Elagabalus

For the god with the same name, see Elagabalus (deity).

Elagabalus
White head statue of a young man
Marble bust, Capitoline Museums, Rome
Roman emperor
Reign16 May 218 – 13 March 222
PredecessorMacrinus
SuccessorSeverus Alexander
Born(Sextus) Varius Avitus Bassianus[1]
c. 204
Emesa, Syria or Rome, Italy
Died13 March 222 (aged 18)[2]
Rome, Italy
Burial
Corpse thrown into the Tiber
Spouses
IssueSeverus Alexander (adoptive)
Regnal name
Imperator Caesar Marcus Aurelius Antoninus Augustus
DynastySeveran
FatherSextus Varius Marcellus
MotherJulia Soaemias Bassiana

Marcus Aurelius Antoninus (born Sextus Varius Avitus Bassianus, c. 204 – 13 March 222), better known by his posthumous nicknames Elagabalus (/ˌɛləˈɡæbələs/ EL-ə-GAB-ə-ləs) and Heliogabalus (/ˌhiːliə-, -lioʊ-/ HEE-lee-ə-, -⁠lee-oh-[3]), was Roman emperor from 218 to 222, while he was still a teenager. His short reign was notorious for religious controversy and alleged sexual debauchery. A close relative to the Severan dynasty, he came from a prominent Syrian Arab family in Emesa (Homs), Syria, where he served as the head priest of the sun god Elagabal from a young age. After the death of his cousin, the emperor Caracalla, Elagabalus was raised to the principate at 14 years of age in an army revolt instigated by his grandmother Julia Maesa against Caracalla's short-lived successor, Macrinus. He only posthumously became known by the Latinised name of his god.[a]

Elagabalus is largely known from accounts by the contemporary senator Cassius Dio who was strongly hostile to him, and the much later Historia Augusta. The reliability of these accounts, particularly their most salacious elements, has been strongly questioned.[5][6] Elagabalus showed a disregard for Roman religious traditions. He brought the cult of Elagabal (including the large baetyl stone the god was represented by) to Rome, making a prominent part of religious life in the city. He forced leading members of Rome's government to participate in religious rites celebrating this deity, presiding over them in person. According to the accounts of Cassius Dio and the Augusta, he married four women, including a Vestal Virgin, in addition to lavishing favours on male courtiers they suggested to have been his lovers,[7][8] and prostituted himself.[9] His behavior estranged the Praetorian Guard, the Senate, and the common people alike. Amidst growing opposition, at just 18 years of age he was assassinated and replaced by his cousin Severus Alexander in March 222. The assassination plot against Elagabalus was devised by Julia Maesa and carried out by disaffected members of the Praetorian Guard.

Elagabalus developed a posthumous reputation for extreme eccentricity, decadence, zealotry, and sexual promiscuity. Among writers of the early modern age, he endured one of the worst reputations among Roman emperors. Edward Gibbon, notably, wrote that Elagabalus "abandoned himself to the grossest pleasures with ungoverned fury".[10] According to Barthold Georg Niebuhr, "the name of Elagabalus is branded in history above all others; [...] "Elagabus had nothing at all to make up for his vices, which are of such a kind that it is too disgusting even to allude to them".[11] An example of a modern historian's assessment is Adrian Goldsworthy's: "Elagabalus was not a tyrant, but he was an incompetent, probably the least able emperor Rome had ever had".[12] Despite near-universal condemnation of his reign, some scholars write warmly about his religious innovations, including the 6th-century Byzantine chronicler John Malalas, as well as Warwick Ball, a modern historian who described him as "a tragic enigma lost behind centuries of prejudice".[13]

Modern scholars have questioned the accuracy of Roman accounts of his reign, with suggestions that the reports of his salacious and homosexual behaviour may have been related to Roman stereotypes regarding people from the Orient as effeminate.[5][14]

  1. ^ de Arrizabalaga y Prado 2010, p. 231.
  2. ^ Arrizabalaga 2010, p. 27.
  3. ^ "Heliogabalus". The American Heritage Dictionary of the English Language (5th ed.). HarperCollins. Retrieved 6 November 2019.
  4. ^ "The Chronography of 354 AD. Part 16: Chronicle of the City of Rome". tertullian.org (in Latin and English). Archived from the original on 1 October 2020. Retrieved 14 November 2020.
  5. ^ a b Osgood, Josiah (28 November 2016). "Cassius Dio's Secret History of Elagabalus". Cassius Dio: Greek Intellectual and Roman Politician. BRILL. pp. 177–190. doi:10.1163/9789004335318_011. ISBN 978-90-04-33531-8. Archived from the original on 21 June 2022. Retrieved 24 June 2024.
  6. ^ Kemezis, Adam (2016). "The Fall of Elagabalus as Literary Narrative and Political Reality A Reconsideration". Historia. 65 (3): 348–390. doi:10.25162/historia-2016-0019. ISSN 0018-2311.
  7. ^ Scott 2018, pp. 129–130, 135–137.
  8. ^ Zanghellini 2015, p. 59.
  9. ^ Campanile, Carlà-Uhink & Facella 2017, p. 113.
  10. ^ Gibbon, Edward. Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire, Chapter VI.
  11. ^ Niebuhr, Barthold Georg (1844). The History of Rome: From the First Punic War to the Death of Constantine. Vol. 2. S. Bentley. p. 306.
  12. ^ Goldsworthy 2009, p. 81.
  13. ^ Ball 2016, p. 464.
  14. ^ Bittarello, Maria Beatrice (15 September 2011). "Otho, Elagabalus and The Judgement of Paris : the literary construction of the unmanly emperor". Dialogues d'histoire ancienne. 37/1 (1): 93–113. doi:10.3917/dha.371.0093. ISSN 0755-7256. Archived from the original on 24 June 2024. Retrieved 24 June 2024.


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