"Roman statues are for the most part thought to be quite accurate depictions. Here I used a photo of a bust of a young Caligula, and brought it up to date (a quick-and-dirty affair, but it gets the idea across). I think it gives us a pretty good idea of what this crazy emperor actually looked like."
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"Quick and dirty?" What can he do when he takes time?
Update Jan 2013:
A pointed out the eery similarity with Joffrey Baratheon from Game of Thrones! You're right, that is just spooky.
Thats not Caligula ... its Elijah Wood! :-) (LOTR)
ReplyDeleteEverybody knows that the real Caligula is John Hurt.
ReplyDeleteAlso, Patrick Stewart is Lucius Aelius Sejanus. Professor X, hah!
By the way, where on Norm's site is this? I can't find it.
ReplyDeleteIt's probably not posted, he just mailed it to me today. But I have forwarded your question.
ReplyDeleteThat stuff doesn't take any talent. The computer does all the work.
ReplyDeleteLooks to me like Daniel Radcliffe with a bad case of hydrocephaly...
ReplyDelete"The computer does all the work."
"Computer, please do all the work. Computer? Are you hearing me? Please acknowledge."
Remember that scene in The Voyage Home where Scotty tries to use a 1970 computer, and mistakes the mouse for a microphone? ROTFL!
BTW, I have my doubts about the eyes as shown here. Caligula was a Roman, therefore an Italian, and probably had darker eyes. In ancient Rome, blue eyes were considered as a sign of weakneess. Very unlikely to see them in an emperor or his lineage...
ReplyDeleteAbout as unlikely as a gay-looking President of the United States, you could say. ;-)
Remember that scene in The Voyage Home where Scotty tries to use a 1970 computer, and mistakes the mouse for a microphone? ROTFL!
ReplyDeleteHomer Simpson did the same thing, speaking into the mouse and ordering his computer to kill Flanders.
Caligula was a Roman, therefore an Italian, and probably had darker eyes.
You probably can't judge Roman appearance by the Italians of today, since most of them probably are the descendants of Visigoths. :)
Looks to me like Daniel Radcliffe with a bad case of hydrocephaly...
ReplyDeleteI kind of thought his head looked really big, or at least he has a really bulging forehead. I don't know if the Romans knew what the brain did or not. Even if they did, Caligula isn't know to history as a big brainbox. I wonder, Doc Referent, if whatever caused his giant watermelon head was responsible for his madness? It's probably a bit difficult to diagnose a patient who has been dead for nearly two thousand years.
It is, Dave. Then again, if you've got a well-preserved body, like the Egyptian mummies...
ReplyDeleteReliable health data has been gathered from as ancient human remains as Neanderthals.
Hudrocephaly itself isn't associated with psychosis. However, there IS something else. Please follow:
- Romans loved wine, ESPECIALLY the wealthy Romans. (Think orgies.)
- The wine in ancient Rome was markedly acidic.
- Romans used to preserve/age wine in jars sealed with lead.
- The acidity would dissolve some of the lead into the wine by contact.
- Ergo, chronic lead poisoning, often in proportion to the wealth and social status.
- Saturnism can VERY MUCH cause "madness" from neuronal toxicity.
- The Romans, especially the aristocracy, LOVED to watch most cruel torture live in the Circus Games. Gladiator fights, Christian burnings, feeding the lions in the petting zoo...
- Sure, any Roman leader was likely to be RAISED into being ruthless... in the first place!
- Cancel that paging for Dr Gregory House, a mystery is LACK of explanations, not a vast choice of possily added causes.
Did you know that the C-section, or cesarean birth, appears to come from the way Julius Caesar, in person, was born? His pregnant (and close to term) mother being mortally wounded, the instant she expired, a crafty (or distrurbingly imaginative?) soldier used his sword to extract the baby.
(Hey, I never said the Romans PERFECTED the procedure!!!)
BTW, GCITM, *if* the Wisigoths modified the gene pool in Italians today, it sure wasn't by ADDING southern-style traits like dark eyes. Unless you also know something I don't about today's Germans? ;-)
Many Syrians have Asian-like features. Gives them a type rather distinct from their Lebanese close neighbors. Those who don't like Syrians very much use that demeaning -but historically accurate- term: Tamerlan's bastards. The Mongols reached Syria, and, well... you know how conquerors typically behaved with women.
Lebanon can pretty much display all ethnic types, give or take. Most of History's conquerors passed by, and many of them settled locally. This is why I once blogged that "a Lebanese can have practically any ethnic type... except look like a Lebanese". ;-)
Maybe that Elijah Wood resemblance influenced the artist for the eye color. Unless Elijah is a direct desendant of Tiberius Caligula's countless mistresses? ;-)
No offense intended. We're pretty much all related these days, and NOBODY can claim to have nothing but noble, upstanding ancestors.
ESPECIALLY the royalty! Hel-lo, fratricidal exterminations!
In fact, given the customs of rulers and their fancy for mistresses, a fancy relayed by nobility (among which many clandestine royal offsprings), chances are that most of us have some genes from a "famous leader".
IRL.
So much for the perceived importance of our remote origins. We are who we choose to be... and the cash/status we inherit at birth, of course! The rest is mere hollow bragging.
Joffrey Baratheon
ReplyDeleteThe Romans used lead as a sweetener. Upper class Romans that is.
ReplyDeleteWell, other people seem to complain quite a bit....I on the other hand really like it! Great Job!
ReplyDeleteBTW, GCITM, *if* the Wisigoths modified the gene pool in Italians today, it sure wasn't by ADDING southern-style traits like dark eyes. Unless you also know something I don't about today's Germans? ;-)
ReplyDeleteI think it meant they would have introduced blue eyes and blond hair and that possibly all Romans or most would have had dark eyes. Then again you have plenty of people with black hair and blue eyes.
Oh my god it's Joffrey Baratheon! :O It all makes sense now!
ReplyDeleteWow.
ReplyDelete(post updated.)
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