:20:46 > 0:20:50Another shows a carriage parading a statue of his mother
0:20:50 > 0:20:53in celebrations founded in her honour.
0:20:53 > 0:20:57And even more important, this one shows Caligula sacrificing
0:20:57 > 0:21:03a bull at the temple of his great-grandfather, the god Augustus.
0:21:03 > 0:21:07This one has an even more pointed message.
0:21:07 > 0:21:10On the one side, there's a really gorgeous portrait of Caligula
0:21:10 > 0:21:13and his name here, Gaius Caesar.
0:21:13 > 0:21:18But on the other, you can see what must be him standing on a box,
0:21:18 > 0:21:24his arm outstretched and he's talking to a group of soldiers
0:21:24 > 0:21:27and it says at the top, ADLOCUT, short for adlocutio,
0:21:27 > 0:21:32the speech of the Emperor, to his troops and underneath, C-O-H,
0:21:32 > 0:21:37short for COHORTES, the cohorts of the Praetorian Guard.
0:21:37 > 0:21:41And the message of this is clear.
0:21:41 > 0:21:43Whatever family background you have,
0:21:43 > 0:21:46whatever deals you've done,
0:21:46 > 0:21:49nobody in Rome can become an Emperor
0:21:49 > 0:21:52unless they've got the support of the army.
0:21:54 > 0:21:58And this is what many modern despots and tyrants have also discovered.
0:21:58 > 0:22:00Without the support of the troops,
0:22:00 > 0:22:03you're either deposed or you're dead.
0:22:06 > 0:22:09These coins give us an idea of how an Emperor
0:22:09 > 0:22:12branded his image in the days before TV and radio.
0:22:14 > 0:22:16Alongside stamping his face on the cash,
0:22:16 > 0:22:20cheap cameos of Caligula were cut from glass and clay
0:22:20 > 0:22:24and portrait busts were sent out across the Empire to be copied
0:22:24 > 0:22:28and turned into a whole gallery of imperial statues.
0:22:30 > 0:22:32If you've ever wondered
0:22:32 > 0:22:35why there are so many heads and so few bodies, one reason is
0:22:35 > 0:22:38that the heads were always meant to be replaceable.
0:22:38 > 0:22:42You can see just how easy it would be to take one head out
0:22:42 > 0:22:45and pop another one in.
0:22:49 > 0:22:51Once established on the throne,
0:22:51 > 0:22:56one of the ways Rome's new Emperors cemented their power was to build.
0:22:56 > 0:23:00And even if Caligula ruled for just four years, we know that some of
0:23:00 > 0:23:05Rome's most iconic ancient monuments started life under his watch.
0:23:07 > 0:23:11There were the aqueducts, the Aqua Claudia and the Anio Novus,
0:23:11 > 0:23:15bringing water from over 40 miles away to the centre of Rome.
0:23:16 > 0:23:21The Obelisk that now stands in front of St Peter's is also Caligulan,
0:23:21 > 0:23:26shipped over from Egypt on an enormous specially-built boat.
0:23:27 > 0:23:30And then there was the most obvious statement of Caligula's power,
0:23:30 > 0:23:34the imperial HQ on the Palatine Hill,
0:23:34 > 0:23:38whose Latin name Palatium, gives us our own word, palace.
0:23:39 > 0:23:43Most of what we now see here dates from long after Caligula's death.
0:23:45 > 0:23:49His own building was destroyed in the great fire of Rome in 64 AD,
0:23:49 > 0:23:53but it seems that Caligula was the first Emperor to remodel
0:23:53 > 0:23:58the imperial residences to make them more palatial in our terms.
0:24:02 > 0:24:05The Emperor didn't just live on the Palatine Hill.
0:24:05 > 0:24:10Caligula also inherited vast pleasure gardens called Horti,
0:24:10 > 0:24:12on the outskirts of the city.
0:24:14 > 0:24:16One of them, the Horti Lamiani,
0:24:16 > 0:24:20is still a garden of sorts in modern Rome and it's the location
0:24:20 > 0:24:24of the only eye-witness account of Caligula in action that we have.
0:24:26 > 0:24:29It was written by Philo, a Jew from Alexandria,
0:24:29 > 0:24:31who had come to petition the Emperor
0:24:31 > 0:24:34against political discrimination back home
0:24:34 > 0:24:38and it's a rare glimpse of Caligula the Emperor,
0:24:38 > 0:24:40face to face with his subjects.
0:24:42 > 0:24:45When Philo and his delegation get to their appointment,
0:24:45 > 0:24:47they discover that the Emperor's mind
0:24:47 > 0:24:49is actually on home improvements
0:24:49 > 0:24:51and they traipse around after him through the gardens
0:24:51 > 0:24:56as he goes from pavilion to pavilion, planning his makeover.
0:24:56 > 0:25:00When they get his attention, they bow down to the ground.
0:25:00 > 0:25:05But it doesn't cut much ice with Caligula, who simply says,
0:25:05 > 0:25:09"So you're the god-haters who don't think I'm a god, then?"
0:25:09 > 0:25:11And he follows that up by asking,
0:25:11 > 0:25:14"And, anyway, why don't you eat pork?"
0:25:14 > 0:25:16One of the Jews thinks quickly on his feet and said,
0:25:16 > 0:25:19"Well, quite a lot of people don't eat a lot of things.
0:25:19 > 0:25:21"I mean, some people don't eat lamb."
0:25:21 > 0:25:26"I'm not surprised," said Caligula, "It tastes horrible."
0:25:26 > 0:25:28And the flunkies all laugh.
0:25:28 > 0:25:33It's a wonderful and horrible vignette of the day-to-day
0:25:33 > 0:25:36exercise of imperial power.
