Magnificent 2,000-Year-Old Marble Mosaic from Caligula's ‘Orgy Ship’ Ends up as Coffee Table in NYC Apartment

Ancient Origins

A valuable piece of mosaic flooring from one of Caligula’s ‘orgy ships’, so-called for the lavish sex parties he hosted on the boats, somehow found its way from the bottom of Lake Nemi to the Upper East Side in New York, and now it's finally heading back home in Italy.

From Rome to New York
The square slab of marble flooring, decorated with a floral motif made of pieces of green and red porphyry, serpentine and molded glass, was discovered at an Italian collector's Park Avenue apartment in New York City. So how did it end up being used as a coffee table in a Manhattan's apartment? Well, there’s a logical explanation to the “mystery.” As NBC News reports, the precious artifact, stolen from Italy's Roman Ship Museum after World War II, was seized by the New York district attorney's office from the collection of Helen Fioratti.

She and husband, Italian journalist Nereo Fioratti, purchased the piece more than 45-years-ago from an aristocratic family that lived on the lake, “It was found in the waters of the lake in the 19th century,” Fioratti told NBC News in a phone interview. While it was unknown to the Fioratti couple how much the Italian family paid for the ancient artifact, they both assumed that it cost them thousands of dollars and was a completely innocent purchase. She explained that when they decided to buy the rare mosaic back in the 1960s, they never considered it was stolen, as they had no reason to question the ownership, “They thought they owned it. We thought they owned it. Everyone thought they owned it," she told NBC News.

Mrs. Fioratti added that she didn’t know how the Italian police learned about the artifact and she speculates that may saw it in a magazine shoot of her apartment, “We had our apartment featured a long time ago in Architectural Digest and I’m sure there was a photograph of the table in front of the sofa,” she said as NBC News reported.

The ancient marble mosaic, which has now been returned to the Italian government in New York. Credit: Yana Paskova / The New York Times

The Long History of the Roman Artifact
The Roman artifact dates back to Caligula's reign, 37-41 AD and came from one of his three ships built at the volcanic Lake Nemi. The mosaic, as well as other ancient objects including two vases, bronzes, coins and manuscripts, were recovered thanks to an investigation carried out by the special art unit of the Carabinieri police led by Fabrizio Parrulli and US authorities.

The 2000-year-old piece of Roman history is extremely significant as it was once dredged from the lake outside Rome after laying underwater for centuries and is one of the few pieces left of Caligula's ships. Described as “floating palaces” by the Museum of Roman Ships, which houses the remains of the ships, they were notable for their luxury and are thought to have been the site of Caligula’s flamboyant ceremonies that lasted for days. The ships were over 70-meter-long and were richly decorated with marble, gold and bronze friezes of animals.

A marble bust of Emperor Caligula

The Fate of Caligula’s Ships
After Caligula was killed, his ships were sunk and remained underwater for centuries, despite efforts since the 19th century to find the treasures. Benito Mussolini was the first to launch an organized exploration of the lake and two vessels were retrieved between 1928 and 1932. In 1936, the Italian government of Mussolini built a museum, the Museo delle Navi inaugurated in 1940, to display the artwork. However, in 1944 an arson attack at the museum, which had been used as a bomb shelter, damaged many of the artifacts. Only a few decorations survived the fire, while other artifacts were taken away before the war, including the mosaic, according to NBC News. Two models representing the vessels are currently exhibited at the museum in Nemi. The third ship, which according to Suetonius in the Lives of the Caesars was the most luxurious of the three, was never retrieved.

Some of the decorations from Caligula’s Nemi ships: A bronze railing ( CC BY SA 2.0 ), a face (Miguel Hermoso Cuesta/ CC BY SA 3.0 ), and brass rings recovered in 1895. These were fitted to the ends of cantilevered beams that supported each rowing position on the seconda nave. ( CC BY SA 3.0)

Top image: The ancient marble mosaic, which has now been returned to the Italian government in New York. Credit: Yana Paskova / The New York Times

By Theodoros Karasavvas

Hold Your Horses! Did Caligula Actually Make a Steed a Roman Consul?

Ancient Origins

When we think of the emperor Caligula, it is John Hurt’s wonderfully maniacal performance in the BBC TV series I, Claudius that usually comes to mind. Hurt dances in a gold bikini, sports a beard soaked with the blood of his progeny, and parades his favourite horse, clad in the toga of a consul, in front of shocked onlookers. He is the very model of a mad Roman emperor.

The story that Caligula made his favourite horse, Incitatus, a consul has long tickled our imaginations. The internet is awash with articles and blogs chewing over whether it is really true. The horse has even made it into the Oxford Dictionary of Phrase and Fable: its definition for the name “Incitatus” reads “the name of Caligula’s horse, made a consul by the emperor”. Perhaps the greatest testament to Incitatus’ immortality, however, is the fact that he has his own Wikipedia page.

While the ancient evidence mentions a plan for making Incitatus consul, the repeated retelling of the story over centuries (in particular, as a snide way to suggest that a politician might be out of his or her depth) means we often forget that Caligula’s horse never actually sat in the senate at all.

Caligula and his horse. (Yo amo la Historia)

The Emperor’s Favorite Ass
The office of consul was the highest magistracy in the Roman Republic. Under the empire, the position still existed, though it was primarily an honorific office, which emperors used to reward loyal senators. On the subject of Caligula’s horse, the ancient sources are unambiguous in their testimony: he was not made a consul.

