From jmpfund@bgnet.bgsu.edu Sat Mar 1 08:55:18 2003 Received: from mxu4.u.washington.edu (mxu4.u.washington.edu [140.142.33.8]) by lists.u.washington.edu (8.12.1+UW01.12/8.12.1+UW03.02) with ESMTP id h21GtHA8044234 for ; Sat, 1 Mar 2003 08:55:17 -0800 Received: from gemini.dacor.net (gemini.dacor.net [63.174.195.21]) by mxu4.u.washington.edu (8.12.1+UW01.12/8.12.1+UW03.02) with ESMTP id h21GtBls003218 for ; Sat, 1 Mar 2003 08:55:15 -0800 Received: from [63.171.164.149] (m149.max3.dacor.net [63.171.164.149]) by dacor.net (Rockliffe SMTPRA 5.2.5) with ESMTP id for ; Sat, 1 Mar 2003 11:55:05 -0500 Mime-Version: 1.0 X-Sender: jmpfund@mailstore.bgsu.edu Message-Id: In-Reply-To: <3E60248D.DA63DF4E@attbi.com> References: <3E60248D.DA63DF4E@attbi.com> Date: Sat, 1 Mar 2003 11:54:51 -0500 To: classics@u.washington.edu From: "James M. Pfundstein" Subject: Re: Caligula walking on the sea Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" ; format="flowed" At 9:10 PM -0600 2/28/03, Jeffrey B. Gibson wrote: >Can anyone confirm that there is a story, possibly told by Dio Cassius, >about Caligula constructing rafts over a body of water and then, while >walking on them, shouting "take that, Poseidon!"? Caligula's Bridge over part of the Bay of Naples From Baiae to Puteoli), and his motive for making it, is in Suetonius' biography of him, cap. 19. The text can be found on-line at the Latin Library. http://www.thelatinlibrary.com/ The same story is told with more detail at Cassius Dio 59.171-11. In the last section Caligula is described as having said that Poseidon (or Neptune) was afraid of him and his hangers-on. I don't have the Greek handy, but and English translation of the whole history was put up by the indefatigable Bill Thayer at his Lacus Curtius site. http://www.ukans.edu/history/index/europe/ancient_rome/E/Roman/home.html Caligula's battle with the ocean is a little later in the same book-- 59.25.1-3. JM("Macro")P .