This type was issued by Caligula for his two deceased brothers, Nero Julius Caesar and Drusus Julius Caesar Germanicus. Nero Caesar was Tiberius' oldest adoptive grandson and was the emperor's most obvious successor until 29 A.D. when he was accused of treason along with his mother, Agrippina the Elder. He was exiled to the island of Ponza where he was either induced to commit suicide or starved to death before October 31. In 30, his brother Drusus Caesar was also accused of treason and exiled and imprisoned. He starved to death in prison in 33, reduced to chewing the stuffing of his bed. In Suetonius', The Lives of Twelve Caesars, Claudius IX we learn that Caligula ordered his uncle and co-consul Claudius to commission statues of his deceased elder brothers. The statues appear on dupondii, immortalized in a pose recognizable as the Dioscuri. The marble statue in the photo right was found in or near Rome during the fifteenth century, and is now in the British Museum. The pose differs from the image on the coins but restorations include the youth’s arms and three of the horse’s legs. Is it one of the two statues commissioned by Claudius? Click the photo to see additional photos and information. | |