Julia Drusilla was a member of the Roman imperial family, the second daughter and fifth child of Germanicus and Agrippina the Elder to survive infancy. She was the favorite sister of Emperor Caligula, who, after her death, had her deified under the name Diva Drusilla Panthea, and named his daughter Julia Drusilla after her.
Drusilla, Statens Museum for Kunst
Inscription found at Caere (Etruria), dedicated to deified Drusilla, sister of Caius Augustus, whose name is cancelled. CIL XI, 3598
Germanicus Julius Caesar was an ancient Roman general and politician most famously known for his campaigns in Germania. The son of Nero Claudius Drusus and Antonia the Younger, Germanicus was born into an influential branch of the patrician gens Claudia. The agnomen Germanicus was added to his full name in 9 BC when it was posthumously awarded to his father in honor of his victories in Germania. In AD 4 he was adopted by his paternal uncle Tiberius, himself the stepson and heir of Germanicus' great-uncle Augustus; ten years later, Tiberius succeeded Augustus as Roman emperor. As a result of his adoption, Germanicus became an official member of the gens Julia, another prominent family, to which he was related on his mother's side. His connection to the Julii Caesares was further consolidated through a marriage between him and Agrippina the Elder, a granddaughter of Augustus. He was also the father of Caligula, the maternal grandfather of Nero, and the older brother of Claudius.
Bust of Germanicus (Musée Saint-Raymond)
Ara Pacis: processional frieze showing members of the Imperial household (south face). Germanicus is the toddler holding Antonia Minor's hand.
Bust of young Germanicus at the time of his adoption by Tiberius in AD 4
Battle of Teutoburg Forest, by Otto Albert Koch (1909).