The north-eastern corner of the area is entirely occupied by the vast ruins of the Palace of Caligula, built against the side of the hill above the Clivus Victoriœ, which still remains, and consisting of ranges of small rooms, communicating with open galleries, edged by marble balustrades, of which a portion exists. In these rooms the half-mad Caius Caligula rushed about, sometimes dressed as a charioteer, sometimes as a warrior, and delighted in astonishing his courtiers by his extraordinary pranks, or shocking them by trying to enforce a belief in his own divinity.[115]
"C'est dans ce palais que, tourmenté par l'insomnie et par l'agitation de son âme furieuse, il passera une partie de la nuit à errer sous d'immenses portiques, attendant et appellant le jour. C'est là aussi qu'il aura l'incroyable idée de placer un dieu infâme.
"Caligula se fit bâtir sur le Palatin deux temples. Il avait d'abord voulu avoir une demeure sur le mont Capitolin; mais, ayant réfléchi que Jupiter l'avait precédé au Capitole, il en prit de l'humeur et retourna sur le Palatin. Dans les folies de Caligula, on voit se manifester cette pensée: Je suis dieu! pensée qui n'était peut-être pas très-extraordinaire chez un jeune homme de vingt-cinq ans devenu tout-à-coup maître du monde. Il parut en effet croire à sa divinité, prenant le nom et les attributs de divers dieux, et changeant de nature divine en changeant de perruque.
"Non content de s'élever un temple à lui-même, Caligula en vint à être son propre prêtre et à s'adorer. Le despotisme oriental avait connu cette adoration étrange de soi: sur les monuments de l'Egypte on voit Ramsès-roi présenter son offrande à Ramsès-dieu; mais Caligula fit ce que n'avait fait aucun Pharaon; il se donna pour collègue, dans ce culte de sa propre personne, son cheval, qu'il ne nomma pas, mais qu'il songea un moment de nommer consul."—Ampère, Emp. ii. 8.
Here "one day at a public banquet, when the consuls were reclining by his side, Caligula burst suddenly into a fit of laughter; and when they courteously inquired the cause of his mirth, astounded them by coolly replying that he was thinking how by one word he could cause both their heads to roll on the floor. He amused himself with similar banter even with his wife Cæsonia, for whom he seems to have had a stronger feeling than for any of his former consorts. While fondling her neck he is reported to have said, 'Fair as it is, how easily I could sever it.'"—Merivale, ch. xlviii.
After the murder of Caligula (Jan. 24, 794) by the tribune Cheræa, in the vaulted passage which led from the palace to the theatre, a singular chance which occurred in this part of the palace led to the elevation of Claudius to the throne.
"In the confusion which ensued upon the death of Caius, several of the prætorian guards had flung themselves furiously into the palace and began to plunder its glittering chambers. None dared to offer them any opposition; the slaves or freedmen fled and concealed themselves. One of the inmates, half-hidden behind a curtain in an obscure corner, was dragged forth with brutal violence; and great was the intruder's surprise when they recognised him as Claudius, the long despised and neglected uncle of the murdered emperor.[116] He sank at their feet almost senseless with terror: but the soldiers in their wildest mood still respected the blood of the Cæsars, and instead of slaying or maltreating the suppliant, the brother of Germanicus, they hailed him, more in jest perhaps than earnest, with the title of Imperator, and carried him off to their camp."—Merivale, ch. xlix.
In this same palace Claudius was feasting when he was told that his hitherto idolised wife Messalina was dead, without being told whether she died by her own hand or another's,—and asked no questions, merely desiring a servant to pour him out some more wine, and went on eating his supper.[117] Here also Claudius, who so dearly loved eating, devoured his last and fatal supper of poisoned mushrooms which his next loving wife (and niece) Agrippina prepared for him, to make way for her son Nero upon the throne.[118]
The Clivus Victoriæ commemorates by its name the Temple of Victory,[119] said to have been founded by the Sabine aborigines before the time of Romulus, and to be the earliest temple at Rome of which there is any mention except that of Saturnus. This temple was rebuilt by the consul L. Posthumius.
Chief of a group of small temples, the famous Temple of Cybele, "Mother of the Gods," stood at this corner of the Palatine. Thirteen years before it was built, the "Sacred Stone," the form under which the "Idæan Mother" was worshipped, had been brought from Pessinus in Phrygia, because, according to the Sibylline books, frequent showers of stones which had occurred could only be expiated by its being transported to Rome. It was given up to the Romans by their ally Attalus, king of Pergamus, and P. Cornelius Scipio, the young brother of Africanus—accounted the worthiest and most virtuous of the Romans—was sent to receive it. As the vessel bearing the holy stone came up the Tiber it grounded at the foot of the Aventine, when the aruspices declared that only chaste hands would be able to move it. Then the Vestal Claudia drew the vessel up the river by a rope.