Incitatus
Incitatus was the favored horse of Roman emperor Caligula (reigned 37–41 AD). Its name is a Latin adjective meaning "swift" or "at full gallop".
According to Suetonius's Lives of the Twelve Caesars (121 AD), Incitatus had a stable of marble, with an ivory manger, purple blankets, and a collar of precious stones. Dio Cassius has indicated that the horse was attended to by servants, and was fed oats mixed with gold flake. Suetonius also wrote that it was said that Caligula planned to make Incitatus a consul, and that the horse would "invite" dignitaries to dine with him in a house outfitted with servants there to entertain such events. “When Incitatus died” in AD 40, “he received a lavish funeral…with Caligula’s ordering his subjects to venerate the horse as a god."[1]
[edit] Caligula's folly
The accuracy of the received history has been questioned by historical revisionists such as Anthony A. Barrett. They suggest that later Roman chroniclers such as Suetonius and Dio Cassius were influenced by the political situation of their own times, when it may have been useful to the current Emperors to discredit the later Julio-Claudian Emperors. Also, the lurid nature of the story added spice to their narratives, winning them additional readers.
One suggestion is that Caligula's treatment of Incitatus was an elaborate prank, intended to ridicule and provoke the Senate, rather than a sign of insanity, or perhaps a form of satire, with the implication that a horse could perform a Senator's duties.
Barrett notes that "Many stories were spread about Incitatus, originating most likely from Caligula's own humorous quips."[2] "Possibly out of perverted sense of humor Caligula would pour libations to Incitatus' Salus [health and well-being], and claimed that he intended to co-opt him as his priest."[2]
[edit] In art and metaphor
Incitatus appears as an allegorical figure when referencing examples of political ineptitude. A Melbourne lawyer once remarked that Incitatus would have the numbers for premier in Victoria, and in act III of Chekhov's The Cherry Orchard (1904) Pishchik says that his family is "descended from that very nag Caligula inducted in the Senate."
