Roman Emperor Elagabalus: Scandal and Controversy

SUMMARY

• Elagabalus, a Syrian priest, became emperor through deceit and military support.
• He introduced the worship of the sun god Elagabal, causing religious and social upheaval.
• His eccentric behavior, including multiple marriages and extravagant displays, alienated many.
• Elagabalus was ultimately overthrown and killed by the Praetorian Guard.

Few emperors enjoy and endure quite as diverse a legacy as Elagabalus, who ruled from 218 to 222 CE. At the age of just 18, mutinous Praetorian guards cut down the emperor and his mother in the imperial capital. The emperor quickly became the subject of gossip and vitriol. From tales of oriental decadence, including smothering banquet guests to death beneath a cascade of rose petals, sexual perversity, and religious eccentricities, the truth of this young emperor is frequently veiled by scandal.

The story of Elagabalus’ rise begins with a lie. His grandmother, Julia Maesa, had previously enjoyed a life of imperial luxury. Her sister, Julia Domna, had been the wife of one emperor, Septimius Severus, and mother of another, Caracalla. Confined to their native city of Emesa in Syria after the murder of Caracalla in 217 CE, Maesa began to scheme. She had two daughters named Julia Soaemias and Julia Mammaea. Both daughters had sons, and Maesa began to spread rumors pertaining to their parentage. In particular, she asserted that Julia Soaemias’ son, Elagabalus, was actually the offspring of an adulterous affair between her daughter and the former emperor, Caracalla. The boy reputedly bore a striking resemblance to the former emperor as a young man. Generous bribes certainly helped the soldiers stationed at Emesa believe that this Syrian youth was actually the son and rightful heir to the Empire.

Elagabalus as a Priest and Prince of Elagabal

While Julia Maesa was busy buying the loyalty of the Roman soldiers and creating spurious family trees, Elagabalus was engaged in his priestly duties. He, like others in his family before him, was the chief priest of the main god in Emesa, Elagabal. Unlike other deities of the Classical world, Elagabal had no human form. Rather than a personified figure, this Phoenician sun god was worshipped as a large, conical black stone, also known as a baetyl.  The Roman soldiers at Emesa allegedly delighted in watching the eccentric but harmless priestly duties of the handsome young man.

Victorious, Elagabalus embarked upon the long journey to Rome from Syria. Wintering at Nicomedia in the winter of 218 CE, he shocked the populace of the Empire he encountered by performing the traditional rites associated with the worship of Elagabal and appearing dressed in ornate luxurious clothing, including, according to Herodian, opulent purple robes and a bejeweled tiara. Electing not to heed the warnings of his grandmother and her concerns that his appearance may shock and alienate the Romans upon his arrival, the young emperor instead ordered a full portrait of himself performing his priestly duties. This was sent ahead of the imperial entourage to be displayed at Rome, in the Curia (the Senate House), above the statue of Victory located there. The relationship between the new emperor and Rome’s traditional power base was off to a rocky start.

Early Warning Signs

That Elagabalus’ reign was to be beset by troubles was evident from its earliest days. The emperor, now officially known as Marcus Aurelius Antoninus, a name change designed to confirm his dubious heritage and dynastic legitimacy, was compelled to combat several revolts within the first year of his reign. The young emperor’s decision to kill Gannys, an adviser who had been central to his initial accession, was a poor one. Angered by the licentious behavior and religious oddities of the emperor, several legions revolted, including the Fourth Legion in Syria, led by Gellius Maximus. The world was already, Dio suggests, beginning to turn on its head.

Things would not improve upon Elagabalus’ arrival in Rome. In 219 CE, he oversaw the devaluation of the Roman currency, with a reduction in the silver levels of the denarius, the standard Roman silver coin.

As the chief priest of the god Elagabal, the new emperor oversaw the complete restriction of the Roman religious hierarchy. Although new forms of worship typically found space within the pluralistic pantheon of Roman religion – provided they accommodated worship of the emperor, which Judaism and Christianity did not – Elagabalus’ religious politics caused social and political tensions to rise. 

This change is most obvious in the new titles the emperor took for himself. Alongside the traditional office of Pontifex Maximus (Chief Priest), the new emperor also became Sacerdos amplissimus dei invicti Solis Elagabali (the most sacred priest of the invincible sun god Elagabalus). The new god was to be housed in two temples built in the imperial capital. One colossal structure was built on the Palatine Hill, the foundations of which are still visible today on the Vigna Barberini, and a second one, according to Herodian, on the outskirts.

Unhappy Marriages

To help ingratiate himself within Roman society, Elagabalus arranged for his marriage to one Cornelia Paula in January 220 CE. The wedding was celebrated with, according to Dio, festivities on an unimaginably grand scale. However, the intemperate youth, still only around 14 at this time, quickly divorced his bride. He quickly married a second, a third, and even a fourth time. However, he divorced all these wives, finally returning to his second wife, Aquilia Severa. This was most scandalous, as Aquila was actually a Vestal Virgin, a sacred priestess of Rome’s goddess of the hearth and home. This marriage was an offense to one of Rome’s most sacred laws.

Alongside this sacrilegious human marriage, the emperor also allegedly sought to integrate his god into Roman society through marriage. Accordingly, he arranged for the Syrian sun god to be wed to some of the most significant deities of the ancient world, including the Carthaginian goddess Urania!

