rock 'n' rome
Or, the wild tale of Elagabalus, the original "Accidentally Became Important at Work" Roman Emperor.
Hello, friends!
First, a brief PSA: I’m participating in a historical fiction-themed auction to benefit the Friends of the Ashland Public Library in Ashland, MA, which closes at 8pm ET on October 15. You can bid on a signed and personalized book bundle from yours truly, as well as a heap of other incredible items from histfic authors who are far cooler than me. (Kate Quinn! Yangsze Choo! Lauren Groff! Geraldine Brooks!) International entries are accepted. Auction link here.
Aside: if you’re wondering what I’m up to when I’m not yelling at you about historical wackadoos, you can always subscribe to my author-focused sub-Substack, Just the Books, Ma’am. You can manage that subscription separately from the core Dirtbags subscription (here’s how). Here’s the latest issue.
Okay! Now that I’ve fulfilled my admin duties, let’s talk about something WILD. Specifically, a real banger of a tale about:
Elagabalus, Ancient Rome’s Queer Teenage Dirtbag Horndog Religious Zealot Emperor!
It’s worth noting that our ability to separate fact from fiction is particularly bad for basically everything to do with Ancient Rome. The line between history and propaganda back then was so fine you reeeally had to squint to find it, and actual contemporary accounts of major events are irritatingly rare. Someone from 400 CE writing about a person in 218 CE sounds close enough at first, until you realize it’s the equivalent of Colleen Hoover providing the world’s only account of the death of 9th American president William Henry Harrison.
Fortunately for me, though! Ancient Roman historians and I have one important guiding principle in common:
(Also, I’m using they/them pronouns for Elagabalus throughout this story because who the fuck knows. So just, note that down.)
Path of Priest Resistance
Elagabalus was born in about 203 CE in (probably) Syria with the absolute mouthful of a name Sextus Varius Avitus Bassianus, which I will not be using in this story for obvious reasons. Syria was part of the Roman Empire at this point, but because of geographic, religious, and cultural differences Rome perceived it as “other,” so put a pin in that.
Understanding Elagabalus’s family is important, because if they’d been born into a different social station, none of what’s coming next would probably have happened. Elagabalus’s parents were Sextus Varius Marcellus, a member of the Roman Senate, and Julia Bassiana, a cousin of the current Roman emperor Caracalla.
Their maternal grandmother (called Julia Maesa, because of course, so I’m going to just call her Grandma Julia for clarity) was the sister-in-law of another emperor. She was a real ambitious sonofabitch who wanted to see the family remain as powerful and important as possible.
But Elagabalus did not give a single flying fuck about their family’s imperial aspirations. They were just a young hot teenager with exactly one hobby, and that hobby was extraordinarily and endearingly sincere worship of the Arab-Roman sun god Elagabal.
Elagabal was believed to exist both as a god and as an extremely spiritually important rock housed in a temple in Elagabalus’s hometown of Emesa. Here is a picture of the rock.
As a young teenager, Elagabalus was named high priest of the cult of Elagabal, partly because of their family’s hereditary position and partly because they were really hype about the duties and this was maybe the only job they were actually qualified to do. While their family went to Rome and jockeyed for power, Elagabalus remained in Emesa, priested about, and minded their own business.
And if the emperor Caracalla hadn’t gone and gotten himself stabbed by a disgruntled subordinate while taking a piss in Edessa in 217, maybe Elagabalus could have carried on getting the High Priest of the Month award in peace. But, of course, Caracalla took a piss, got stabbed, and here we are.
In Which We Set the Bar High for All Future Grandma-Driven Schemes Throughout History
Caracalla was succeeded by the emperor Macrinus, who decided to consolidate his power by immediately exiling Caracalla’s entire family from Rome. Mom Julia and Grandma Julia grumpily decamped to Emesa. And the moment Grandma Julia’s feet touched Syrian soil, this bitch (complimentary) began to plot. One imagines the scene unfolded like this:
Grandma Julia: How dare Macrinus exile me from Rome?
Mom Julia: IDK, maybe because he thought you might try to overthrow him?
Grandma Julia: So unfair! So unjust!
Mom Julia: Indeed.
Grandma Julia: Anyway, I’m going to overthrow Macrinus.
Mom Julia: Obviously.
Grandma Julia: On that note, have you noticed how hot Elagabalus is?
