Final week, Ridley Scott’s eagerly anticipated Gladiator II premiered in theaters throughout the USA. Greater than twenty years after his first journey to the world in Gladiator (2000), Scott’s follow-up focuses not on the reign of Commodus, who murders his father, Marcus Aurelius, for the throne within the first film, however relatively on the rule of the Roman imperial brothers Caracalla (Fred Hechinger) and Geta (Joseph Quinn). It’s now the yr 211 CE, and the Colosseum is full of gladiators, rhinoceroses, and a few ahistorical sharks.
These enviornment sharks are simply one among many anachronisms, however the greater downside with the movie is its portrayal of the brand new rulers. Regardless of their casting as pasty strawberry blondes, as an illustration, the real-life counterparts of Caracalla and Geta have been sons of an African Roman emperor named Septimius Severus and a Syrian lady named Julia Domna. The movie has its enjoyable in casting aspersions on the masculinity and management skills of those fraternal rulers by cladding them in lavish colours and thick cosmetics and accessorizing them with jewellery and even a pet monkey. It misses out, nevertheless, on the chance to discover the fascinating, colourful, and syncretistic world of the actual Severans being reconstructed by artwork historians and artists in the present day.
Emperor Caracalla (Fred Hechinger) and Emperor Geta (Joseph Quinn) in Gladiator II (2024)
Earlier than we are able to perceive how these two Afro-Syrian brothers got here to energy, we should return to the demise of Commodus. Within the first Gladiator, the previous normal after which enslaved gladiator Maximus Decimus Meridius (Russell Crowe) kills the evil emperor Commodus (Joaquin Phoenix) as 50,000 Romans watch within the Colosseum. In actuality, Commodus, Marcus Aurelius’ son, was killed by a youthful athlete named Narcissus in 192 CE. The murderer strangled the ruler whereas he was in a shower in his home on Rome’s Caelian Hill.
By that point, it had been virtually ten years since the actual Commodus killed his sister, Lucilla, in 182 CE. Within the film model, nevertheless, Lucilla (Connie Nielsen) stays alive, enjoying the long-suffering mom of Lucius (Paul Mescal), the hero of Gladiator II. In Roman historical past, the interval of uncertainty after Commodus’ demise was known as the “Year of the Five Emperors.” Finally, it was a Roman governor of Punic and Italian origins named Septimius Severus who marched on the town of Rome with the help of the Roman legions from alongside the Rhine and Danube rivers, changing into the brand new emperor. His second spouse, Julia Domna, was the rich daughter of a priest from Emesa in present-day Homs, Syria. When the Severan Dynasty got here to energy in 193 CE, the couple already had a pair of sons: five-year-old Caracalla and four-year-old Geta. Within the movie, the 2 are depicted as twins, and their father just isn’t seen in any respect.
Not solely does the African emperor not make it to the display in Gladiator II, however the Africans which are depicted play the position of barbaric outsiders in methods each problematic and acquainted. Lucius, who goes by the Phoenician identify Hanno, was raised to hate Rome within the African province of Numidia. Regardless of his upbringing, Lucius finally reveals that he’s a Virgil-quoting Roman solely hiding within the garb of an African. Numidia and different such provinces similar to Africa Proconsularis are characterised as rebellious and non-Roman from the opening scenes of the film, throughout which an rebellion is put down by the Roman normal Marcus Acacius (Pedro Pascal). This, despite the fact that they’d by then been a part of the Roman Empire for a lot of centuries, and a large number of rich Roman households have been dwelling inside them.
Macrinus (Denzel Washington) in Gladiator II (2024)
Essentially the most allegedly progressive casting for the film was Denzel Washington because the African usurper Macrinus, a gladiator troupe proprietor and energy dealer. The actual Macrinus was a Mauritanian and a praetorian prefect from a rich household of elite Roman equestrians initially primarily based in what’s now Algeria. Scott’s Macrinus, although, isn’t any equestrian elite, however relatively an bold nouveau-riche who trades in gladiators, slaves, and gentle energy. As a substitute of depicting Macrinus as the rich African from a longtime Roman household that he’s, Scott chooses to depict Macrinus as an upstart and — as it’s revealed later — a previously enslaved individual.
