Commodus: The Gladiator Emperor of Rome

Commodus was the 17th emperor of the Roman Empire and belonged to the widely praised “Nerva-Antonine Dynasty.” However, he is generally remembered in sharp contrast to his hallowed “good” predecessors as an infamously “evil” emperor. Raised by the wise and philosophical Marcus Aurelius, the Commodus we meet in the ancient accounts seemed totally disinterested in continuing his father’s celebrated legacy. Instead, we meet a precocious and cruel tyrant, indifferent to duty and propriety, whose debauchery and megalomania are played out through the Gladiatorial games of the Roman Colosseum.

Uniquely, Commodus was the first emperor to be born while his father was emperor and to be raised to imperial authority jointly with his father during his reign. Even the celebrated Julio-Claudians had to use adoption to secure the succession, and while Vespasian was succeeded by his son Titus, the young man was already 30 years old when his father succeeded to imperial power.

Thus, Commodus was the first emperor “born to the purple,” when his mother Faustina the Younger gave birth to him and his twin brother on August 31st, 161 CE, in an Italian city near Rome called Lanuvium. His father, the Stoic emperor Marcus Aurelius, had been in power for five months as the adopted heir of Antoninus Pius, who in turn had been adopted by the emperor Hadrian.

A Cruel and Idle Heir?

Commodus outlived his twin, who died at four, just as seven of his other 13 siblings were lost. This breathed life into an apparent dream that Faustina had before giving birth to Commodus. She dreamt that she gave birth to twin snakes, one of which was much stronger than the other.

At the early age of four, around the time of his twin’s death, his father named him heir, determined that his son would share the same comprehensive education he had received. Even with these paternal efforts, the sources tell us that Commodus had no interest in such personal edification to prepare him for rule but preferred to live an idle and indifferent life instead.

Furthermore, the same sources—particularly the dubious Historia Augusta—assert that Commodus began to exhibit a depraved and cruel nature from early on. For example, there is a horrifying anecdote claiming that Commodus, at the age of 12, ordered one of his servants to be cast into a boiling furnace because the latter had failed to properly heat up the young heir’s bath.

The same source also claims that he would send men to the wild beasts of the arena at whim. On one occasion, it was because somebody was reading an account of the emperor Caligula, and the speaker noted that Commodus and Caligula shared the same birthday.

Such anecdotes about Commodus’ early life are then compounded by general assessments that he “never showed regard for either decency or expense.” Claims made against him include that he was prone to filling his time playing dice in his own home, which was considered an improper activity for someone in the imperial family, and that he collected a harem of prostitutes of all shapes, sizes, and appearances. Further, he enjoyed riding chariots and living with gladiators.

The Historia Augusta then gets much more debauched and depraved in its assessments of Commodus, claiming that he cut open obese people and would mix excrement with all manner of food before forcing others to consume it. Perhaps to distract him from such improper indulgences, Marcus Aurelius brought his son along with him across the Danube in 172 CE, during the Marcomannic Wars that Rome was bogged down in at this time.

Marcus Aurelius continued efforts to redirect Commodus’s predilections by expediting his elevation to manhood and official Roman citizenship in a ceremony known as “toga virilem sumere.” Shortly after this, a rebellion broke out in the east by a prominent governor and commander called Avidius Cassius. Although it was put down quickly and easily, it prompted the emperor to secure the succession.

Consequently, he soon after elevated Commodus to co-ruler at the strikingly early age of 16, marking another new precedent that would be accentuated by later “child-emperors.” Marcus himself had been the first emperor to share imperial power with his co-ruler Lucius Verus, although the latter died in 16 CE from the Antonine Plague.

Yet, with all of these efforts impressed upon him, Commodus apparently did not adjust his behavior and continued to occupy himself in the same ways. His time was spent obsessing over gladiator fighting and chariot racing, and he kept company with habitual degenerates and reprobates.

In what was perhaps a last-ditched attempt to correct his son’s course, Marcus brought Commodus along with him to the northern frontier when war broke out again with the pugnacious Marcomanni tribe, who hailed from across the Danube River.

It was here, on March 17th, 180 CE, that Marcus Aurelius died, leaving Commodus as the sole emperor.

Early Stages as Sole Emperor

According to the 3rd-century CE Roman historian Cassius Dio, Commodus’s sole accession marked the moment when the Empire descended from “a kingdom of gold, to one of iron and rust.” This remark mirrors the perception of most subsequent commentators, who describe Commodus’s accession as the beginning point of the gradual decline and death of the Roman Empire in the West.

