The Roman Emperor Who May Have Invented The Whoopee Cushion

Crowned at just 14 years old, Elagabalus was only Roman emperor from 218 to 222 CE, roughly the same length as the Carter administration. But he packed a whole lot of scandal into those brief years. In fact, when it comes to the weirdest royals throughout history, Elagabalus might be the wildest of all, with a possible claim to one of the most well-known novelty items in history. So today, we're going to take a look at how the Roman emperor Elagabalus was a wild tyrant who may have invented the whoopee cushion. But before we get started, be sure to subscribe to the Weird History channel. After that, leave a comment and let us know what other Roman emperors you would like to hear about. OK, friends, YouTube viewers, countrymen, lend us your ears. Some people just aren't the marrying kind. Elagabalus, however, was not one of those people. As a matter of fact, Elagabalus married five women while he was emperor. That's an average of one and a quarter wives per year. Hope you got a discount on the venue. Historians only know the names of three of his wives. But perhaps the most famous was a woman named Achillea Severa. According to Historia Augusta, she was a Vestal Virgin, sworn to chastity in the worship of the goddess Vesta, which incidentally, is where the term Vestal Virgin comes from. Vesta was the goddess of the hearth. And her priestesses kept her sacred fire, which wasn't allowed to go out. Their efforts were considered essential to the security and preservation of the Roman Empire. However, none of that jibber jabber was going to deter Elagabalus. He swooped in and married Achillea Severa, which effectively violated her vows. He even declared that their union would produce godlike children, which could have been seen as a gesture to lessen the blow of abandoning her religious duty, but maybe was more likely the product of an unchecked ego. He was like Emperor Vin Diesel. Rumor had it that Elagabalus also took a husband, although the man's name has been lost to the ages. While his identity has been disputed by scholars, some believe it was either Athelete Zoticus or the chariot driver Hierocles. So the rumor is he either married his personal trainer or his chauffeur. Also apparent in the record is that Elagabalus liked to have his husband catch him committing adultery, which might be the first documented kink in recorded history. Speaking of which, for the ancient Romans, it was considered downright blasphemous for an emperor to bathe in public, let alone with the public. Can you imagine? Apart from safety concerns and protecting the emperor from possible teasing, bathing generally seems like a private activity. But if you think Elagabalus was going to let that stop him, then you don't know Elagabalus. He opened the palace baths and the baths of Plautinus to the general populace. He basically set up a queue outside his personal bathroom like it was a nightclub. Why would he flout convention this way? Well, it wasn't just to have a spot of company in the tub. He had an ulterior motive, which was that he wanted to get a supply of men with unusually large organs, so to speak. In other words, he was creating a makeshift meat market. And that wasn't all he did. Elagabalus also supposedly took care to have the whole city and the wharves searched for anoboli, which is what the Romans called people who seemed particularly lusty. The word anoboli is a rough combination of the Greek words for donkey and weapon. And you can probably fill in the blanks from there. OK, so violating the vows of vestal virgins, cheating on his husband, and the winking nature of his public bathhouses definitely paint an unseemly picture of Elagabalus. But Historia Augusta made a shocking claim that goes way beyond any of that. According to that particular history, Elagabalus sacrificed children in honor of his god. The unknown author of Historia Augusta wrote that Elagabalus also sacrificed victims. And for this purpose, he collected from the whole of Italy children of noble birth whose fathers and mothers were alive, intending that the sorrow, if suffered by two parents, should be all the greater. The Historia Augusta goes on to describe the rituals in chilling detail. It's a pretty damning picture. But it's also unlikely these claims were true, as sacrifice was rarely practiced in Syria or Rome at the time. In fact, the Historia Augusta, which is a collection of biographies of Roman emperors believed to be written during the reigns of Diocletian and Constantine I, is generally considered to be unreliable on many points. So take the human sacrifice allegations with a grain of salt. But don't let it diminish your side eye for Elagabalus. The man was nothing if not worthy of healthy suspicion. The unknown author of Historia Augusta also recorded one of Elagabalus' least charming alleged habits, physically harming his guests. He would reportedly strap them to a water wheel and would plunge them into the water and then bring them back to the surface again, calling them Meanwhile River Excions. So what the hell does that mean? Well, in Greco-Roman mythology, Excion was a man who tried to force himself on Hera. To punish him, Zeus condemned him to be strapped to a spinning wheel in the underworld for eternity. Elagabalus was essentially recreating his favorite mythological torture scenario, using his houseguests as props. Once again, the information comes from the less than reliable Historia Augusta, which is pretty much the only continuous Latin history of the time period that survived into modern times. So historians don't have much else to work with. But it isn't hard to believe that he liked springing surprise torture sessions on his guests, considering how he treated the general public. Everyone loves a practical joker, right? OK, maybe not. But Elagabalus certainly thought so. Had he been born in a different century, he might have had an irritatingly successful YouTube channel. Elagabalus loved playing jokes on dinner party guests. One example of the kind of joke he liked to play came during the dessert course, when the emperor would let lions and leopards into the dining room. Oh, yeah, that old chestnut. Now, those lions and leopards had been rendered harmless and trained by tamers. But the dinner party guests didn't know