0:25:36 > 0:25:39There's no cruelty here, there's no violence.
0:25:39 > 0:25:41There's even a bit of banter.
0:25:41 > 0:25:45But, all the same, it's humiliating.
0:25:45 > 0:25:48Caligula's message is quite clear.
0:25:48 > 0:25:52My fancy window glass is more important
0:25:52 > 0:25:55than the Jews of Alexandria.
0:25:56 > 0:25:59It's a revealing story and it also tells us
0:25:59 > 0:26:02a lot more than we might think about imperial luxury.
0:26:02 > 0:26:07For one of the ways Emperors dazzled you with their power,
0:26:07 > 0:26:13rammed it in your face, was with the very trappings of their world.
0:26:13 > 0:26:16And it's from the pleasure gardens that we can still find
0:26:16 > 0:26:18traces of Caligulan splendour.
0:26:18 > 0:26:22From them have come some of the most impressive
0:26:22 > 0:26:24and famous statues of Ancient Rome,
0:26:24 > 0:26:26such as the Discobulus,
0:26:26 > 0:26:30the discus-thrower, a version of an earlier Greek masterpiece.
0:26:39 > 0:26:41There's the Maid of Anzio
0:26:41 > 0:26:45found at the palace where we think Caligula was born.
0:26:47 > 0:26:50And the Sleeping Hermaphrodite,
0:26:50 > 0:26:53a wonderfully urbane joke,
0:26:53 > 0:26:55the kind the palace just loved.
0:26:55 > 0:26:59On the one side, she's a luscious sleeping woman.
0:26:59 > 0:27:02On the other, she's definitely more of a bloke.
0:27:04 > 0:27:09And in the 1870s, excavators dug up an astonishing find
0:27:09 > 0:27:13in one of the imperial pleasure gardens that used to be Caligula's.
0:27:13 > 0:27:17Hundreds of precious stones, rubies, garnets, carnelians,
0:27:17 > 0:27:20bits of rock crystal and amber
0:27:20 > 0:27:25embedded in amazing frames of filigree silver and gold.
0:27:25 > 0:27:29When this stuff was first discovered in the 1870s,
0:27:29 > 0:27:31no-one could quite work out what it was.
0:27:31 > 0:27:36One idea was that they'd come across a throne room,
0:27:36 > 0:27:41but there's just so much of this stuff, I think we have to imagine
0:27:41 > 0:27:45precious stones literally embedded in the palace walls,
0:27:45 > 0:27:50twinkling in the lights at night, looking amazing,
0:27:50 > 0:27:53or perhaps a bit tacky during the day.
0:27:53 > 0:27:57We do know that Caligula was dead keen on pearls
0:27:57 > 0:28:01and one contemporary witness says he actually used to like slippers
0:28:01 > 0:28:04with pearls sewn into them,
0:28:04 > 0:28:06which, if you ask me,
0:28:06 > 0:28:10is a far cry from those little military boots he started out with.
0:28:12 > 0:28:13It's a cute vision.
0:28:13 > 0:28:17A newly-crowned Emperor showing off his pearled slippers
0:28:17 > 0:28:19to his flunkies.
0:28:19 > 0:28:23But it's also another example of how the imperial family
0:28:23 > 0:28:28used the ostentation of their world to unsettle and disarm.
0:28:30 > 0:28:32This is one of the most iconic
0:28:32 > 0:28:35and impressive imperial paintings from Ancient Rome,
0:28:35 > 0:28:38the so-called Garden Room,
0:28:38 > 0:28:41designed for Caligula's great-grandmother Livia,
0:28:41 > 0:28:45in whose home Caligula spent time as a boy.
0:28:45 > 0:28:48It's an impossibly utopian scene.
0:28:48 > 0:28:52The trees are all full of perfectly ripe fruit.
0:28:52 > 0:28:55Every flower is perfectly in bloom
0:28:55 > 0:28:59and in the gloom of the flickering lamps 2,000 years ago,
0:28:59 > 0:29:02it would be hard to know whether we were looking at a real garden
0:29:02 > 0:29:05or a painting of one.
0:29:05 > 0:29:08Of course, that sort of illusionism is one of the most impressive
0:29:08 > 0:29:11trademarks of Roman art.
0:29:11 > 0:29:14But it's also slightly unsettling.
0:29:14 > 0:29:20The blurring of the boundary between the fake and the real
0:29:20 > 0:29:26is one of the factors about Roman court culture that made it so scary.
0:29:27 > 0:29:29You never quite know
0:29:29 > 0:29:32whether what you're looking at is real or an imitation.
0:29:32 > 0:29:35Pretence or reality.
0:29:37 > 0:29:40On the one hand, what you think is real turns out not to be
0:29:40 > 0:29:44and there's a great story about going to dinner with Caligula,
0:29:44 > 0:29:47looking at the fantastic spread, it all looks wonderful
0:29:47 > 0:29:52until you spot that the food on the table is made of gold.
0:29:52 > 0:29:55It's very precious but what are you supposed to do?
0:29:55 > 0:29:57Can you pretend to eat it?
0:29:57 > 0:29:59And on the other hand,
0:29:59 > 0:30:04what you think is fake can turn out to be deadly real.
0:30:04 > 0:30:09There's another story of Caligula having what looked like
0:30:09 > 0:30:14a practice gladiatorial bout with an opponent, with wooden swords,
0:30:14 > 0:30:18except Caligula had a real weapon.
0:30:18 > 0:30:21So this all looks very impressive.
0:30:21 > 0:30:26It's all very lovely, but it reminds us that there's a more shadowy,
0:30:26 > 0:30:31sinister world of smoke and mirrors in the Imperial Court.