After being acclaimed as the sole ruler near the frontier, Commodus expeditiously (and unpopularly) ended the war with Germanic and Sarmatian tribes across the Danube. This act was traditionally seen as a reversal and regression of his father’s expansionist policy across the frontier, which had aimed to expand Roman territory beyond the river.

Ancient commentators accused him of cowardice and disregard for duty. However, some modern historians have asserted that the move was necessary. It would have placated sectors of the war-wearied Roman elite and allowed Commodus to focus on consolidating his position at home.

Nonetheless, it crucially created an atmosphere of criticism and resentment in the army and the militaristic elements of the aristocracy, who had looked forward to further glory and Roman expansion in the north. However, these elements were somewhat assuaged by Commodus putting down rebellions in other corners of the Empire, particularly in Britain and North Africa.

While these disturbances were being addressed, Commodus’s early years in Rome were not marked by many great policies in the judicial or administrative spheres. He did, however, aim to appease and impress the people by focusing on providing the populace with prodigious games and shows.

As a result, he seems to have become quite popular with the plebeian class, and the army was also said to have been eventually assuaged with payments given to them after his accession, as was the custom. The one class that he fatally chose to disregard, which also tended to be the writers of history, was the senatorial aristocracy.

Instead of utilizing “the best (senatorial) men” to fill his bureaucracy and machinery of state, he often preferred to favor his “freedmen”; ex-slaves who had won their freedom. Although almost every other emperor before him utilized freedmen to some extent, Commodus was particularly conspicuous in his promotion of freedmen at the perceived expense of senators.

This, like his policy of making peace with the tribes north of the Danube, caused considerable indignation in elite aristocratic circles, particularly due to its contrast with Marcus’s modus operandi.

While some historians have accredited Commodus with a callous and capricious disposition since childhood, many have pointed to the assassination attempt against him in 181 CE as an important factor in his suspicious and infamous behavior as emperor.

The attempt may have had a particularly strong effect on Commodus because it was orchestrated by his sister Lucilla (depicted in Gladiator by Connie Nielsen). Although Commodus would subsequently believe that it was a senatorially inspired attempt, most ancient sources attribute it to Lucilla’s jealousy and her desire to increase her standing.

While there may be some truth to this, especially as Lucilla was once, in effect, an empress-consort to Lucius Verus, it is also likely that she had some backing from senatorial circles. Either way, she used her apparent lovers, Marcus Ummidius Quadratus and Appius Claudius Quintianus, to carry out the deed. Both were caught, with the latter trying to kill Commodus when he entered a theater.

These two conspirators were soon executed, and Lucilla was exiled to the island of Capri and later also executed. After this, Commodus began to distrust many of those close to him or in powerful positions, leading to a series of violent purges based on apparently dubious evidence.

While this trail of blood was being made, Commodus neglected many of his duties as emperor, delegating responsibilities to a coterie of avaricious and iniquitous advisors, especially the prefects in charge of the Praetorian Guard, the emperor’s personal bodyguards.

While these advisors were carrying out their own campaigns of violence and extortion, Commodus focused his efforts on the arenas and amphitheaters of Rome. In complete disregard for his position as emperor, Commodus regularly rode in chariot races and fought many times against maimed gladiators or drugged beasts, usually in private but often in public as well.

For many, especially in the aristocracy, this was an occupation well below the standards expected of an emperor. This impropriety, combined with the fact that the fights were staged or heavily adjusted to favor Commodus, only added to the farce.

In the midst of this increasingly erratic turn, there was another notable assassination attempt on the emperor Commodus, this time initiated by Publius Salvius Julianus, son of a prominent jurist in Rome. Like the previous attempt, it was quite easily foiled and the conspirator executed. Nevertheless, it amplified Commodus’s suspicion of everyone around him.

Soon after these plots against his life, Commodus endowed his favorites and prefects with immense power. The most notorious of these were the freedman Saetorus and the Praetorian Prefects, Perrenis and Cleander. Each is said to have extracted as much as they could from their respective positions of power, as Commodus gave up interest in the proper running of the Empire.

However, Commodus’s favorites were never completely secure in their power. In 182 CE, Saetorus was implicated in a plot against Commodus by the Prefect Perennis and killed by Cleander, another Prefect who was himself a former freedman.

This opened the door to Perennis’s ascendancy, who took charge of all the emperor’s correspondence, putting him in a very powerful and influential position. In this role, he gave away a prodigious number of gifts to various sycophants and prominent personages, especially in the military, in order to expand his power base.

Whether true or not, Perennis was then implicated in a plot against Commodus by none other than his prior accomplice Cleander. Perennis and his sons were executed on the orders of the emperor, leaving Cleander to fill the revolving vacuum of power that punctuated the chaotic Roman court at this time.

