This bronze balance with a single movable weight was found in 1846 during excavations at the ancient Italian city of Pompeii that perished in A.D. 79 during an eruption of Mount Vesuvius.
The weight in the form of a bust of a boy records the appearance of the Roman Emperor Gaius Caesar Germanicus -- the infamous Caligula -- in childhood. The Emperor, who reigned fron 37 to 41 A.D., was born at Antium in 12 A.D. His father Germanicus, the nephew and adopted son of Emperor Tiberius, was popular with the legions and commanded the Roman forces on the Rhine. Until he was four, the young Gaius lived with his parents in military camps and he was dressed in clothes that were a smaller copy of the uniform of a Roman legionary. The soldiers presented their "mascot" with little campaign boots (caligi) and he became known by the nickname Caligula -- "little boot".