25. Geta Was Murdered by His Brother While Cowering in the Arms of Their Mother
Brothers Geta and Caracalla jointly inherited Rome’s imperial throne when their father, Emperor Septimius Severus, died in Britain in 211. Severus had been a generally capable emperor, who had unified the empire and restored order after a period of chaos following the death of Emperor Commodus (the evil ruler from Gladiator). However, handing the empire over to his sons to rule jointly was not one of Severus’ better ideas. Even during their father’s life, the siblings had been bitter rivals, and things only got worse when they became co-emperors.
During the journey back to Rome with their father’s ashes, Caracalla and Geta quarreled nonstop, and their already tense relationship steadily grew more toxic. At some point, they decided to avert open conflict by splitting the empire between themselves, with Caracalla ruling the western half of the Roman Empire, and Geta ruling the eastern half. However, their mother talked them out of it and arranged a reconciliation meeting between them for December 26th, 211. When looking back at how the get-together went down, she probably kicked herself for not having simply let her sons go their separate ways. Caracalla ordered his henchmen to murder his sibling at the meeting. A grievously wounded Geta fell into his mother’s bosom, and she frantically begged Caracalla to call off his men. He ignored her pleas, and personally finished off his brother with a knife while Geta cowered in their mother’s arms.
