Commodus (; Latin: [ˈkɔmmɔdʊs]; 31 August 161 – 31 December 192) was Roman emperor from 177 to 192, first serving as nominal co-emperor under his father Marcus Aurelius and then ruling alone from 180. Commodus's sole reign is commonly thought to mark the end of the Pax Romana, a golden age of peace and prosperity in the history of the Roman Empire.
Commodus accompanied his father during the Marcomannic Wars in 172 and on a tour of the Eastern provinces in 176. The following year, he became the youngest emperor and consul up to that point, at the age of 16. His sole reign saw less military conflict than that of Marcus Aurelius, but internal intrigues and conspiracies abounded, goading Commodus to an increasingly dictatorial style of leadership. This culminated in his creating a deific personality cult, including his performances as a gladiator in the Colosseum. Throughout his reign, Commodus entrusted the management of affairs to his palace chamberlain and praetorian prefects, namely Saoterus, Perennis, and Cleander.
Commodus was assassinated by the wrestler Narcissus in 192, ending the Nerva–Antonine dynasty. He was succeeded by Pertinax, the first claimant in the tumultuous Year of the Five Emperors.
Early life and rise to power (161–180)
Lucius Aelius Aurelius Commodus was born on 31 August 161 in Lanuvium, near Rome. He was the son of the reigning emperor, Marcus Aurelius, and Aurelius' first cousin, Faustina the Younger, the youngest daughter of Emperor Antoninus Pius, who had died only a few months before. Commodus had a twin brother, Titus Aurelius Fulvus Antoninus, who died in 165. On 12 October 166, Commodus was made caesar together with his younger brother, Marcus Annius Verus. The latter died in 169 having failed to recover from an operation, which left Commodus as Marcus Aurelius's sole surviving son.
He was looked after by his father's physician, Galen, who treated many of Commodus's common illnesses. Commodus received extensive tutoring from a multitude of teachers with a focus on intellectual education. Among his teachers, Onesicrates, Antistius Capella, Titus Aius Sanctus, and Pitholaus are mentioned.
Commodus is known to have been at Carnuntum, the headquarters of Marcus Aurelius during the Marcomannic Wars, in 172. It is presumed that there, on 15 October 172, he was given the victory title Germanicus, in the presence of the army. The title suggests Commodus was present at his father's victory over the Marcomanni. On 20 January 175, Commodus entered the College of Pontiffs, the starting point of a career in public life.
In 175, Avidius Cassius, Governor of Syria, declared himself emperor following rumours that Marcus Aurelius had died. Having been accepted as emperor by Syria, Palestina and Egypt, Cassius carried on his rebellion even after it had become obvious Marcus was still alive. During the preparations for the campaign against Cassius, Commodus assumed his toga virilis on the Danubian front on 7 July 175, thus formally entering adulthood. Cassius, however, was killed by one of his centurions before the campaign against him could begin. Commodus subsequently accompanied his father on a lengthy trip to the Eastern provinces, during which he visited Antioch. The Emperor and his son then travelled to Athens, where they were initiated into the Eleusinian Mysteries. They then returned to Rome in the autumn of 176.
Marcus Aurelius was the first emperor since Vespasian to have a legitimate biological son, though he himself was the fifth in the line of the so-called Five Good Emperors, also known as the Adoptive Emperors, each of whom had adopted his successor. Commodus was the first (and until 337, the only) emperor "born in the purple," meaning during his father's reign.
On 27 November 176, Marcus Aurelius bestowed the title of Imperator on Commodus. Modern authors often use this date as the beginning of his reign, but the exact chronology of events is uncertain. Commodus is first mentioned as Augustus (emperor) on 17 June 177, but he reckoned his reign back to his salutation in 176. For instance, he assumed the tribunicia potestas (tribunician power) around February 177, but in April 177 he started to backdate this event to November 176.
On 23 December 176, the two imperatores celebrated a joint triumph. On 1 January 177, Commodus became consul for the first time, which made him, aged 15, the youngest consul up to that time (the minimum age for the consulship was around 30). He subsequently married Bruttia Crispina before accompanying his father to the Danubian front once more in 178. Marcus Aurelius died there on 17 March 180, leaving the 18-year-old Commodus as sole emperor.
Upon his ascension, Commodus devalued the Roman currency. He reduced the weight of the denarius from 96 per Roman pound to 105 per Roman pound (3.85 grams to 3.35 grams). He also reduced the silver purity from 79 percent to 76 percent – the silver weight dropping from 2.57 grams to 2.34 grams. In 186, he further reduced the purity and silver weight to 74 percent and 2.22 grams respectively, being 108 to the Roman pound. His reduction of the denarius during his rule was the largest since the empire's first devaluation during Nero's reign.
Whereas the reign of Marcus Aurelius had been marked by almost continuous warfare, Commodus's rule was comparatively peaceful in the military sense, but was also characterised by political strife and the increasingly arbitrary and capricious behaviour of the emperor himself. In the view of Cassius Dio, his accession marked the descent "from a kingdom of gold to one of iron and rust".
Despite his notoriety, and considering the importance of his reign, Commodus's years in power are not well chronicled. The principal surviving literary sources are Herodian, Cassius Dio (a contemporary and sometimes first-hand observer and Senator during Commodus's reign, whose reports for this period survive only as fragments and abbreviations), and the Historia Augusta (untrustworthy because of its character as a work of literature rather than of history, with elements of fiction embedded within its biographies; in the case of Commodus, it probably embroiders what the author found in reasonably good contemporary sources).
Commodus remained with the Danube armies for only a short time before negotiating a peace treaty with the Danubian tribes. He then returned to Rome and celebrated a triumph for the conclusion of the wars on 22 October 180. Unlike the preceding emperors Trajan, Hadrian, Antoninus Pius, and Marcus Aurelius, he seems to have had little interest in the business of administration. He tended throughout his reign to leave the practical running of the state to a succession of favourites, beginning with Saoterus, a freedman from Nicomedia who had become his chamberlain.
Dissatisfaction with this state of affairs led to a series of conspiracies and attempted coups, which in turn eventually provoked Commodus to take charge of affairs, which he did in an increasingly dictatorial manner. Nevertheless, though the senatorial order came to hate and fear him, the evidence suggests he remained popular with the army and the common people for much of his reign, not least because of his lavish shows of largesse (recorded on his coinage) and because he staged and took part in spectacular gladiatorial combats. He was not an inspired combatant. He killed animals by bow, standing above the arena. When he fought fellow gladiators, they would purposely submit. During this period Rome's economy declined.
One of the ways he paid for his donatives (imperial handouts) and mass entertainments was to tax the senatorial order. On many inscriptions, the traditional order of the two nominal powers of the state, the Senate and People (Senatus Populusque Romanus) was provocatively reversed (Populus Senatusque...).
At the outset of his reign, Commodus, aged 18, inherited many of his father's senior advisers, notably Tiberius Claudius Pompeianus (the second husband of Commodus's eldest sister Lucilla), his father-in-law Gaius Bruttius Praesens, Titus Fundanius Vitrasius Pollio, and Aufidius Victorinus the Prefect of the City of Rome. He also had four surviving sisters, all of them with husbands who were potential rivals. Lucilla was over ten years his senior and held the rank of Augusta as the widow of her first husband, Lucius Verus.