Incitatus Dio (155-235 AD) indicated that the horse was attended to by servants and was fed oats mixed with gold flake, and that Caligula made the horse a priest. The accuracy of the received history is generally questioned. Historians such as Anthony A. Barrett suggest that later Roman chroniclers such as Suetonius and Dio Cassius were influenced by the political situation of their own times, when it may have been useful to the current emperors to discredit the earlier Julio-Claudian emperors. Also, the lurid nature of the story added spice to their narratives, winning them additional readers. One suggestion is that
Frederick I, Holy Roman Emperor from the donkey. To add to this debasement, they were made to announce, ""Ecco la fica"" (meaning "behold the fig"), with the feces still in their mouths. It used to be said that the insulting gesture, (called fico), of holding one's fist with the thumb in between the middle and forefinger came by its origin from this event. Frederick's first marriage, to Adelheid of Vohburg, did not produce any children and was annulled. From his second marriage, to Beatrice of Burgundy, he had the following children: Frederick I, Holy Roman Emperor Frederick I (, ; 1122 – 10 June 1190),