The Simpsons revisit the ancient world again in this episode focused on ancient Rome (for their retelling of Homer’s Odyssey, see the episode, “Tales from the Public Domain”).
The episode is framed as a story told by a museum curator to the family as they visit an exhibit on ancient Rome. The story told is of Obesus the Wide (played by Homer), a poor man who is sold into slavery by his father. He becomes a gladiator (with nods to the Ridley Scott film) and catches the eye of Marjora (Marge), his master’s daughter, whom he impregnates (there’s a fun Spartacus reference here as each gladiator claims “I had sexicus” when interrogated about it). He is freed so that they can be married, and her father then puts him in charge of his laundry business.
The pair have twins, Bartigula and Lisandra. Obesus becomes wealthy after he comes up with a clever way to collect the urine needed to clean clothing – by placing pots to collect it outside of taverns. Marjora then urges him to climb the rungs of power. He is made a Senator after he assassinates Emperor Quimbus at the behest of his adopted father Senator Mortimus (aka Mr. Burns). Marjora then urges Bartigula to assassinate Mortimus (now emperor) in a quest to gain even more power and influence. Bartigula does so and then promptly goes on a megalomaniacal spree much like his namesake Caligula: he declares war on Neptune, builds a wall to keep out foreign invaders, and proclaims himself a god. Finally, Obesus insists on putting an end to his son’s reign and the two duke it out in the arena where they both meet their end (again, a la Gladiator). The episode ends with the museum curator summing up the lesson of his tale: “stop letting stupid people into museums.”
The historical references and cultural cliches fly thick and fast in this episode. As Den of Geek reviewer Tony Sokol notes, “It is one of the many episodes which will get funnier on repeated viewings. It won’t produce more laughs, but the references will seem more clever.”
Fun facts: The theme song from the short-lived animated Hanna-Barbera show “The Roman Holidays” appears twice in this episode.
The Roman gods appear at the end of the episode and make fun of the show as if they’ve just watched it. They speculate that the series will be coming to an end soon.
A set of five Funko Pop! figurines was created featuring the family in their Roman guises, as well as Mr. Burns.
Mike Duncan, creator of The History of Rome podcast, served as historical consultant for the episode.
Writer Cesar Mazariegos was nominated for a Writers Guild of America Award for Television: Animation for this episode.
More: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/I,_Carumbus
https://tvshowtranscripts.ourboard.org/viewtopic.php?f=431&t=39366
Animated Antiquity 
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