The biographer Suetonius does, however, report that the emperor lavished gifts upon Incitatus, equipping him with a marble stall, ivory manger, purple blankets, luxurious furniture, and his own slaves. At the climax of this passage, Suetonius writes:

 …it is also reported that he designated [Incitatus] to the consulship.

Another ancient source, the historian Cassius Dio, gives a slightly different version:

…and he even promised to designate [Incitatus] consul. And he would most certainly have done this, if he had lived longer.

The story therefore probably owes its origin to an off-hand remark made by Caligula that he would make Incitatus a consul (though he never followed through with it).

Although Caligula remarked that he would make his horse Incitatus a consul he never followed through with it. (Tvtropes/CC BY NC SA 3.0)

Why would Caligula say this? One of the most popular theories is that the emperor was criticising the consuls: they were such “asses” that he might as well include his horse in this elite group.

The name of the horse is particularly relevant here. “Incitatus” means “fast-moving”. The historian David Woods has ingeniously suggested that the name was intended to be an insult directed towards one particular consul, Asinius Celer, whose name means “swift ass”. A joke by Caligula the comedian has been interpreted as historical fact.

Emperor Caligula. (CC BY-SA 3.0)

A Party Fit for a Horse
Caligula was a far cry from his imperial predecessors Augustus and Tiberius. We think of Augustus as the “first emperor” but he positioned himself as a leading Republican politician, not a monarch. His successor, the dour Tiberius, tried to refuse as many monarchical honours as possible.

Caligula, on the other hand, was a boisterous young man in his mid-twenties. He was keen to experiment with the opportunities his position allowed him, adopting ceremonies and dress that were more in keeping with eastern kings. In short, Caligula wanted to be – and be seen to be – a monarch.

The youth of Rome loved their horse-racing. The attention Caligula lavished on Incitatus went above and beyond that shown to prize steeds by other young aristocrats. He was the emperor, so bigger and better was the name of the game.

Caligula did hold parties for his friends in the horse’s grand stables, where Incitatus himself was the “host”. But all the bling was really for Caligula and his mates, so they could live it up in style – it was not for the horse. Caligula’s regal pretensions did not sit well with Roman aristocrats, who wanted their emperors to respect them and Republican institutions such as the consulship. We can easily imagine Caligula and his drinking buddies lampooning the stuck-up consuls as “asses”, and the emperor declaring that Incitatus would soon be joining their ranks!

Caligula’s Horse (Dali’s Horses), Salvador Dali, 1971. (Fair Use)

The Neighs Have It
The story of Caligula and Incitatus proved so irresistible as a paradigm of political abuse that it didn’t seem to matter that the horse never donned the consular toga. In particular, commentators through the centuries have had a great deal of fun in comparing contemporary politicians to the emperor’s favourite horse.

 One of the cleverer examples of this is a piece from the London Magazine and Monthly Chronologer, printed on 6 February 1742. In a column entitled Common Sense, the subject for discussion is “Caligula’s Prime Minister”. The Prime Minister of Great Britain at the time was Robert Walpole, who, on 28 January 1742, had lost a vote of no confidence in Parliament. The author of this satire immediately lays his cards on the table, stating that Caligula was a good and able emperor who chose the best candidate for the job of “Prime Minister”:

What a happiness … must it have been to have liv’d under the auspicious Reign of the Emperor Caligula, who had so great a Regard to Merit wherever he found it, and took such a fatherly Care in providing for the Happiness of his People, that he made his Horse a Minister of the State.

Imaginary depiction of Caligula making Incitatus a consul. (imgur)

Incitatus comes up trumps compared to Walpole, as the horse demonstrates all the qualities of a good Prime Minister. The real blow, however, is dealt at the end of the piece:

Whoever considers these Things with an unprejudiced Judgement, will upon an impartial Comparison with another whom I have in my Eye, be obliged to own, that the Horse was not only the honestest, but by far the wisest Minister of the two.

Caligula’s horse also appears in more serious contexts, such as a British response to the American Declaration of Independence of 1776, entitled the “Rights of Great Britain Asserted against the Claims of America”. The author cites the story of Incitatus’ consulship as one of many examples from ancient Rome where the wrong people are given decision-making power:

The extension of the right of electing Magistrates to the people at large, was the principal cause of the fall of freedom in Old Rome. The prejudices and fears of the rabble were the steps by which ambitious men ascended to a power, which they converted into tyranny over their foolish Constituents…the grandsons of voters who placed Marius, Cinna, and Caesar at the head of the State, were employed by Caligula in raising his horse to the Consulship.

Here the story of Incitatus becomes a parable of what happens when a state abandons its founding principles at the behest of sycophants.

But there is a final twist in this horse’s tale. Cassius Dio states that Caligula made a horse – assumed to be Incitatus – a priest of the emperor’s cult. This has usually been overlooked, perhaps because Dio mentions it in a different section and does not explicitly name Incitatus.

As a result, we have been accustomed to interpreting this story as one about the abuse of political, rather than religious, power. Even though Caligula’s horse never actually got to sit in the ivory chair in the Roman senate (his ivory stable had to suffice), we still like to imagine a time when a politician literally was an ass.

Top Image: An equestrian statue of a Julio-Claudian prince, originally identified as Caligula. Source: Trustees of the British Museum/CC BY NC SA 4.0

The article, originally titled ‘Mythbusting Ancient Rome – Caligula’s Horse’ by Shushma Malik and Caillan Davenport was originally published on The Conversation and has been republished under a Creative Commons license.

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