ABSTRACT
WITH THE DEATH of Caligula the senators could enjoy a brief moment of euphoria. Once again, for the first time in living memory they felt about to be called upon to play the great role that had been theirs during the Republic, answerable in a vague sense to the Roman people, but at the whim and mercy of no single individual. They were convened on the Capitol by the consuls. This had happened also after the deaths of Augustus and Tiberius, but on this occasion the consuls’ role was seen as more than a mere formality, but almost a declaration of newly regained independence.1 The consuls also took the precaution of transferring funds from the treasuries (presumably the Aerarium Saturni in the Temple of Saturn in the forum) to the Capitol, and set guards over them.2 The senators seem to have been full of confidence.3 A decree charging Caligula with unspecified crimes was passed, and there were even demands that all the Caesars be condemned to damnatio memoriae and their temples destroyed. There was, of course, an element of selfinterest in the apparent senatorial idealism. They no doubt appreciated that the ending of the imperial system would, in fact, lead to a restoration of their own powers and privileges, a development foreseen also by the Praetorians and the people. Josephus comments that the kind of government they would have instituted was an ‘aristocracy, as the government of old had been,’ and notes that they met in a spirit of excessive arrogance, as if power already lay within their hands.
