The Roman Emperor, Caligula (full name Gaius Julius Caesar Augustus Germanicus) is reported (probably falsely) to have made his favorite horse a Senator. The question still remains, was this idiocy or satire? That is, was he really crazy, or simply mischievously clever at putting down the old aristocracy?
So does it matter today? Probably not, but history does repeat, and repeat. And, as philosopher, George Santayana, said, "Those who do not know history are doomed to repeat it."
We may be witnessing a historical parallel today without knowing it.
For instance, the irreversible decline of a great republic.
On March 15 in 44 BC, Julius Caesar returned to Rome, a great Republic, from a series of very successful foreign wars. He had written a whole history of his exploits and sent it back to Rome like weekly news bulletins. It made him very popular.
The old Republican ruling class had lost touch with a large, various, and unruly populace. Knowing the law of money, as we do, we might safely surmise that their wealth bought their political power and their political power increased their wealth .... Well, you know. Till there were only a few rich and a great many poor.
When the poplar Caesar started home, he just happened to have brought back with him a seasoned army. That gave him a certain political independence.Officials of the ruling Senatorial class had ordered the popular general not to come back into Italy. But he did. He crossed the Rubicon River, and Rome was never the same.
We still use the phrase, "cross the Rubicon", to refer to a decisive action from which there is no turning back.
When the victorious warrior arrived back in the City itself, he was mobbed with supporters. They wanted to make him King! King!!
For six centuries, "King" had been a bad word in Rome. The great Roman republic had been born out of a successful revolution against their oppressive foreign kings.
Something like the American Republic, you know.
Well, they did not get Julius Caesar for their king. A group of Senatorials, including some of his good friends, publicly stabbed him to death.
But 17 messy years later, his adopted son/nephew, Octavianus Augustus, became the first in a long line of Roman emperors.
Augustus did not call himself King, but "First Citizen". Good PR department, I'd say.
The Republic never recovered.
A divided society, a wide gap between rich and poor, wealth, political power, military power. Hmmmnnnn.
Those who don't know history...