Mom Julia: Well, they’re my child and also a priest and also I haven’t seen them in literal years because they’ve been hanging out with a rock, so honestly no, hadn’t noticed.
Grandma Julia: I bet I could make them emperor. People love a hot emperor.
Mom Julia: They’re 14 and have absolutely zero transferable skills.
Grandma Julia: Yes, but they’re hot and also my grandchild.
Mom Julia: Touché.
So Grandma Julia schemed up a real hell of a scheme and began convincing the people of Syria that Elagabalus was the illegitimate child of the assassinated emperor Caracalla and therefore deserved to be the next emperor. Remember, Elagabalus and Caracalla were like second cousins or something, so they probably looked at least a little similar. I went to Google Images to see if I could spot the resemblance, but honestly all busts look the same to me.
To enhance the believability of this story, Grandma Julia went around bribing members of the Third Legion stationed in Syria and reminding everybody how shitty Macrinus was for the economy &c. Pretty soon, she had an army on her side, and the Third Legion began staging an insurrection to overthrow Macrinus. As best I can tell, Elagabalus carried on being High Priest and made exactly zero contributions to their grandma’s war effort.
The military effort was successful, and by the summer of 218 Elagabalus was all set to be crowned emperor of Rome.
Party Rock Anthem
“Hey Grandma,” Elagabalus said (probably). “Do you mind if I bring some stuff from home with me when we move to Rome?”
“Fine,” Grandma Julia replied (probably). “Just be chill about it.”
Elagabalus, never having been chill a single day in their life, had other ideas.
Specifically, they packed up the literal rock of Elagabal on a giant chariot and brought it with them to Rome. Nobody drove the chariot with the rock in it—the rock drove itself into Rome. And Elagabalus ran backwards in front of the rock chariot all the way into Rome while his entourage watched.
I have not stopped thinking about the Rock of Elagabal driving itself through the carpool lane up the Palatine Hill since the moment I heard this story. I also could not resist including this gif. Sorry.
Cult Classic
Elagabalus was crowned emperor in June 218. To the surprise of absolutely nobody who’s been paying attention up to this point, they asked Mom Julia and Grandma Julia to join the Senate, delegating governing decisions to the Two Julias while Elagabalus pursued their true passion of converting the entire Roman Empire to the cult of Elagabal.
Specifically, they made the very chill and not-at-all controversial decision to overthrow the entire Roman pantheon and instate Elagabal as the supreme god of everything, with Elagabalus as the high priest of the highest god. Rome was shocked and aghast by this move. If pearls went with togas, they would have been clutched with gusto.
As a concession, Elagabalus said “OK fine, y’all can keep Minerva, but she’s going to be married to Elagabal. Happy now?” Reader, Rome was not happy.
Festivals to Elagabal got more and more elaborate, with a giant-ass temple built in Rome right next to the Colosseum to house the rock. What’s happening politically across the Roman Empire throughout all of this, you ask? Fuck if Elagabalus knows. Party Rock is in the house tonight, and that’s all that matters.
Elagabalus also made another bold decision and married Julia Aquilia Severa in 220 CE. Why was this a bold choice, you ask? Not because this is the third goddamn Julia to enter this story, clearly indicating a lack of respect for my poor nerves. No, it’s because Julia Severa just oh-so-happened to be a VESTAL VIRGIN. You know, the most sacred women in all of ancient Rome, who swore themselves to absolute celibacy for thirty years and were supposed to be buried alive if they ever broke the vow.
I genuinely can’t come up with a modern-day analogy for how scandalous this was. Elagabalus believed that a Vestal Virgin and the High Priest of Elagabal would be able to have the most godlike babies of all time, which makes sense from like a math perspective but absolutely did not fly with the people.
Elagabalus and Julia Severa were divorced shortly after in what is clearly a Grandma Julia PR Move. No one knows what happened to her after that, because Ancient Rome hates women. I also suspect no one asked her if she wanted to be married to Elagabalus in the first place, for the same reason.
eLeGaBal(TQ+)
Now, it’s important to remember that Elagabalus was Syrian. And people in Ancient Rome had all kinds of racist preconceptions that people from Syria were effeminate and untrustworthy. So all of that colors the next part of the Scandal of Elagabalus, namely all of the gay and trans content.
