Ahve, and welcome to Emperor of Rome, a Roman history podcast from Latrobe University.

I'm your host Matt Smith and with me today is Dr.

Cayland Davenport, senior lecturer in Roman history from Macquarie University.

This is episode CX-V-I, disgraced human nature.

That's a phrase describing Caracala from the legendary historian Edward Gibbon,

who's always good for an episode title. I'll quote him now, Re Caracala. Such was the

end of a monster whose life disgraced human nature and whose reign accused the patience of the

Romans.

Here's Kalin Davenport.

Caracala was on campaign in Syria and his high command,

his chief advisors, composed of two Victorian prefects, Marcus Oglotinius Aventus and Marcus Opeleus

McCrinus. We should introduce at this point and talk about him a bit,

McCrinus, because he will have a big part to play in Caracalla's downfall

and he is his successor.

Definitely. McCrinus is from Mauritania, so that's North Africa, Modern Algeria.

He is of equestrian rank, so that means he's part of this status group directly below the

senators and equestrians hold administrative positions in the government. They also hold positions as officers in the army.

And the top equestrian post was that of Pretorian Prefect. So there were two of those at the moment. So McCrinus was in his 50s at this stage.

He had a long career as an administrator. He was also known for his experience in law. So he's not a

military man per se. There were two routes the Petorian Prefecture really in

this period. you can ascend through administrative

officers or you can ascend through a combination of administrative and military posts.

...