The History Channel had a wonderful program on a few months back on the large ships, barges, pleasure palaces or whatever you wish to call them. I will leave some great links on the Nemi Project and some arifacts. These ships were absoulutely enourmous and on one of the links you will see a man standing next ot one. The most intriguing artifact that I saw was a lead pipe from the ship that read CCAESARISAVGGERMANICI(US) Since I could not find a photo of the lead pipe I kept pausing the lead pipe on the show to make sure I had the inscription right. This is rare to find any inscriptions with Caligula's name (Gaius) except on coinage of course. The only other inscription I have seen is from a Wine barrel which reads Inscription from a wine barrel,
mentioning C[aligula] really Gaius Cae[sar]
Aug[ustus] Ger[manicus] In 40, the emperor Caligula visited Fectio when he was travelling to Lugdunum. The remains of a wine barrel from his personal vinyard have been found. For photo of wine barrel inscription go to: http://www.livius.org/a/1/germania/caius.jpg The inscription to me is a very important piece of archaeological evidence that links the ship. Here is a link to visit the artifacts from Caligula's floating palaces.

http://www.abc.se/~pa/mar/nemships.htm

I found it fascinating that the Romans had a turning table on the ship probably for a statue and the valves they used are just like the valves used for today.

Joe Geranio
The Portraiture of Caligula