From the depths of depravity: Caligulas party boat to be raised after 2,000 years

[rpannier]

After a brutal four-year reign in which he killed for pleasure, allegedly slept with his sisters and tried to appoint his horse a consul, the Roman Emperor Caligula was assassinated and his memory hushed up by his imperial successors.

Two thousand years on, researchers hope to bring back to life his debauched regime by raising the lost wreck of one of his enormous party boats from the muddy bottom of an Italian lake.

Divers using high-tech scanners will start scouring Lake Nemi, south of Rome, today in the hunt for the remains of a 400ft vessel on which, according to legend, Caligula threw wild orgies during his reign from AD37 to 41.

snip

“If it’s down there, and it’s that long, then we are talking about the world’s first luxury cruise ship,” said Alberto Bertucci, the mayor of Nemi, the local town, who is masterminding the search. “Every emperor had a villa — but Caligula demanded floating villas complete with columns, hot water, gold and mosaics.”

link:
http://www.thetimes.co.uk/edition/news/from-the-depths-of-depravity-caligula-s-party-boat-to-be-raised-after-2-000-years-fjgdkw3jk?CMP=TNLEmail_118918_1613548

according to a small bit under the pic at the top of the article, 'Caligula’s pleasure craft had hot running water and technology not replicated in the Royal Navy until 1841'

[Warpy]

1. It wasn't his only party boat

but it was more an elaborate floating building that was never meant to travel anywhere. It's an example of why he was finally assassinated and it had nothing to do with his sexual kink, which was standard among the emperors, or his habit of having so many people close to him, that was standard practice also. It was because he squandered money at a rate never seen before, threatening to bankrupt the Empire.

Had they not offed him, he'd have stopped paying the legions, who had a nasty habit in the past of fomenting revolutions and sacking prosperous cities they'd been hired to protect.

I see a lot of parallels between Dolt45 and Caligula, especially the lack of any idea about what tax money was supposed to be spent on and the profligacy when it comes to their own enjoyment.

Fortunately, Dolt has one hell of a lot less power than Caligula got handed.

[rpannier]

2. One thing that makes Caligula more tragic the Hair Gropenfuror

Caligula started as a pretty good emperor and then lost it
One very strong theory had to do with his goblet. It was made of lead. Researchers made a goblet using the same method as back then and found that it leeched lead several times in excess of what a human could stand and suffer mentally from it
It's likely the cause of his insanity.
Be curious what drove our loser over the edge

[Warren DeMontague]

3. Propecia?

Tertiary Syphilis?

could go either way, or both, in theory.

[Warpy]

7. Not old enough for tertiary syphilis

although bones excavated near Herculaneum showed signs of the disease as a congenital illness.

Propecia is a drug used to treat alopecia. He had hair and wore it in a rather bouffant style.

Were you thinking of paresis? That's the mental illness caused by tertiary syphilis. I've known people who had it but benefited from the timely advent of penicilin so they stopped at the happy drunk stage instead of progressing to the screaming horror stage.

[Warren DeMontague]

10. No, I meant Trump, not Caligula!

[Warpy]

11. Nah, he's got garden variety senile dementia

but he's in the very early stages of it, so I'm not sure he's aware he's losing it yet. He will be.

People with paresis have all been a lot nicer than he is.

[Warpy]

6. Our loser was likely raised to be a sociopath

by a daddy who equated decency with weakness. That's usually what happens, bullies create new bullies in their children.

[dembotoz]

4. New site for Trump tower?

[flamingdem]

5. Caligula was a loser!

[dalton99a]

9. Is that drool or sperm out the side of his mouth?

[dalton99a]

8. It's a shame Trump doesn't have a horse

"the greatest U.S. senator of all time"

[rpannier]

12. Jared

That will be Hair Douchengroper's horse equivalent