I was wondering if someone would ever attempt this. Usually historical images are left uncensored, however explicit or graphic they may be. After all, documentaries can show graphic photographs of Jack the Ripper’s victims while having to censor modern-day crime images. Likewise, we can’t get away with parading our own naked bodies on the TV but images of ancient (or even Renaissance) art are the exception.
Not anymore.
According to the Geneva Museum of Art and History, Facebook blocked them from using two images of Roman statues (and I’m including them in this article just because I can).
The images in question are a statue of the goddess Venus (known to the Greeks as Aphrodite) and a captive kneeling, his hands presumably tied behind his back. Apparently, the museum wanted to use images of the statue to promote their “Caesar and Rhone” exhibit but they were blocked by Facebook, citing the reason as nudity.
The exhibit features items recovered from the river Rhone during underwater excavation and highlight Julius Caesar’s invasion of the region in Gaul in the first century BC.
Gaul actually was constituted of many different states of different ethnic origins and wasn’t a singular region. By the end of the Iron Age, the different tribes and cultures were resembling each other more and more due to trade, and they became known to the Greeks and Romans as Celts or Gauls. By the fourth century, these Gallic warriors had invaded Italy and even overtook Rome for a time!
In the second century, for reasons unknown, there were mass migrations from Germanic tribes starting, and by the reign of Caesar, it looked like the Gaul would have to either become Romans or be overtaken by the Germanic people.
What terrified Rome was that if the Germanic tribes overtook the Gaul tribes, they would likely go on to attack their territory, too!
Hence the attacks on Gaul started. It should be noted, however, that Caesar originally wanted to invade Rumania for its precious metals and leave the Gaul out of it. Unfortunately, the migration of the Helvetians (originally from modern-day Switzerland) forced Rome’s hand, for they’d migrated to the southwest of modern-day France and were crossing through Roman territories.
Intending to attack the Germanic peoples (and impress the Senate, which was still functioning at this time), Caesar destroyed the bridge at Geneva, as his forces were still in the eastern end of the province, and blocked the road along the Rhone river.
Those actions gave Caesar time to cross the Alps and recruit two extra legions, forcing the Helvetians to leave. However, as they attempted to cross the Saone Caesar attacked and defeated them.
The Gauls also recruited him for help in pushing back the Seubians, which Caesar did. However, instead of returning his armies to the south, he kept them in the region, intentionally provoking his former allies.
He’d decided to conquer all of Gaul.
He called it a preventative war, like most Presidents of the United States of America refer to their own invasions, and managed to rally the Roman citizens to him. These actions would eventually secure him as Rome’s first Emperor, spelling the end of Rome’s Republic.
And now we can’t look at one of the statues commemorating Julius Caesar’s victory in these early battles.
You refer to Julius Caesar as "Rome’s first Emperor". Even if that is a question of definitions, historical science usually ascribe that epithet to Octavianus.