Profile for Emperor: Elagabalus - A guide to the coins of the Roman Empire

Elagabalus

Reece Period attributed: Period 10

Member of the The Severans dynasty.

Coins for this issuer were issued from 218 until 222.

Varitus Avitus Bassianus was born in AD 203 or 204, in Syria. He rose to power when 14, because his mother claimed he was Caracalla’s illegitimate child and the army believed her. His mother and grandmother ultimately ran affairs, but Elagabalus was the iconic emperor.

Reportedly beautiful, Elagabalus was the chief priest of the eponymous Syrian sun-god. He attempted to introduce this cult to Rome, even bringing with him the huge stone which represented the god and building it a temple near the Colosseum. Elagabalus also had notorious sexual appetites for both men and women, and promised a huge reward to any doctor who could perform a sex-change operation. He married at least three women within four years. Eventually, the Roman army and senate could no longer respect Elagabalus, and the women behind his administration began quarrelling. He adopted the future Alexander Severus in an attempt to legitimize his power, but the Praetorian Guards murdered Elagabalus and his mother anyway.

Elagabalus had large eyes and a youthful, underdeveloped face. He tended to wear gold or purple tunics, and at times a female diadem.

View all coins recorded by the scheme attributed to Elagabalus.

Wikipedia derived information

Elagabalus, also known as Heliogabalus, was Roman Emperor from 218 to 222.

A member of the Severan Dynasty, he was Syrian on his mother's side, the son of Julia Soaemias and Sextus Varius Marcellus. Early in his youth he served as a priest of the god El-Gabal at his hometown, Emesa. Upon becoming emperor he took the name Marcus Aurelius Antoninus Augustus and was called Elagabalus only after his death.

In 217, the emperor Caracalla was assassinated and replaced by his Praetorian prefect, Marcus Opellius Macrinus. Caracalla's maternal aunt, Julia Maesa, successfully instigated a revolt among the Third Legion to have her eldest grandson, Elagabalus, declared emperor in his place. Macrinus was defeated on June 8, 218, at the Battle of Antioch, upon which Elagabalus, barely fourteen years old, ascended to the imperial power and began a reign that was marred by infamous controversies.

During his rule, Elagabalus showed a disregard for Roman religious traditions and sexual taboos. He replaced the traditional head of the Roman pantheon, Jupiter, with a lesser god, Deus Sol Invictus, and forced leading members of Rome's government to participate in religious rites celebrating this deity, which he personally led. Elagabalus was married as many as five times, lavished favors on courtiers popularly assumed to have been his homosexual lovers, and was reported to have prostituted himself in the imperial palace.

His reputed behaviour infuriated the Praetorian Guard, the Senate and the common people alike. Amidst growing opposition, Elagabalus, only 18 years old, was assassinated and replaced by his cousin Alexander Severus on March 11, 222, in a plot formed by his grandmother, Julia Maesa, and disgruntled members of the Praetorian Guard. Elagabalus developed a reputation among his contemporaries for extreme eccentricity, decadence and zealotry which was likely exaggerated by his successors and political rivals.

This likely propaganda was passed on and, as a result, he was one of the most reviled Roman emperors to early historians. For example, Edward Gibbon wrote that Elagabalus "abandoned himself to the grossest pleasures and ungoverned fury. " "The name Elagabalus is branded in history above all others" because of his "unspeakably disgusting life," wrote B.G.

Niebuhr..

Wikipedia page: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Elagabalus
This data is sourced from dbpedia, and as such should be treated with caution