0:30:34 > 0:30:39It's a perfect example of the choreography of threat
0:30:39 > 0:30:43that lurked beneath everyday palace life.
0:30:43 > 0:30:46A threat, if you think about it from the Emperor's point of view,
0:30:46 > 0:30:48that worked both ways.
0:30:48 > 0:30:53The labyrinthine corridors of the palace were teeming with people,
0:30:53 > 0:30:55from visiting dignitaries and spies
0:30:55 > 0:30:58to the collectors of the Imperial rubbish.
0:30:58 > 0:31:01It must have been a security nightmare.
0:31:01 > 0:31:04How did the Emperor ever know who was who?
0:31:04 > 0:31:06And how did he marshal his own security?
0:31:10 > 0:31:12They did have a system of passwords.
0:31:12 > 0:31:14The Emperor would issue a new one each day
0:31:14 > 0:31:17and you would have to say the word if you were challenged.
0:31:17 > 0:31:20But that wasn't enough for the most anxious of emperors.
0:31:20 > 0:31:22One of them is said
0:31:22 > 0:31:25to have had the walls of the palace lined with mirrors
0:31:25 > 0:31:28so he really could see who was coming up behind him.
0:31:31 > 0:31:35In this world, where the Emperor was always watching his back,
0:31:35 > 0:31:38the people he ended up trusting the most
0:31:38 > 0:31:42weren't just his personal security force, but also his slaves.
0:31:42 > 0:31:45And high up on the wall of the museum in Rome
0:31:45 > 0:31:51is the record of the staff from one of Caligula's actual palaces.
0:31:51 > 0:31:53Each one tells us what they did.
0:31:53 > 0:31:58Here's one, for example, "Saturninus Svaia".
0:31:58 > 0:32:00That is short for "Svairista".
0:32:00 > 0:32:05It means ballplayer, but perhaps Saturninus was a personal trainer.
0:32:06 > 0:32:10We've got Argaeus, he's a Gubernatio,
0:32:10 > 0:32:13the helmsman, perhaps, on the Imperial yacht.
0:32:13 > 0:32:20But perhaps my favourite of all is this chap here, Venustos Spec.
0:32:20 > 0:32:23Spec could be short for "speculatos".
0:32:23 > 0:32:28Venustos might have been a watchman or spy.
0:32:28 > 0:32:31But it could also be short for "specularius",
0:32:31 > 0:32:36in which case he was the guy who made the mirrors.
0:32:36 > 0:32:40It's a wonderful snapshot of the underbelly of court life.
0:32:40 > 0:32:44But it would be a mistake to think that they were just lowly servants.
0:32:44 > 0:32:47Some of them played a vital role
0:32:47 > 0:32:50in the palace's strategy of control and fear.
0:32:50 > 0:32:54Aphetos, here, he's an "invitato".
0:32:54 > 0:32:59He's the guy who controls the guest list at the palace dinner parties.
0:32:59 > 0:33:01Now, Roman aristocrats
0:33:01 > 0:33:05wouldn't have touched this kind of job with a barge pole.
0:33:05 > 0:33:09But these guys could have quite a lot of power.
0:33:09 > 0:33:14And Romans told quite a lot of sometimes wild stories
0:33:14 > 0:33:19about just how powerful these imperial slaves and ex-slaves were.
0:33:19 > 0:33:22Caligula is supposed to have had one called Protogenes,
0:33:22 > 0:33:25who carried around with him under each arm,
0:33:25 > 0:33:30with more than a bit of menace and ham-acting at the same time,
0:33:30 > 0:33:31two different files,
0:33:31 > 0:33:36one labelled "dagger", the other labelled "sword",
0:33:36 > 0:33:39as if they contained the lists inside
0:33:39 > 0:33:41of who was to be put to death and how.
0:33:43 > 0:33:48It's not hard to see why the Emperor relied on these guys.
0:33:48 > 0:33:52They didn't represent a direct threat to him,
0:33:52 > 0:33:55they weren't going to become emperor themselves.
0:33:55 > 0:33:57And, after all, he owned most of them.
0:33:57 > 0:34:00But in the end it didn't do Caligula any good.
0:34:00 > 0:34:02Some of them are supposed to have been involved
0:34:02 > 0:34:04in the final plot to kill him.
0:34:07 > 0:34:11This is now one of the most powerful images of Caligula that we have.
0:34:11 > 0:34:17A man who was paranoid about his own security, and not unreasonably.
0:34:17 > 0:34:21As he no doubt learned from the fate of his own family under Tiberius,
0:34:21 > 0:34:27conspiracies were an absolutely inevitable part of Imperial Life.
0:34:29 > 0:34:33If Caligula is always looking behind him, if he is always watchful,
0:34:33 > 0:34:36are there people who really are out to get him?
0:34:36 > 0:34:37Yes, there were people out to get him,
0:34:37 > 0:34:41and I think they were of two quite different types.
0:34:41 > 0:34:46Either they are people within the extended family who accept
0:34:46 > 0:34:50that Rome is now a dynastic autocracy of which they are part,
0:34:50 > 0:34:54but want themselves, rather than Caligula, to be the autocrat.
0:34:54 > 0:34:58But there's also another type of potential opposition,
0:34:58 > 0:34:59which is people who don't think
0:34:59 > 0:35:02that Rome ought to be a dynastic autocracy at all,
0:35:02 > 0:35:05and they want to put the clock back to the Republic
0:35:05 > 0:35:09run by the Roman aristocracy, run by the Senate.
0:35:09 > 0:35:13But it's really the first type, the family trying to replace him
0:35:13 > 0:35:16from one of their own number, that looks like the most important.
0:35:16 > 0:35:19- We have most evidence for it.- Yes.