One of many solely makes an attempt within the movie to deal with Rome’s oppressive use of enslaved labor comes within the final bloody moments of the jumbled plot. Lastly revealing his background, Macrinus tells Lucius that he was as soon as enslaved by Marcus Aurelius, a nod to the truth that emperors enslaved lots of of individuals as a part of the familia Caesaris, or “family of Caesar.” Not lengthy after, Macrinus kills Geta and finally Caracalla as effectively, seizing energy. The triumphal Macrinus now stands within the hallowed halls of the Roman Senate Home because the acclaimed emperor. And but, Macrinus’ former servitude and ire towards Marcus Aurelius goes unexplored.
This was yet one more missed alternative for Macrinus, and by extension, Scott and the movie writ massive, to talk up about the actual Marcus Aurelius. Simply as he was within the earlier movie, Aurelius continues to be extolled, quoted, and aesthetically referenced in sculpture because of the ahistorical notion that he needed to rid Rome of imperial succession and return to the Republic that existed earlier than Julius Caesar. Though the emperor has loved a lot celebration by rich technocrats obsessive about quoting Stoic virtues from the emperor’s Meditations, the actual Marcus Aurelius was a person who selected his personal organic son, Commodus, to take over as Roman Emperor. This broke with over 80 years of emperors adopting extra becoming rulers to take over the Roman Empire throughout the course of the second century CE. He put household earlier than group in a means neither Gladiator or Gladiator II ever reckons with. And he did so whereas adopting a Stoic philosophy that promotes being pleased with one’s lot in life and never specializing in wealth. It is a a lot simpler factor to do when one is born an emperor relatively than a slave.
Tondo displaying the Severan dynasty: Septimius Severus with Julia Domna, Caracalla, and Geta, whose face has been erased, in all probability due to the reminiscence sanctions decreed by Caracalla, from Djemila (Algeria) (c. 199–200 CE), held on the Neues Museum, Berlin, Germany 9 (picture by Carole Raddato through Flickr)
In different methods, African identification is glossed over altogether in Gladiator II — the Afro-Syrian lineage of Geta and Caracalla isn’t addressed. The brothers’ household is non-existent. Archaeological stays inform a unique story. Maybe probably the most well-known depiction of the emperor, his spouse, and his youngsters comes from a painted tondo dated to round 199–200 CE made about seven years into Septimius Severus’ reign and located in Djemila in present-day Algeria. The tondo permits for extra perception into the variant pores and skin tones inside the Roman Mediterranean and additional investigation into what the Severans appeared like in actual life.
The famed portrait just isn’t the one proof that permits us to entry how the Severans appeared. Main artwork historians and artists at the moment are working with the Sidney and Lois Eskenazi Museum of Artwork at Indiana College to attempt to reconstruct the Severans utilizing the vestiges of historical polychromy left on two busts of Septimius Severus and Julia Domna within the museum assortment. Working with Mark Abbe, an Affiliate Professor of Artwork Historical past and Classics on the College of Georgia and a number one polychromy scholar, and Stephen Chappell, an unbiased digital artist, the museum is utilizing new microscopic analyses of the remaining colorants on the museum’s busts with a purpose to counsel quite a few attainable reconstructions for Severus and Domna. The busts and a number of attainable reconstructions sit side-by-side within the gallery. A brand new publication, Imperial Colours: The Roman Portrait Busts of Septimius Severus and Julia Domna (2023), reveals these new reconstructions whereas additionally displaying how Septimius Severus and Julia Domna used references to Egyptian gods like Serapis and Isis to intensify the truth that they “had one foot planted in Africa and the other in Rome.”
Stephen Chappell, experimental reconstructions of the portrait bust of septimius severus and the portrait bust of Julia Domna (2023) (© Eskenazi Museum of Artwork, The Trustees of Indiana College; picture used with permission)
