I count this as one of the most glorious (and innovative?) of all Roman imperial portraits: Caracalla, with his fierce glower in the years just before he became sole-ruler (more on that later…).
He arguably inherited an empire already on a downward slide. Born in Gaul, even his parentage spoke to a vast territory, Septimius Severus hailing from N. Africa and Julia Donna from the Roman Syria. In a bid to shore things up after his death, Septimius left Caracalla and his slightly younger brother Geta as co-rulers after his death in 211 A.D. This arrangement did not last long, ending (predictably?) within a year in fratricide, with Geta murdered on his brother’s orders.
Most of Caracalla’s life, and much his short reign (the emperor was assassinated by a disgruntled soldier 6 years after he snuffed out his own sibling) was spent outside Rome on military campaign. His portraits (especially this one) were considerably less hairy than those of his father and the Antonines, perhaps reflecting a more practical ‘campaign cut’ if not an outright break with that earlier tradition. Even more striking is his deeply furrowed and powerful brow, nearly forming an ‘X’.
And well it is tempting to read this visage ‘psychologically’, using it to interpret the emperor as paranoid and nasty, as his contemporary detractors (esp. Cassius Dio) did, it is more useful to see it rather as a projection outward. His likeness in various forms (especially this type and a slightly curlier, brooding one later…a colossal granite one found in Egypt is shown above) were disseminated to the far reaches of the empire. The goal must have been to show the emperor’s unshakable focus and military might in the face of formidable challenges.