0:35:19 > 0:35:23His brother-in-law, Aemilius Lepidus,
0:35:23 > 0:35:26was executed for plotting against him.
0:35:26 > 0:35:29And his wife, Caligula's sister,
0:35:29 > 0:35:32and also Caligula's other surviving sister,
0:35:32 > 0:35:33were both exiled as a result.
0:35:33 > 0:35:39So clearly, Caligula saw this as a threat from those closest
0:35:39 > 0:35:42to him inside the family, to his own position.
0:35:42 > 0:35:44So in a sense, he is quite right to be looking over his shoulder
0:35:44 > 0:35:48because the people who've got the knife out are likely to be
0:35:48 > 0:35:52- the people he's hanging out with most days of the week.- Yes.
0:35:52 > 0:35:54And he doesn't know how many of them there are.
0:35:56 > 0:36:00Ever since, historians have wanted to make this family plot
0:36:00 > 0:36:02one of the turning point in Caligula's reign
0:36:02 > 0:36:06that marked his transition from golden boy with promise
0:36:06 > 0:36:09to the maniacal monster we've all come to know.
0:36:09 > 0:36:12But the fact is that this is the period of Caligula's life,
0:36:12 > 0:36:17his time in power, about which we actually know the least.
0:36:17 > 0:36:21Were these conspiracies real conspiracies?
0:36:21 > 0:36:24Was this the moment that he started to lose his grip?
0:36:24 > 0:36:26We don't know.
0:36:26 > 0:36:30What we do is that this is when the stories of madness
0:36:30 > 0:36:35and excess that have come to define Caligula mostly start.
0:36:36 > 0:36:41And perhaps the most famous is that he gave his favourite horse,
0:36:41 > 0:36:44Incitatus, that's "Speedy", his own palace.
0:36:44 > 0:36:47That he fed him oats mixed with gold
0:36:47 > 0:36:49and that he made him a consul of Rome.
0:36:50 > 0:36:54The fact is that no ancient writer ever says that Caligula
0:36:54 > 0:36:56made his horse a consul.
0:36:56 > 0:37:01What they say is that he planned to or that people said he planned to.
0:37:03 > 0:37:06I'd be pretty certain that what underlies all this
0:37:06 > 0:37:09is a bit of banter, a Caligulan joke.
0:37:09 > 0:37:12I can imagine him at dinner one evening with his friends
0:37:12 > 0:37:15among the aristocracy and he's trying to needle them a bit.
0:37:15 > 0:37:17He's saying, "Oh, you're a right hopeless lot,
0:37:17 > 0:37:20"I'd rather have my horse consul than one of you."
0:37:20 > 0:37:24And that then goes down in history as if he was serious.
0:37:24 > 0:37:27But anyway, we all do love stories about monarchs
0:37:27 > 0:37:30and their pampered pets.
0:37:30 > 0:37:32Just think of our fantasies about Queen Elizabeth
0:37:32 > 0:37:35and her corgis, how they have diamond collars
0:37:35 > 0:37:38and they eat out of silver bowls
0:37:38 > 0:37:41and they're served by footmen in uniform.
0:37:41 > 0:37:42I wonder what we'd say
0:37:42 > 0:37:46if we found that she'd nicknamed one of them Prime Minister?
0:37:48 > 0:37:52And it wasn't just stories of unbridled excess.
0:37:52 > 0:37:55Much of what else was thought wrong with Caligula
0:37:55 > 0:37:57came down to his sex life.
0:37:57 > 0:38:01It was said he turned his palace into a brothel,
0:38:01 > 0:38:06loved dressing up in women's clothes and was so insatiable for sex
0:38:06 > 0:38:09that he wore out his male partners.
0:38:09 > 0:38:12For us, Caligula has become more than anything
0:38:12 > 0:38:15a byword for sexual excess and perversion.
0:38:15 > 0:38:20We can hardly hear his name without conjuring up images
0:38:20 > 0:38:24of drunken orgies, sex in the wrong place with the wrong people,
0:38:24 > 0:38:30with little boys, married women, virgins and, most notoriously,
0:38:30 > 0:38:32with his own three sisters.
0:38:32 > 0:38:36If we were making a porn movie, Roman-style,
0:38:36 > 0:38:40we'd be bound to cast Caligula in the lead.
0:38:40 > 0:38:42And if these stories have been added to
0:38:42 > 0:38:44and embellished over the years,
0:38:44 > 0:38:47they actually first appear in sources
0:38:47 > 0:38:49written years after his death,
0:38:49 > 0:38:53mostly by the second century biographer Suetonious.
0:38:53 > 0:38:56And they tell us just as much about the anxieties
0:38:56 > 0:38:59of the Roman elite as they do about Caligula.
0:38:59 > 0:39:03So you get these tales about, you go to dinner with Caligula,
0:39:03 > 0:39:05you're a senator and you take your wife
0:39:05 > 0:39:08and then in the middle between courses, you suddenly discover
0:39:08 > 0:39:12that the Emperor has gone out of the room with your wife.
0:39:12 > 0:39:15They come back a bit later, they all look a bit flushed
0:39:15 > 0:39:19and then the Emperor says, "Oh, she's not very good in bed, is she?"
0:39:19 > 0:39:21Yeah, and associated with those stories,
0:39:21 > 0:39:24there's the account of how people are coming to the banquet,
0:39:24 > 0:39:28Caligula is on his couch, people file past the end
0:39:28 > 0:39:30and he acts like someone at a slave market,
0:39:30 > 0:39:31sort of checking out the girls,
0:39:31 > 0:39:34trying to decide which one he's going to select for later.
0:39:34 > 0:39:37So this is how the Emperor shows his power,
0:39:37 > 0:39:42by humiliating the elite in all sorts of different ways.
