August 31, 12 - Caligula
His reign began with genuine public goodwill — he was the son of a beloved general, the survivor of a family largely destroyed by Tiberius — which makes the turn it took all the more striking to historians. Within months of taking power, Caligula became associated with arbitrary cruelty, public humiliation of senators, and a style of rule that ancient sources describe as increasingly erratic and absolute. Whether those accounts reflect reality or the hostile tradition of Roman historiography remains debated, but the pattern they describe — unchecked personal authority wielded without restraint — places him among the earliest and most studied examples of autocratic excess in Western history.
From Wikipedia
Gaius Julius Caesar Augustus Germanicus (31 August AD 12 – 24 January AD 41), also called Gaius and Caligula (), was the third Roman emperor, ruling from AD 37 until his assassination in AD 41. He was the son of the Roman general Germanicus and Augustus' granddaughter Agrippina the Elder, members of the first ruling family of the Roman Empire. He was born two years before Tiberius became emperor. Gaius accompanied his father, mother and siblings on campaign in Germania, at little more than four or five years old. He had been named after Gaius Julius Caesar, but his father's soldiers affectionately nicknamed him "Caligula" ('little boot').
Germanicus died in Antioch in AD 19, and Agrippina returned with her six children to Rome, where she became entangled in a bitter feud with Emperor Tiberius, who was Germanicus' biological uncle and adoptive father. The conflict eventually led to the destruction of her family, with Caligula as the sole male survivor. In 26, Tiberius withdrew from public life to the island of Capri, and in 31, Caligula joined him there.
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