Crinis Caesaris

Läsarfråga!

"Jag läste detta, mycket underhållande kåseri.

Det anges i texten att Ceasar skulle ha varit skallig. Då han
aldrig brukar avbildas på det viset undrar jag om det finns
något skäl att tro att han var det under den del av hans liv
det här handlar om."

Vi börjar med ett smakprov ur detta kåseri:

"In 59BC, Julius Caesar declared he was so shocked by the incursions of the dangerous Helvetii tribe into Gaul, and the suffering of the Gaulish peoples, that he had himself appointed 'protector of the Gauls'. By the time he'd finished protecting them, a million Gauls were dead, another million enslaved and Julius Caesar owned most of Gaul. Now I'm not suggesting there is any similarity between George W Bush's protection of the Iraqi people and Caesar's protection of the Gauls.
For a start, Julius Caesar, as we all know, was bald, whereas George W Bush has a fine head of hair.
In any case, George W Bush is not personally making huge amounts of money out of it. The money-making is all left in the capable hands of companies like CACI International, Blackwater Security and Haliburton.

It's true that Vice-President Dick Cheney's stock options in his old company, Haliburton, went up from $241,498 in 2004 to $8m in 2005 - that's an increase of 3,281 per cent.

But then Dick Cheney is bald.

The point I'm trying to make is that there is absolutely no comparison to be made between Julius Caesar's invasion of Gaul in 58-50BC and George Bush's invasion of Iraq.
I mean, Julius Caesar had the nerve to pretend that the Roman state was being threatened by what was going on in Gaul. He claimed he had to carry out a pre-emptive strike against the Helvetii in the interests of homeland security. In reality, his motives were political. He desperately needed a military victory to boost his standing in Rome and give him the necessary popular base to seize power."

Det blev långt, men jag är fortfarande i en lättare extas efter valet i USA, vilket (k) kan intyga då hon häromdagen fick bevittna min 'Donald "let's ruuuumble" Rumsfeldt-har-avgått'-dans. Stackars flicka.

Nåväl, Caesars skallighet var det. Jo, karln hade problem av det slaget och var ganska brydd över detta. om vi går till Suetonius Caesar-biografi hittar vi följande i slutet av XLV:

Circa corporis curam morosior, ut non solum tonderetur diligenter ac raderetur, sed velleretur etiam, ut quidam exprobraverunt, calvitii vero deformitatem iniquissime ferret saepe obtrectatorum iocis obnoxiam expertus. ideoque et deficientem capillum revocare a vertice adsueverat et ex omnibus decretis sibi a senatu populoque honoribus non aliud aut recepit aut usurpavit libentius quam ius laureae coronae perpetuo gestandae.

I mest älskade Robert Graves på intet sätt helt ordagranna översättning blir det:

He was something of a dandy, always keeping his head carefully trimmed and shaved; and has beesn accused of having certain other hairy parts of his body depilated with tweezers. His baldness was a disfigurement which his enemies harped upon, much to his exasperation; but he used to comb the thin stands of his hair forward from his poll, and of all the honours voted him by the Senate and the people, none pleased him so much as the privilege of wearing a laurel wreath on all occasions- he constantly took advantage of it.

Caesar blandade alltså de tre favorittekniker som bekymrat skalliga män nyttjar, han rakade, gjorde the comb-over (eller the comb-forward), samt dolde det med huvudbonad, i hans fall en lagerkrans.

Statyer skildrade säkerligen detta på ett smickrande vis, och visst har han oftast håret kammat framåt och även ofta med lagerkransen på.