Alongside reordering Rome’s religious order, Elagabalus also allegedly oversaw various other attempts – frequently masked behind tales of debauched sexual liberality, ostentation, and oriental excess – to turn the world upside down. Roman political traditions and the administration of the Empire were, reputedly, of little consideration to the young emperor. His contempt for the Senate, for instance, is recorded by the Historia Augusta, which says that Elegabalus offended the Senate by allowing his grandmother to attend Senate meetings, and by establishing a women’s Senate, a senaculum, on the Quinrinal Hill.

His contemporaries also found evidence for this world upside was found in Elagabalus’ sexuality. Not only did the emperor allegedly hire members of his court based on the preposterous size of their genitals, most famously Aurelius Zoticus, but alongside his failed marriages, he also took a string of lovers of both genders. These included his favorite Hierocles, whom he paraded as his “husband.”

A Note On Sources

The obvious hostility and questionable validity of the sources make understanding the Elagabalian Empire – the Roman world upside down – all the more difficult. The main narrative sources are the senatorial historian Cassius Dio, Herodian, a low-level bureaucrat from Asia Minor in the mid-3rd century, and the much more problematic Historia Augusta, an anonymous collection of pseudo-biographies now believed to have been written in the late 4th century. 

Various issues underpin the use of these sources in the accurate reconstruction of the events and realities of Elagabalus’ reign. Blustering rhetoric from an offended member of the outraged 3rd-century Senate may have contributed to Dio’s deprecating depiction of Elagabalus’ alleged effeminacy. Meanwhile, the imperial caricature crafted by the Historia Augusta was designed predominately to entertain an educated 4th-century audience. As ever, the situation is not hopeless. Inscriptions, coins, and archaeological remains help fill in the blanks and question the rhetoric surrounding Elagabalus.

Regardless of the bluster and bias of the sources, the truth remained that Elagabalus was not a popular emperor. His grandmother, Julia Maesa, who had done so much to facilitate Elagabalus’ accession, was growing increasingly dismayed at how the populus of the imperial capital was beginning to turn against the young emperor. Most worryingly, he appears to have lost the support of the soldiers, who were disgusted at his femininity. Maesa once again turned king-maker and began making plans to have her other grandson, Alexander, recognized as Elagabalus’ heir. Even this was turned into a farce by the emperor. He declared before the Senate that Alexander, his cousin, was actually his son and heir; they were actually almost the same age. The emperor also reportedly made several attempts to murder his “son” to protect his authority.

All was too little too late. The soldiers in Rome rebelled, proclaiming their support for the boy Alexander. It was a death sentence for Elagabalus. He was struck down in the Praetorian camp, while held tightly by his mother Julia Soaemias, who also perished. The memory of Elagabalus and his mother was condemned, a practice known to modernity as damnatio memoriae. Their corpses were mutilated and cast into the sewers of the city. In the immediate aftermath, the Empire was cleansed of traces of Elagabalus. His statues were torn down, his inscriptions erased, and the god Elagabal was sent back to Syria.

Elagabalus’ Afterlife

Elagabalus was to be remembered by history as one of the worst Roman emperors. Alongside other notorious imperial monsters, such as Caligula, Nero, and Commodus, Elagabalus came to symbolize the corruption of power. The reign of Alexander Severus was characterized by a concerted effort to re-right the Roman world. The traditional gods were restored to prominence, with Jupiter once more at the summit. In the world of politics, the Senate was once more welcomed back into the fold, and a period of relative stability endured for the 13 years of his reign.

Although the poor reputation of Elagabalus would endure for centuries after his death, with even Niccolò Machiavelli drawing on him as a poor model of imitation in The Prince, the emperor’s reputation as a depraved tyrant was not to prove indefinite. In the late 19th century’s Decadent movement, Elagabalus’ excesses – manifest as his orientalism, ennui, and androgyny – saw him championed. This rehabilitation continued in the second half of the 21st century, when increasing interest in sexual politics has seen the figure of Elagabalus rise again, celebrated for his alleged liberal attitudes to sexuality and gender. Ultimately, the search for Elagabalus, the emperor of opposites, goes on.

Was Elagabalus transgender?

Gender identity is a complex issue, and Elagabalus is not here to explain how he identified. Nevertheless, many modern scholars have claimed that he was transgender based on evidence in the sources. First, Elagabalus is described by the sources as a highly promiscuous youth who took both male and female lovers. The sources also consistently suggest that Elagabalus was feminine in his voice, mannerisms, and dress. He reportedly often played the role of a woman, asking to be called wife, mistress, or queen. But the most pertinent piece of evidence is a passage in Cassius Dio (80.16.7) which says that he asked physicians to contrive a woman’s vagina for him via incision.

Did Elagabalus drown people in rose petals?

According to the Historia Augusta, Elagabalus once invited diners over to a banqueting room with a reversible ceiling, and he used it to release violets and other flowers that buried his guests, smothering some of them to death as they were unable to crawl to the top. Since this event is not recorded in any other sources, which were also hostile towards Elagabalus, it seems likely that it was invented to scandalize and amuse the 4^th-century readers of the Historia Augusta.

Originally published: May 4, 2020. Last update: January 21, 2025, by Jessica Suess.