After murdering
Geta c. 25 December 211,
Caracalla departed c. summer 212 on a
military expedition to Raetia and Upper
Germany. The Acts of the Arval Brethren record that he crossed the
border of Raetia into enemy territory about a year later, c. 1 August 213; early in October 213
his victory over the barbarians was announced and he was voted the title
Germanicus.
Several months later, early in 214,
Caracalla evidently returned to
Rome for a short visit. Halfmann, in
his important book on imperial travels (Itinera Principum, Stuttgart 1986), rejected this visit, suggesting that
Caracalla proceded from Raetia directly to
Thrace and northern
Asia Minor, where we know he spent the
winter of 214-5 at
Nicomedia. Earlier scholars, however,
had accepted that
Caracalla visited
Rome in 214, and two coin
types prove that they were right:
1.
LIB AVG VIIII P M TR P XVII
IMP III
COS IIII P P S C,
Caracalla on platform presiding at
his ninth
largesse;
sestertius, illustrated below (
CoinArchives).
Caracalla had distributed a
largesse in 212 after Geta's assassination, and there would have been no reason for him to distribute this new one in 214 (
his TR P XVII), UNLESS HE
HAD PERSONALLY RETURNED TO
ROME. So
Marcus Aurelius distributed no largesses during
his lengthy absence for the Marcomannic Wars from 169 to 177, except one in 175 for Commodus' assumption of the
toga virilis, at which
Commodus himself presided. Dio informs us that when
Marcus finally returned to
Rome in 177 and said in
his first speech to the people that he
had been away for many years, the people shouted "Eight!" and held up eight fingers, indicating that the emperor's absence
had lasted eight years, and hoping for a record distribution of eight
aurei per person at the
largesse that they knew he would soon be distributing!
2.
P M TR P XVII
COS IIII P P, sacrifice scene before the temple of
Vesta, very like that on the new
aureus of Septimius;
aureus, also illustrated below (
CoinArchives). On the right,
Caracalla, laureate and in
military dress, stands left, holding a
patera over the
altar in front of the temple. Behind him, a flamen wearing a pointed
cap (
apex); between
Caracalla and the flamen, a child standing left in the foreground, and the facing
head of an adult in the background. To the left of the
altar,
Julia Domna standing right, veiled, holding a ladle over the
altar, accompanied by a priestess standing behind her; or maybe these ladies are the Chief
Vestal Virgin (who might have a
brooch fastening her veil, on which see below) and another
Vestal. Between them, as on the right, a child standing r. in the foreground and the facing
head of an adult in the background.
This scene evidently depicts Caracalla's sacrifice to
Vesta either immediately after returning to
Rome from Raetia, or immediately before departing again from
Rome for
Thrace and
Asia Minor, both events taking place towards the beginning of 214, say in January and March 214 respectively.
The temple of
Vesta was destroyed by fire under
Commodus in 191, but was apparently
restored by Septimius, for it was shown on two occasions on coins of
Julia Domna, first in 207 under Septimius and then c. 214 under
Caracalla; see the
aureus of 207 and an As of c. 214 below, both from
CoinArchives. Here it is not the imperial family who are shown sacrificing before the temple, but the six
Vestal Virgins; for on the
Berlin silver
medallion of 207 four of them wear
brooches on their chests that fasten their veils, a detail characteristic of depictions of Vestals in other media, as Heinrich
Dressel observed in
his excellent book on the
Roman medallions in
Berlin. Such
brooches also seem to be visible on the chests of the two frontal veiled heads shown in the background on the
VESTA MATER aureus illustrated below. This personal connection to the Temple of
Vesta, which they
had rebuilt, may be the reason why it was only Septimius and
Caracalla who chose to symbolize their departures from
Rome or their arrivals in the city by depicting their sacrifices before that temple, although other emperors too doubtless performed similar arrival or departure rites at the same temple,
as is specifically attested for
Nero (see above).
I think
Pat Lawrence is right that these coins of
Julia Domna are the only evidence for the widespread assumption that it was
Domna herself, rather than her husband, who
restored the Temple of
Vesta. R. Lanciani, generally an excellent and reliable scholar, even asserts that
Julia restored the temple "at her private expense"! Richardson repeats the assertion that
Julia restored the temple, but the passages in
Herodian and the
Historia Augusta that he cites merely recount the destruction of the temple in the fire of 191!