0:39:42 > 0:39:44This is one way amongst many.
0:39:44 > 0:39:48But perhaps the most damning story was Caligula's incest
0:39:48 > 0:39:52with his favourite sister, Drusilla, with whom, as a boy,
0:39:52 > 0:39:56he was said to have been discovered in bed by his own grandmother.
0:39:56 > 0:40:01There's no actual accusation of incest by anybody contemporary,
0:40:01 > 0:40:03absolutely contemporary with Caligula, is there?
0:40:03 > 0:40:07And even this Suetonious stuff,
0:40:07 > 0:40:11where he's talking about granny finding them in bed,
0:40:11 > 0:40:15it's quite interesting that even Suetonius is only saying,
0:40:15 > 0:40:18"People used to say that. The gossip was..."
0:40:18 > 0:40:20Whereas he's quite clear that incest took place,
0:40:20 > 0:40:24when it gets to the detail, it's all...
0:40:24 > 0:40:25Kept at a distance.
0:40:25 > 0:40:30Yes. I think even Seneca, who is pretty much Caligula's contemporary,
0:40:30 > 0:40:33he does talk about when Caligula's sister Drusilla dies,
0:40:33 > 0:40:37Caligula's excessive grief for Drusilla.
0:40:37 > 0:40:39He doesn't know what to do with himself,
0:40:39 > 0:40:41he dashes off to the country, he dashes back to Rome,
0:40:41 > 0:40:45he tries to console himself with gambling.
0:40:45 > 0:40:48He goes around in a terrible state.
0:40:48 > 0:40:51But he doesn't link that to perverse sexuality.
0:40:51 > 0:40:54I think there's also the dynastic aspect of it.
0:40:54 > 0:40:57The stories about incest are partly about their anxieties
0:40:57 > 0:41:00about the way that power is now transmitted in the Roman world.
0:41:00 > 0:41:03Instead of it going from one lot of middle-aged men
0:41:03 > 0:41:05to another lot of middle-aged men
0:41:05 > 0:41:07through a proper process in the Senate,
0:41:07 > 0:41:10it's one family that's holding on to power
0:41:10 > 0:41:13and the women in the family then have influence in a way
0:41:13 > 0:41:16they never had previously done under the Roman Republic.
0:41:16 > 0:41:19So really what the stories are telling us,
0:41:19 > 0:41:21- they are telling us about power? - I think that's right.
0:41:21 > 0:41:24He's a youngish man, he's not a great military leader
0:41:24 > 0:41:27or anything like that, but he's got all this power
0:41:27 > 0:41:28as leader of the Roman world.
0:41:28 > 0:41:32His relations with the Senate are clearly very uneasy.
0:41:32 > 0:41:36So they tell these stories about his outrageous behaviour.
0:41:41 > 0:41:45Perhaps this is a clue to one of the problems of Caligula.
0:41:45 > 0:41:49Whereas Augustus and Tiberius had come to power after prominent
0:41:49 > 0:41:54military careers, "Bootikins" was thrust on the throne at just 24.
0:41:55 > 0:41:59Without the military pedigree or political experience
0:41:59 > 0:42:01to earn the elite's respect,
0:42:01 > 0:42:04it's hardly surprising that he might cast around
0:42:04 > 0:42:08for alternative, more king-like models of leadership.
0:42:08 > 0:42:13And that included presenting himself as both Emperor and God.
0:42:16 > 0:42:18The boundary between Roman emperors
0:42:18 > 0:42:21and the gods was always a fragile one.
0:42:21 > 0:42:24But Caligula trampled right through it.
0:42:24 > 0:42:27He is said to have insisted
0:42:27 > 0:42:31on being worshipped as a god in his own lifetime.
0:42:31 > 0:42:33And to make matters worse, we are
0:42:33 > 0:42:37told he transformed the most symbolic space in Rome,
0:42:37 > 0:42:41the People's Forum, into his own stage to be worshipped.
0:42:41 > 0:42:46One story was that he turned the Temple of Castor and Pollux
0:42:46 > 0:42:48into the porch of his own house
0:42:48 > 0:42:51and used to go and sit there between the statues of the gods,
0:42:51 > 0:42:53waiting to be worshipped.
0:42:54 > 0:42:58Another story was, he used to go up to the Capitoline Hill
0:42:58 > 0:43:00to talk to Jupiter there.
0:43:00 > 0:43:04And then built a bridge between the Palatine
0:43:04 > 0:43:08and the Capitoline to make those conversations a bit easier.
0:43:09 > 0:43:13It's even said that he had flamingos sacrificed to him.
0:43:13 > 0:43:18If there's now nothing left of these buildings above ground in the Forum,
0:43:18 > 0:43:22archaeologist Henry Hurst has uncovered evidence beneath
0:43:22 > 0:43:25that suggests they might not be entirely fantasy.
0:43:25 > 0:43:28We dug over all of this area and we're very lucky
0:43:28 > 0:43:32in that we found some unusually well-dated remains.
0:43:32 > 0:43:33We could date them
0:43:33 > 0:43:37pretty much to around 40 AD, around the time of Caligula's reign.
0:43:37 > 0:43:42And what they consisted of was a large courtyard going that way
0:43:42 > 0:43:45towards the hill and behind it a very grand room
0:43:45 > 0:43:49and a grand courtyard. Then where we are, a big enclosure
0:43:49 > 0:43:51with a central monument.
0:43:51 > 0:43:55The combination of that and this grand courtyard and room
0:43:55 > 0:43:59makes one think of some sort of a palatial complex.
0:43:59 > 0:44:02And on the other side of that wall is the Temple of Castor and Pollux.