The story goes that Elagabalus had lovers of multiple genders, including a particularly passionate relationship with a male chariot driver named Hierocles and a Smyrnan athlete named Zoticus. As an editorial note, I remind folks that this isn’t even remotely uncommon in the Roman empire [*cough cough Emperor Hadrian*], but by the time people were writing histories about them, this was used as a sign of depravity. Historians doubled down by getting real kink-shame-y in their writings about these relationships, which I’m not gonna get into here because I feel like it is none of historians’ business?
According to Ancient Roman historian and famed messy bitch Cassius Dio, Elagabalus also requested that people refer to them as “lady” rather than “lord,” regularly dressed in traditionally female clothing, and sent out a request to any doctor in Rome who could surgically construct them a vagina.
Is any of this true? Bitch, I don’t know!
It’s very possible the whole “cross-dressing” thing is actually racism in disguise, with people misinterpreting traditional Syrian dress as femme-coded, and the rest spiraled out from there. But if you think I’m gonna read a story about an apparently queer gender-nonconforming disaster in 220 CE and not say “yes, this is representation,” you clearly don’t know the MO of Dirtbags Through the Ages.
Emperor of Stab-ness
Yes, this is an Ocean Vuong Roman Empire pun. Surely if the audience for such a joke exists, they live on Substack.
You can imagine that none of this is doing wonders for Elagabalus’s popularity among the Roman Empire. The fact that they’re currently 17 or 18 years old and their pre-frontal cortex isn’t fully cooked yet is not helping matters. There’s also a rumor that Elagabalus once hosted a dinner party and dropped a literal metric ton of rose petals from the ceiling, crushing all of their guests to death, which I don’t understand logistically but would be remiss not to mention.
Put all of this together, and by 221 CE, dozens of legions of soldiers were in active revolt against Elagabalus as emperor. And Grandma Julia was back on her scheming bullshit.
Having realized by now that “is my grandchild” and “looks sort of like Caracalla” are not in fact adequate qualifications to rule an empire, Grandma Julia was fully off the Elagabalus Train by now. So she turned to her other grandson, 15-year-old Alexander Severus, and started a campaign to get him named as Elagabalus’s heir.
Listen. I said she was a schemer. I never said she was a great schemer. Surely the problem with her original plan was that she picked the wrong completely unqualified teenage grandchild.
Elagabalus was a lot of things, but they were no dummy. Whenever someone who has already staged one coup starts taking a sudden vested interest in naming your heir, you can bet that an assassination is right around the corner. They tried many, many times to have Alexander assassinated, but unfortunately none of the attempts stuck, probably because the entire imperial army was no longer interested in taking orders from Elagabalus.
Finally, in March of 222, everything hit the tipping point. Elagabalus and Alexander were parading through the streets of Rome, and the crowd started cheering Alexander and booing Elagabalus. Elagabalus flew into a rage and commanded the Praetorian Guard to arrest and execute everyone who had booed them. Which, to be fair, sounds like a very 18-year-old thing to say. If I could have ordered the arrest of everyone who made fun of me senior year of high school, I might have.
The Praetorian Guard, suddenly thinking of a more efficient thing they could do with their swords, chased Elagabalus through the streets of Rome and stabbed him. They also stabbed Mom Julia, who had fled with her child and tried to protect them from the guards.
Elagabalus and Mom Julia were both decapitated and thrown in the Tiber, and Alexander Severus was named the new emperor of Rome. Elagabalus was later subjected to damnatio memoriae, the ancient practice of physically stripping a ruler’s memory from all records and forbidding them from being mentioned in writing. AKA the thing that most pisses off everyone even remotely interested in history. Think of how many more engravings of the rock driving into Rome we could have had.
If it isn’t obvious from the way I’ve been telling this story, I’m really very fond of Elagabalus and feel history has done them dirty. They, like me, would have absolutely thrived if they’d been left alone and never asked to have any responsibilities ever. Just let them vibe and do not entrust them with any aspects of the strategic plan.
All righty, that’s all for this time, my friends! Until next time, be well, and drop your favorite historical scheming grannies in the comments because I’m starting to think about doing a series,
-Allison
Imagine your Granny coming to you and saying she wants you to become the teenage emperor. After she just made your cousin the teenage emperor and then he and his mother were murdered DUE TO THE SCHEMING OF YOUR GRANNY. I guess no, thanks wasn't really an option
Wait--the Rock drove itself? I'm picturing a teenager running backwards all the way to Rome coaxing those horses--"this is going to look so cool!" That's got to be worth something!