that. Naturally, the guests would panic, which presumably resulted in some color-changing togas, if you catch our meaning. Elagabalus, who was pretty clearly a sociopath, found this riotously amusing. Note to self, do not accept dinner invitations from Elagabalus. Another example of Elagabalus' unique sense of humor was the time he collected a ton of snakes and proceeded to let them loose in a crowd of people that had assembled to watch the games. If you're wondering how he stopped the snakes from biting people, the answer is he didn't. According to the reports, the people were harmed by the snakes' fangs, as well as in the general panic. Not even the streets were safe, as Elagabalus also had a habit of cruising around in chariots driven by exotic animals like camels or elephants. And of course, Elagabalus was the emperor. So you still had to pretend you thought it was funny. And that was the worst injustice. Elagabalus loved nice smelling things. According to Historia Augusta, he used to strew roses and all manner of flowers, such as lilies, violets, hyacinths, and narcissus, over his banqueting rooms, his couches, and his porticos, and then stroll about in them. Sometimes that love of flowers went a little too far. Reportedly, at one party, Elagabalus released tons of flowers from the ceiling of the room, essentially burying his guests in a massive floral arrangement. It was probably an impressive sight right up until the moment the guests found out they couldn't crawl out from under the flowers. Some of them perished while the emperor watched in amusement. Worst party ever. As you've probably come to expect by now, the feasts thrown at Elagabalus's palace were anything but tame. Instead of seating his guests on cushions, according to Historia Augusta, some of his humbler friends, he would seat on air pillows instead of on cushions and let out the air while they were dining. The cushions deflated, and the flabbergasted guests would slide under the table without anything to support them. Some say this makes Elagabalus the inventor of the whoopee cushion. And while that distinction is probably up for debate, the emperor's status as the most chaotic member of his group of friends certainly wasn't. Before he was emperor, the Syrian-born Elagabalus served as a priest of the sun god Elagabalus, which is how he got his name. But before he was called Elagabalus, he actually had a few other names. Early in his life, he was called Varius, which was supposedly a cruel joke. The story goes that the name Varius was given to him by his schoolfellows because he seemed to be sprung from the seed of various men, as would be the case with the son of a harlot. Yeah, kids are cruel in every era. Later, he adopted the names Antoninus to make himself seem more Roman. And finally, Elagabalus, which now that we're on the topic, does sound like a name someone would invent for themselves. You can just see Elagabalus airbrushed on the side of a guitar case. The emperor imported his namesake god's worship to Rome. And he developed a reputation for neglecting governmental duties in favor of making his patron deity the first and foremost god. He built the sun god a super temple near the Palatine Hill and tried to give him the most sacred emblems of Roman religion, including the fires of Vesta and the Palladium. His master plan was to ultimately incorporate all faiths under the worship of Elagabalus. To worship Elagabalus, the emperor conducted what the Romans considered to be barbarian rites in public. According to Herodian, accompanied by flutes and drums, he went about performing, as it appeared, orgiastic service to his god. And do you remember what I did to you at the last orgy, Gracchus? Yeah, you ate my testicles. That's right. Hmm, sounds like a pretty groovy church. But this didn't go over super well with the general Roman populace. The Roman Senate was strictly for men, that is, until Elagabalus came along. According to Historia Augusta, he established a synoculum, or woman's senate, on the Quirinal Hill. Sounds pretty inspiring. But before you crown him a feminist hero, know that this organization wasn't particularly great for women. Under the influence of Elagabalus' mother, they set restrictive rules regarding what matrons could wear, how they could ride, and who could wear gold shoes. Apparently, that was a major source of contention. You have to be selective, because if everyone wears gold shoes, nobody wears gold shoes. Once again, due to the unreliability of the Historia Augusta, it's unclear whether this all-female senate actually existed. But Elagabalus' female relatives did seem to play important roles in his reign. Furthermore, if he did create the synoculum, it wouldn't necessarily have been out of his drive to bring more rights to women. More likely, it would have been created as an insult to the existing senate, as he often showed contempt for the senate, calling them slaves and togas. Emperor or not, Elagabalus eventually pissed off way too many powerful people. From the Praetorian Guard to the Roman elite, the one thing everyone could agree on was that they had had enough, even his own grandmother. Yes, it was Elagabalus' grandmother, Julia Maisa, who sensed which way the wind was blowing and decided he had to be replaced. Her choice for new emperor was her other grandson, Severus Alexander, who was just then 15 years old. Julia convinced Elagabalus to make Severus Alexander her heir and to give him the title of Caesar. They shared power for a year, but when Elagabalus began to suspect his guards liked Severus better, he tried to have him whacked. When that didn't work, he started a rumor that Severus was on death's door, you know, just to see how the guards would react. They reacted by rioting and demanding to see Severus. Elagabalus obliged. But when he saw the guards cheering for Severus instead of himself, he freaked out and ordered them all to be arrested and executed. It was at that point that the guards finally turned on him. They eliminated Elagabalus and his mother, dragged their bodies through the city, then dumped them. Maybe he should have rethought some of those pranks. So what do you think? Would you have attended one of Elagabalus' parties? Let us know in the comments below. And while you're at it, check out some of these other videos from our Weird History.