0:44:02 > 0:44:07Yes, so the story that Caligula extended the palace out
0:44:07 > 0:44:10towards the Forum and made the temple his vestibule
0:44:10 > 0:44:15seems quite possible because these remains are huge and palatial
0:44:15 > 0:44:18and very close to the back of the temple.
0:44:18 > 0:44:21And what about Caligula's fantastical bridge to Jupiter
0:44:21 > 0:44:23on the Capitoline Hill,
0:44:23 > 0:44:28which, if true, would have spanned a distance of over 250 metres,
0:44:28 > 0:44:30and been 30 metres above the ground?
0:44:31 > 0:44:34The sane and traditional view of this is that the bridge
0:44:34 > 0:44:38was just a timber footbridge, which went from somewhere high up,
0:44:38 > 0:44:41using the roofs of buildings, and ended up over in the Capitoline
0:44:41 > 0:44:44so you wouldn't find any traces archaeologically.
0:44:44 > 0:44:48But we have the mystery of what we're standing on.
0:44:48 > 0:44:55What it looks really like is a pier of the Roman bridge at Verona.
0:44:55 > 0:44:59These look like that quite a bit, so we thought, is this a bridge pier?
0:44:59 > 0:45:03And in favour of that is this question of levels
0:45:03 > 0:45:08because the temple behind us there is one storey up from where we are.
0:45:08 > 0:45:12There's also the story about how Caligula threw coins
0:45:12 > 0:45:15from the roof of the Basilica Julia, also one storey up,
0:45:15 > 0:45:18and that was just over there, so it would be quite sensible
0:45:18 > 0:45:21if you were having a bridge for it to be effectively one storey high
0:45:21 > 0:45:24so that it could link these things all at first floor level.
0:45:24 > 0:45:27So a raised walkway and then up to the Capitoline.
0:45:27 > 0:45:29And then eventually up to the Capitoline, yes.
0:45:30 > 0:45:33It's just a small block of marble, a tantalising clue
0:45:33 > 0:45:37to the lengths Caligula went for his own self-aggrandisement.
0:45:38 > 0:45:41But it also points to the difficulty we now have
0:45:41 > 0:45:44in separating fact from fiction.
0:45:44 > 0:45:46After just four years in power,
0:45:46 > 0:45:50there's little hard archaeology that we can tie to Caligula for certain.
0:45:51 > 0:45:56But there is one site not far from Rome where we can.
0:45:56 > 0:46:00This is Lake Nemi, one of Caligula's favourite places.
0:46:00 > 0:46:04It's where all the myths come together.
0:46:04 > 0:46:09The uncontrolled extravagance, the divinity, and even the violence.
0:46:12 > 0:46:16It was known in the ancient world as the speculum Dianae -
0:46:16 > 0:46:18the mirror of Diana.
0:46:19 > 0:46:20And in the 1930s,
0:46:20 > 0:46:25it was the site of one of the most stunning finds in Roman archaeology,
0:46:25 > 0:46:30two enormous floating villas that were so large
0:46:30 > 0:46:34and so lavish that they've become the ultimate symbols
0:46:34 > 0:46:38of Caligula's excess towards the end of his reign.
0:46:39 > 0:46:45And unsurprisingly, it was Italy's 20th-century tyrant, Mussolini,
0:46:45 > 0:46:49who spent a fortune raising them from the mud and installing them
0:46:49 > 0:46:53in a huge museum at the end of the lake.
0:46:53 > 0:46:55The shells of the boats were tragically destroyed
0:46:55 > 0:46:58in the Second World War.
0:46:58 > 0:47:03Now we've only got models, but much of the hardware still survives.
0:47:03 > 0:47:06No doubt whose boats these are!
0:47:06 > 0:47:10It says Gaius Caesar Augustus Germanicus.
0:47:10 > 0:47:12These are Caligula's barges.
0:47:12 > 0:47:16It's a bit hard to know what a water pipe is doing on a boat.
0:47:16 > 0:47:18They can't be ordinary boats.
0:47:18 > 0:47:23Perhaps they're bringing water to Caligula's hot tub under the stars.
0:47:26 > 0:47:29Suetonius has left us a vivid description
0:47:29 > 0:47:31of other Caligulan boats,
0:47:31 > 0:47:36so luxurious that they had jewelled prows, sails of purple silk,
0:47:36 > 0:47:39and bathrooms of alabaster and bronze.
0:47:39 > 0:47:41Long thought a myth,
0:47:41 > 0:47:44the boats of Nemi hint that they might in fact be true.
0:47:47 > 0:47:52For alongside the naval hardware of the ships are glimpses
0:47:52 > 0:47:54of astonishing imperial luxury.
0:47:56 > 0:48:01There are rows of columns made from Grecian marble,
0:48:01 > 0:48:03sinister sculptures of Medusa heads,
0:48:03 > 0:48:06and huge golden hands,
0:48:06 > 0:48:10beautifully sculpted mooring rings of wolves and lions,
0:48:10 > 0:48:13and balustrades cast in solid bronze.
0:48:15 > 0:48:18There have been all kinds of theories about what these boats
0:48:18 > 0:48:19were actually for.
0:48:19 > 0:48:23Some people have thought they must have been religious.
0:48:23 > 0:48:27Was it here that Caligula came to commune with the goddess Diana
0:48:27 > 0:48:30by the light of the moon?
0:48:30 > 0:48:34Was one of them a temple to the Egyptian goddess Isis?
0:48:34 > 0:48:38Or were they just very lavish pleasure barges?
0:48:38 > 0:48:42Romans with too much money loved nothing more
0:48:42 > 0:48:46than to build out onto water. Was that what Caligula was up to?
