Augustan Art

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Gaius Octavius Thurinus ? Gaius Iulius Caesar
Octavianus ? Imperator Caesar Augustus

• 63 birth (grandnephew of Julius Caesar)
• 44 named in Caesars will as principal heir
  adopted son
• 43 forms 2nd Triumvirate with Antony and Lepidus
  ? proscriptions (e.g., Cicero)

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Octavian succeeds Caesar defeats Antony

• 42 Caesar proclaimed a god, making Octavian divi
  filius son of a god

34 Octavian breaks with Antony 31 Octavian
Agrippa defeat Antony Cleopatra at Actium
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Coin of Augustus celebrating the triple triumph
in 29 BCE Dalmatia, Actium, Egypt
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It was the will of our ancestors that the
gateway of Janus Quirinus should be shut when
victories had secured peace by land and sea
throughout the whole empire of the Roman people
from the foundation of the city down to my birth,
tradition records that it was shut only twice,
but while I was the leading citizen the senate
resolved that it should be shut on three
occasions (RG 23).

• Closing of the Doors of the Temple of Janus
  Quirinus 29 BCE

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Augustan aureus, 28 BCEAugustus seated on the
sella curulis
LEGES ET IURA P(OPULI) R(OMANI) RESTITUIT He
restored the laws and the rights of the Roman
people I transferred the republic from my
power to the dominion of the senate and people of
Rome (RG 34) (27 BCE)
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27 BCE First settlementauctoritas, Imperator
Caesar Augustus princeps
In my sixth and seventh consulships 28-27 BC,
after I had extinguished civil wars, and at a
time when with universal consent I was in
complete control of affairs, I transferred the
republic from my power to the dominion of the
senate and people of Rome . After this time I
excelled all in influence auctoritas, although
I possessed no more official power potestas
than others who were my colleagues in the several
magistracies (RG 34). 23 BCE Second
settlement maius imperium tribunicia
potestas
My name was inserted in the hymn of the Salii by
a decree of the senate, and it was enacted by law
that my person should be inviolable for ever and
that I should hold the tribunician power for the
duration of my life (RG 10). the consulship
was also offered to me, to be held each year for
the rest of my life, and I refused it (RG 5).
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Augustan aureus post-23 BCEcorona civica
(civic crown) made of oak leaves
OB CIVIS SERVATOS for saving the citizens
the door-posts of my house were publicly wreathed
with bay leaves and a civic crown was fixed over
my door on account of my courage, clemency,
justice and piety (RG 32)
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• Augustus of Prima Porta
• (Livias villa), post-20 BCE
• Imperator in adlocutio pose (addressing the
  troops)

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I compelled the Parthians to restore to me the
spoils and standards of three Roman armies and to
ask as suppliants for the friendship of the Roman
people (RG 29)

• Details on the cuirass
• Tiberius(?) receives the standards of Crassus and
  Antony from a Parthian
• Deities represented include Apollo / Sol
• Provinces represented include Hispania, Gaul
• Personification of Tellus (Mother Earth) with
  horn of abundance (cornucopia)

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I found Rome a city of bricks and left it a city
of marble (Suetonius Life of Augustus 28) I
built (RG 19-21
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• I built the temple of Mars the Avenger and the
  Forum Augustum on private ground from the
  proceeds of booty (RG 21)
• Vowed in 42 BCE after Philippi (defeat of
  Caesars Republican assassins)
• Begun in 20 BCE after Parthian standards
  recovered
• Inaugurated in 2 BCE

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Temple of Mars Ultor (Avenger)
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Venus Mars Iulius CaesarAeneas
RomulusAugustus
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Augustus as Pontifex Maximusafter 12 BCE
I declined to be made pontifex maximus in the
place of my colleague who was still alive, when
the people offered me this priesthood which my
father had held. Some years later, after the
death of the man who had taken the opportunity of
civil disturbance to seize it for himself, I
received this priesthood, in the consulship of
Publius Sulpicius and Gaius Valgius 12 BC, and
such a concourse poured in from the whole of
Italy to my election as has never been recorded
at Rome before that time (RG 10)
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• Augustan complex
• Ara Pacis Augustae
• Horologium Augusti
• Mausoleum Augusti

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Ara Pacis Augustae, 13-9 BCE
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Res Gestae 12 on the Ara Pacis

• When I returned from Spain and Gaul, in the
  consulship of Tiberius Nero and Publius
  Quintilius, after successful operations in those
  provinces, the senate voted in honour of my
  return the consecration of an altar to Pax
  Augusta in the Campus Martius, and on this altar
  it ordered the magistrates and priests and Vestal
  virgins to make annual sacrifice.

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Processional FriezeAugustus, Lictors, Marcus
Agrippa
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Augustus Horologium (obelisk pointed towards Ara
Pacis on his birthday, Sept. 23rd)
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Augustus Mausoleum
Res Gestae would have been displayed on the
doorposts
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Reconstruction of Mausoleum
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How did Roman historians and poets assess
Augustus?

• How does Velleius Paterculus assess Augustus
  impact on Rome?
• How does Tacitus assess Augustus impact on Rome?
  
• How do Horace and Ovid assess Augustus impact on
  Rome?
• As you read the Aeneid, how does Vergil assess
  Augustus (future) impact on Rome?

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How do we assess Augustus?

• What are the values that matter to Augustus?
• What values does he scorn?
• How does he present himself to the reader?
• What does he consider his most important
  accomplishments?
• How does this autobiography compare with the
  correspondence and philosophical works of Cicero?
  That is, do we get a complete picture of either
  man from the literary works they left behind?