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202. CARACALLA
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CARACALLA. 198-217 AD.
The emperor visited Alexandria for intellectual and religious reasons, staying at the Serapeum and being present at the temple's sacrifices and cultural events. Earlier, during the German war, the emperor visited the shrine of the Celtic healing-god Grannus. Caracalla also visited the famous temple of Asclepius in Pergamum and fully participated in its program, which involved sleeping inside the temple compound and having his dreams interpreted.
It was this religious devotion that led to Caracalla's murder in 217. Although suspicious of the praetorian prefect Macrinus, Caracalla allowed himself to be accompanied by only a small, select corps of bodyguards on an early spring trip from the camp at Edessa to the temple of the moon-god at Carrhae, about 25 miles away. During the journey back on 8 April 217, Caracalla was killed. The returning guards claimed the emperor was ambushed while defecating, and that the alleged assassin was one of their own, a soldier named Martialis. Martialis was himself killed by the avenging guards, or so the story went. Suspicion was strong that Macrinus arranged the entire affair.
Caracalla's violent end seemed appropriate for an emperor who, early in his reign, had his own brother killed. Yet the moralizing about fratricide by both ancient and modern historians obscures the energetic, reformist and even intellectual character of Caracalla's reign. Some of the reforms, especially the pay raise for soldiers, would prove burdensome for future emperors, but the changes brought about in the little more than five years of Caracalla's sole rule would have long-lasting implications throughout the empire for generations to come.
AR Denarius (19mm, 3.11 gm). Struck 215 AD. ANTONINVS PIVS AVG GERM, laureate head right / P M TR P XVIII COS IIII PP, Sol standing left, radiate, raising right hand and holding globe. RIC IV 264a; BMCRE 139; RSC 288. EF
Ex - CNG
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