0:48:48 > 0:48:52The boats of Nemi will no doubt always remain an enigma...
0:48:53 > 0:48:57..but there is one place on the lake where Caligula's intentions
0:48:57 > 0:48:59come into sharper focus.
0:49:02 > 0:49:05All around the shore were dozens of shrines and temples
0:49:05 > 0:49:08that went back hundreds of years.
0:49:08 > 0:49:11And one of them raises troubling questions
0:49:11 > 0:49:16about whether he was a victim or actually a colluder in his own fate.
0:49:21 > 0:49:25This was once the sanctuary of Diana,
0:49:25 > 0:49:29a richly decorated temple in a grove of sacred trees.
0:49:30 > 0:49:35There was just one weird thing about the sanctuary of Diana
0:49:35 > 0:49:39and that was the priest in charge, the so-called King of Nemi,
0:49:39 > 0:49:41the Rex Nemorensis.
0:49:41 > 0:49:46First of all, he was a runaway slave, and secondly,
0:49:46 > 0:49:50in order to get the job, he had to kill the present incumbent.
0:49:50 > 0:49:54If you wanted to become Rex here, you came to the sanctuary,
0:49:54 > 0:49:56you went and found the special sacred tree,
0:49:56 > 0:49:58you pulled off a branch.
0:49:58 > 0:50:02If you managed to pull off that branch, you were allowed
0:50:02 > 0:50:06to challenge the current priest to a fight to the death.
0:50:07 > 0:50:10If you won, you became Rex yourself,
0:50:10 > 0:50:13but of course you also got a death sentence
0:50:13 > 0:50:17because someone else would be along sooner or later to challenge you.
0:50:18 > 0:50:22Ancient writers tell us about seeing the priest in this sanctuary.
0:50:22 > 0:50:24He had a sword in his hand
0:50:24 > 0:50:28and he was always looking furtively about him, for obvious reasons.
0:50:33 > 0:50:36The ritual of Nemi harked back to a very primitive level
0:50:36 > 0:50:38of ancient religion,
0:50:38 > 0:50:41and Caligula was said to have revived it with glee,
0:50:42 > 0:50:46finding a slave to come and kill the priest in charge.
0:50:47 > 0:50:51Whether Caligula did that because he wanted to inject
0:50:51 > 0:50:54a bit of religious reality into what had become a charade,
0:50:54 > 0:50:58or whether it was just capricious sadism, we don't know,
0:50:58 > 0:51:03but it's hard not to think of the King of Nemi
0:51:03 > 0:51:07as an uncanny double of the Emperor of Rome.
0:51:07 > 0:51:10Both were looking behind their backs,
0:51:10 > 0:51:13and maybe Caligula had spotted that too.
0:51:19 > 0:51:24However knowing Caligula might have been, in the end it didn't save him.
0:51:24 > 0:51:26On 22nd January, 41 AD,
0:51:26 > 0:51:32he was assassinated after just three years, 10 months,
0:51:32 > 0:51:34and eight days in power.
0:51:36 > 0:51:40And if the facts of Caligula's life might forever elude us,
0:51:40 > 0:51:44ironically it's his death about which we know the most,
0:51:44 > 0:51:48thanks to a graphic account written by a Jewish historian,
0:51:48 > 0:51:50Flavius Josephus.
0:51:50 > 0:51:54Peter Wiseman is taking me to where he thinks is the exact spot
0:51:54 > 0:51:57where Caligula, the Emperor Gaius,
0:51:57 > 0:52:01was set upon by members of his own personal security force.
0:52:02 > 0:52:04He sees, coming towards him,
0:52:04 > 0:52:07a colonel of the Praetorian Guard called Cassius Chaerea,
0:52:07 > 0:52:10- whom he knows of old.- So, he feels safe.- He thinks he's safe.
0:52:10 > 0:52:12Cassius Chaerea, however,
0:52:12 > 0:52:15is the leader of the assassination conspiracy,
0:52:15 > 0:52:20and Chaerea draws his sword and he brings it down as hard as he can.
0:52:20 > 0:52:24Gaius is staggering around, totally disoriented,
0:52:24 > 0:52:28and the guy who actually gave him the final blow
0:52:28 > 0:52:32was a man called Aquila, so he's the man who has the credit
0:52:32 > 0:52:37for the assassination of the Emperor Gaius - Caligula.
0:52:37 > 0:52:40- Are people pleased - a tyrant is dead?- Some people thought that.
0:52:40 > 0:52:44What you have to understand about Gaius Caligula is that he was
0:52:44 > 0:52:47enormously popular with the ordinary population.
0:52:47 > 0:52:50He was a Caesar, who was the son of Germanicus,
0:52:50 > 0:52:52he was the great-grandson of Augustus,
0:52:52 > 0:52:55he was the great-great-grandson of Julius Caesar.
0:52:55 > 0:52:58All of these were popular heroes. He was their popular hero,
0:52:58 > 0:53:03and they hated the idea that people - senators, senior army officers -
0:53:03 > 0:53:07should take it upon them to kill their man.
0:53:07 > 0:53:10But there's a sort of irony to this, isn't it, because this is not an
0:53:10 > 0:53:13uprising of popular will, this is a take-out move
0:53:13 > 0:53:15by the Praetorian Guard.
0:53:15 > 0:53:18Yes, a small group of senior officers
0:53:18 > 0:53:21who were also involving senior senators.
0:53:21 > 0:53:26It's a question what they expected to happen afterwards.
0:53:26 > 0:53:28It seems that Chaerea
0:53:28 > 0:53:34and the others were idealistic enough to believe that, in killing Gaius,
0:53:34 > 0:53:38they would put an end to what we call the principate.