At around this time (in 184/5 CE), Cleander made himself responsible for almost all public offices. When he had done so, he abandoned all propriety by selling entry to the senate, army commands, governorships, and consulships to the highest bidders.

Part of the reason this profligate behavior was allowed relatively unhindered was because Commodus had secluded himself in his private estates after yet another assassination attempt, this time by a soldier named Maternus. The latter had reportedly come from a disgruntled legion in the province of Gaul, which at this time was witnessing a lot of unrest, along with the German provinces next to it.

With Commodus removing himself further from public life, Cleander was provided with the opportunity to aggrandize himself without restraint. The other Praetorian Prefect, Atilius Aebutianus, was removed without contest, leaving Cleander the sole Prefect and the de facto ruler of the state.

He continued his corruption, selling public offices and alienating much of the aristocracy around him. As a result, when Rome was hit by the early signs of an impending famine in 190 CE, a magistrate responsible for the food supply pointed the angry and hungry mob towards Cleander, who he said was to blame.

Cleander was chased out of the city to Commodus’s private estate, where the people demanded the Prefect’s head. Commodus seemingly realized his mistake in allowing others to rule in his stead, had Cleander executed, and decided to again take up the mantle of emperorship, with notoriously disastrous results.

When Commodus came back to the political fore, it was clear that he had grand, and perhaps insane, ambitions for his legacy. Much of his subsequent political agenda revolved around making himself the center of Roman religious, cultural, and social life in increasingly eccentric ways.

An event that seemingly accelerated this megalomania was the fire of Rome in 191/2 CE, which engulfed large parts of the city. Although Commodus acted reasonably quickly to address the problem, he also decided to use the opportunity to almost sacrilegiously recategorize Rome as a colony, renaming it after himself: Colonia Lucia Aurelia Commodiana.

To complement this great and obscene honor he had bestowed on himself, he added a number of mythical or divine titles to his nomenclature, including Amazonius, Herculius, and Exsuperatorius. In the process, he asserted that a new “Golden Age” was upon the Roman people, overseen by a divine ruler.

Indeed, the title “Exsuperatorius” most strikingly and absurdly associated him with Jupiter, king of the Roman Gods. To complement this array of elaborate titles, he was reported to appear always adorned with golden clothes befitting a god. He also began to dress up as Hercules, the eastern God Mithras, and the sun god Sol.

This establishment of a divine personality cult was propagated and propounded not only through his titles and clothing but also through coinage, statues, and architecture. Moreover, he changed the name of each month of the year to one of his own (now) twelve names, just as he renamed the fleets and legions of the Empire after himself as well.

To top all of this off, he famously decided to appear in the Colosseum dressed as Hercules, fighting staged battles and maiming victims. In the process, he had turned Rome into his personal playground, presenting himself as a divine ruler without equal or precedent.

As we have seen, such unrestrained self-indulgence naturally alienated many segments of society, who did not wish to endorse Commodus’s new “Golden Age” or his violent purges of the aristocracy. While many assassination attempts had failed, it seemed inevitable that one would eventually succeed.

As such, when the emperor’s mistress Marcia found a “kill list” with her name and the two Praetorian Prefects, Laetus and Eclectus, on it, they formed a preemptive plot. They decided that the best method would be to poison the emperor’s food, selecting New Year’s Eve, 192 CE, as the day to administer the poison.

However, the poison was not properly ingested as Commodus threw up most of his food, made vague threats, and then decided to take a bath. Not to be deterred, the three conspirators then decided to send Commodus’s wrestling partner, Narcissus, to finish the job. Creeping up on Commodus while he bathed, the wrestler strangled Commodus to death, ending his reign in a fittingly ignominious and violent manner.

Following his death, his memory was ordered to be expunged from all records and dedications, a process known as Damnatio Memoriae, as the Empire devolved into a protracted civil war. Even when order was eventually restored under Septimius Severus, the Empire never again reached the heights of Nerva-Antonine stability and prosperity.

It is no surprise that “Commodus the Gladiator Emperor” is viewed so negatively as an “evil emperor.” Though some revisionist historians have attempted to reimagine Commodus as the victim of senatorial envy and intrigue, it is difficult to disregard the litany of crimes and absurd policies attributed to him.

To completely reverse his father’s policies at home and on the frontiers was bound to cause negative effects, just as his perverse attempts to establish himself as a living god were sure to cause controversy. When compared with his close predecessors, there were very few policies, whether judicial, economic, or military, that were particularly praiseworthy.

It is, therefore, safe to say that Commodus truly was a terrible emperor, and very possibly an insane one.