CARACALLA, or CARACALLUS, MARCUS AURE'LIUS ANTO• N1'NUS BASSIA'NUS, son of Septimiva Severna, was born at Lyon while his father was governor of the provincia Lugdunensis. After Severna became emperor, Bassianus married Plautilla, daughter of I'lautianus, the emperor's favourite. He accompanied Severna in his expedition to Britain, and was with him in the Caledonian war, on which occasion he is said to have conspired against his father, and even to have once drawn his sword to kill him. Severus forgave him, but his mind and health became so affected by the unnatural conduct of his son, that he soon after died at Eboracum (York), A.D. 211, leaving his two sons, Bassianus and Geta, his joint successors to the empire. Having concluded peace with the Caledonians, the two brothers returned to Rome, where Bassianus caused ()eta to be murdered in the apartment, and in the very arms, of his mother Julia. Having bribed the Praetorian soldiers, by money and promises, to acknowledge him as sole emperor, ho next put to death all the friends and attend ants of Geta, and those who had shown any sorrow for his death, to the number of several thousands. The celebrated jurist Papinianuv, the friend of Severus, was among the victims. Bassianus gave himself up to the company of buffoons, comedians, gladiators, and eunuchs, to whom he was prodigal of the public money, and many of whom he raised to high offices. In order to obtain money for his extravagance he deteriorated the public coin, and forced base money into circulation. During a visit to Gaul he put to death the proconsul of the provincia Narbonensia, and many other persons on his arrival at Narho. On his return to Rome he brought with him a great quantity of garments made after a Gaulish fashion, in the shape of a long tunic with a hood to it, and known by the name of Caracalla, which he obliged all those who came near his person to adopt. From this circumstance he derived the surname Caracallus. At Rome he built the magnificent therms)
which are known by his name. In an expedition into Germany he fought with the Catti and the Alemanni, and after much slaughter purchased peace by paying them large sums of money. He seems to have been the first emperor who adopted this humiliating system, which in course of time proved fatal to Rome. In the following year he went into Dacia against the Oetm, and thence ho proceeded by Thrace into Asia Minor. Having arrived at Antioch, he invited the kings of Armenia and of Osrhoene to come to him, and then made them prisoners. He eeized upon Oarhoene, and founded a colony at Edessa. J laving understood that the people of Alexandria spoke freely of him, and had loudly disapproved of the murder of Clete, he visited that city under tho pretence of sacrificing to Serapia, and ordered an Indis criminate massacre of the citizens, which lasted several days : the city he gave up to plunder. He afterwards invaded the territory of the Parthians, under the pretence that Artabanus their king had refused him the hand of his daughter. He took Arbela, and overran Media, the Parthians having withdrawn to the mountains beyond the Tigris to collect their forces. The following year while he was expecting to bo attacked by them, a conspiracy was formed against his life by Macrinus, pi-40feet of the prtetorium. As the emperor was proceeding on horseback from Edeasa to Carve, having alighted from his horse on the road, a soldier of the name of Julius Martians stabbed him to death, in 217, after a reign of six years and two months. Macrinus was proclaimed emperor by the army. (Dion. 77, 78; Spartianus, and Herodian, lib. iv.) Caracalla was one of the worst among the bad emperors of Rome his cruelty seems to have been mixed up with a degree of insanity, a frequent conequence of unlimited power being possessed by one individual of uncontrolled passions and no principles.