0:53:38 > 0:53:40There wouldn't be an emperor any more.
0:53:40 > 0:53:45But in the end they get this very, very brief little flowering
0:53:45 > 0:53:49of what looks as if it might be about to become the overthrow
0:53:49 > 0:53:51of autocracy entirely,
0:53:51 > 0:53:54and the return to the republic, the little bit of debate,
0:53:54 > 0:53:59and then half an hour later they found Caligula's uncle,
0:53:59 > 0:54:01Claudius, to put back on the throne.
0:54:01 > 0:54:05That's because the Praetorian Guard itself
0:54:05 > 0:54:08depended on there being an emperor.
0:54:11 > 0:54:14It was the ultimate betrayal, and a chilling reminder
0:54:14 > 0:54:18that in Imperial Rome it was not the emperor, but the army,
0:54:18 > 0:54:20who held the reins of power.
0:54:22 > 0:54:26But there's one final chapter in Caligula's story which adds,
0:54:26 > 0:54:28I think, to his terrible reputation.
0:54:31 > 0:54:34There's evidence that attacks on his memory began
0:54:34 > 0:54:36almost before his body went cold.
0:54:37 > 0:54:39To justify his assassination,
0:54:39 > 0:54:42the new regime condemned him as a tyrant.
0:54:44 > 0:54:47His uncompleted building projects were then taken over
0:54:47 > 0:54:49and inscribed with Claudius's name.
0:54:51 > 0:54:53Some of his coins were defaced,
0:54:53 > 0:54:57his initials symbolically scratched out,
0:54:57 > 0:55:00and in many of his official statues,
0:55:00 > 0:55:03the heads were either replaced or destroyed.
0:55:04 > 0:55:07At the wonderful Montemartini Museum in Rome,
0:55:07 > 0:55:10there's a strange bust of Caligula's uncle,
0:55:10 > 0:55:13the new and in many ways just as vicious emperor,
0:55:13 > 0:55:16which underscores the shifty awkwardness
0:55:16 > 0:55:18of the transition of power.
0:55:18 > 0:55:22The face looks for all the world like the Emperor Claudius.
0:55:22 > 0:55:27It is a bit middle-aged and frowny, just how Claudius is often shown,
0:55:27 > 0:55:31but he's got this strangely bouffant fringe.
0:55:33 > 0:55:36And if you go up above him, you can
0:55:36 > 0:55:40see the whole bouffant hairstyle has been roughly chiselled off.
0:55:40 > 0:55:45What has gone on is that a statue of Caligula has been
0:55:45 > 0:55:48changed into a statue of Claudius.
0:55:48 > 0:55:53And it looks pretty weird, except if you imagine that this head
0:55:53 > 0:55:58would have been on a full-length statue, and if you get low down,
0:55:58 > 0:56:03well, actually, he works pretty OK as Claudius from this angle.
0:56:03 > 0:56:08Now, it's a way of saying Caligula is obliterated
0:56:08 > 0:56:11and Claudius is now on the throne.
0:56:11 > 0:56:16I have a sneaking suspicion that it also says, actually,
0:56:16 > 0:56:22the new emperor is only the old emperor with a re-cut face.
0:56:27 > 0:56:30This hybrid head gives us a clue as to why it's always been
0:56:30 > 0:56:34hard to come face-to-face with the real Caligula.
0:56:35 > 0:56:40In the bloody transition of power, his real face has got lost.
0:56:42 > 0:56:45And to find him, you now have to look for him in other ways.
0:56:45 > 0:56:49In the shadow of his heroic father on the battlegrounds of Germany,
0:56:49 > 0:56:52in the bricks of the palace on Capri,
0:56:52 > 0:56:55where, one by one, he lost his family.
0:56:55 > 0:57:00Or in the eerie luxury of his boats, found at the bottom of Lake Nemi.
0:57:01 > 0:57:05And if what this tells us is that some of the myths may be true,
0:57:05 > 0:57:09the paranoia, the excess, even the self-proclaimed divinity,
0:57:09 > 0:57:12the rest, we'll never know.
0:57:12 > 0:57:15Were the stories of murder and madness
0:57:15 > 0:57:20created as much by Caligula himself to further a culture of fear?
0:57:20 > 0:57:24Or were they spun just like his nickname, Bootikins,
0:57:24 > 0:57:29to blacken his name and to justify his violent assassination?
0:57:29 > 0:57:32Whatever the truth, it's in the story of Caligula
0:57:32 > 0:57:36that all the elements of tyranny as we now recognise it
0:57:36 > 0:57:39come together for the first time.
0:57:39 > 0:57:43And perhaps that's why he's left such a powerful imprint
0:57:43 > 0:57:45on our world.
0:57:45 > 0:57:46For almost 2,000 years now,
0:57:46 > 0:57:51Caligula has made people reflect on power and its abuse.
0:57:51 > 0:57:53The man and the myth,
0:57:53 > 0:57:57and to be honest, you can't ever quite separate the two, have raised
0:57:57 > 0:58:02all kinds of questions about cruelty, excess, about adoration,
0:58:02 > 0:58:05and about the delusions of an autocrat,
0:58:05 > 0:58:07and about his fearful isolation.
0:58:08 > 0:58:13But, for me, Caligula also turns the spotlight onto ourselves,
0:58:13 > 0:58:16about what our own responses to tyranny should be.
0:58:16 > 0:58:19Maybe there's a lesson. After all,
0:58:19 > 0:58:23when that group of disgruntled army officers decided to rid Rome
0:58:23 > 0:58:29of the monster, sure - they left him in bits on the palace floor -
0:58:29 > 0:58:32but all they got was more of the same.
0:58:56 > 0:58:59Subtitles by Red Bee Media Ltd