The Top 10 people who have been compared to Caligula’s horse

A league table of the objects of a questionable classical reference

A statue of Roman Emperor Gaius Caesar Augustus Germanicus Caligula (12 - 41 AD), perhaps looking at his favourite horse (Getty)

This list arose from an online discussion of the revisionist theory that Neville Chamberlain bought time to allow Britain to prepare for war. Ted Morris asked how this could account for Sir Thomas Inskip, considered to have been a weak minister for coordination of defence, 1936-39. He was, as Andrew David Stedman pointed out, likened to Caligula’s horse by Michael Foot and others, who wrote Guilty Men under the name “Cato” in 1940.

Of course, the whole thing is a misunderstanding, a myth as misused as Canute’s attempt to demonstrate to his courtiers that even he, a mighty king, could not command the waves to withdraw. Emperor Caligula may have been a tyrant, but he was probably the subject of posthumous propaganda intended to portray him as capricious to the point of insanity. Consul by then had come to be a dignified but empty title, and all Suetonius says in his life of Caligula about Incitatus, his horse, is consulatum quoque traditur destinasse – “it is also said that he planned to make him consul”. Mild stuff by the standards of modern Twitter attack ads. Anyway, here is the list.

1. Floki, Elon Musk’s dog. Thanks to Simon Cook, who noted Sam Ashworth-Hayes’s “Ah, the Caligula arc” comment on Musk’s BBC interview: “I did stand down. I keep telling you I’m not the CEO of Twitter, my dog is the CEO of Twitter.” (Footnote: Floki is a Shiba Inu, the same breed as the dogecoin logo with which Musk has replaced the Twitter logo on the desktop version of the website.)

2. Carrie Johnson. “Much as Caligula’s horse never got the consul job, making do with a luxurious stable upgrade, the then Carrie Symonds never did work at the Foreign Office.” Catherine Bennett, The Observer, 26 June 2022.

3. Stanley Johnson. The Independent editorial, 7 March, condemned Boris’s plan to procure a knighthood for his father in his resignation honours list. This prompted Private Eye to report: “Caligula’s horse furious over Stanley Johnson comparison.”

4. Julie Burchill. “I got the heave-ho from my cushy billet at the Sunday Express, where I later learned my nickname had been Caligula’s Horse because my best friend – briefly the editor – had appointed me.” Julie Burchill, The Guardian, 28 December 2019.

5. Alec Douglas-Home. “Caligula’s appointment of his horse as a consul was an act of prudent statesmanship compared with this gesture of sickbed levity by Mr Macmillan.” Daily Mirror front-page editorial, 19 October 1963. Nominated by Ted Morris.

6. Jeremy Corbyn. “I have always wondered what it would be like to watch ... the modern equivalent of Caligula suddenly decid[ing] he would like to make his horse a consul. As the pale white crowds roll up, I realise that Labour is now Caligula and Jeremy Corbyn is that horse.” Camilla Long, The Sunday Times, 13 September 2015. But Tom Holland argued that Corbyn was more like Caligula: “Caligula, like Corbyn, came to power impatient with what he saw as a sclerotic and obstructive establishment. Determined to vest his authority in the love and support of the people, he sought to reach out to them over the heads of the senatorial elite. Many of the stunts which so appalled conservative opinion were consciously designed to mobilise the enthusiasm of the plebs. ‘The people loved him – because he brought their goodwill with money.’ On occasion, Caligula would take this policy to literal extremes. A couple of times, he stood on the roof of a basilica, and showered the crowds below with gold and silver coins.” (Thanks to Xlibris1.)

7. Richard Rush. His appointment as US secretary of the treasury was greeted by John Randolph, senator for Virginia, in 1828: “Never were abilities so much below mediocrity so well rewarded; no, not when Caligula’s horse was made consul.” Thanks to Allan Holloway.

8. Andrew Johnson, US president 1865-69. “Johnson is an insolent drunken brute in comparison with which Caligula’s horse was respectable.” Senator Charles Sumner of Massachusetts, 1865.

9. The House of Lords. “When Caligula appointed his horse as consul it was to discredit the institution. I fear their lordships are in danger of experiencing the same fate.” Lord Forsyth, The Sunday Telegraph, 4 December 2022. Or the Welsh assembly: “The assembly is the most ridiculous political institution since Caligula’s horse.” Graham Jones, letter to the editor of The Sunday Times, 12 June 2016.

10. Caligula’s Horse, an Australian progressive metal band from Brisbane, Queensland.

Next week: Buildings that no one knows are named after MPs, such as Quibell Park Stadium, Scunthorpe.

Coming soon: Winners of the weekly “There’s always one” award for Top 10 nominations, such as Harry Cole, who nominated the King James Bible for “works of fiction named after a character who isn’t the main one”.

Your suggestions please, and ideas for future Top 10s, to me on Twitter, or by email to top10@independent.co.uk