Augustus Essay Plans Flashcards
1
Q
How effectively did Augustus accomplish his accession?
A
Must Mentions
○ Egypto Capta, presents as war against foreign nation, spun into propaganda
○ Res gestae barely mentions
○ Cleo over Ant
○ Divus Filius
§ Associating himself with Ceasar makes him popular as Julius gave lots away in his will
○ Public status
○ Giving up of powers
○ Vergil and Horace mentioned, smaller point for retcons
○ PROPAGANDA
○ Res gestae says not as important as his popularity
○ Avenging Caesar
- Actium w/o propaganda would be less significant, to still important - Popularity high for ending civil war and avenging Julius/ divus filius - Propaganda was catalyst for extreme reaction that allowed him to do this - The sources present Actium as a massively significant factor, overshadowing popularity which built off it, though Augustus’ propaganda machine was the largest, as it encapsulated both and multiplied
2
Q
To what extent was Augustus a successful military leader?
A
- Triple Triumph (RG 22)
○ Actium
○ Dalmatia
○ Alexandria
○ Held in 29BC- Campaign in Spain
○ 26-24BC fully subdues them and takes control of Cantabri - Tiberius in Germany
○ 8-7BC - Coins used to portray his victories
○ Coin N31 - Egypto Capta
○ Coin N15 - Receiving triumphal branches (15-12BC)
○ Coin N5 - Victory on one side and Octavian on the other
○ Coin N24 - Armenia Capta - Never commanded (Suetonius 20-23)
○ Only commanded in two foreign battles
○ Used his Leutinants who were successful
§ Mostly Agrippa but then later Tiberius - Brought peace (VP 2.89)
○ Triumph
○ Brought peace and prosperity to the empire
○ Ara Pacis (Peace in the empire)
§ Successful enough in battle to secure the Roman empire in peace
○ Temple of Janus Quirinus (RG 13) - Eagle standards from Partian (Suetonius 20-23)
○ Lost by Crasus and Antony
○ Placed into Temple of Mars Ultor
○ Not so much a military achievement but more of a diplomatic victory
○ Representation of his success? - Varian Disaster (16BC)
○ Loss of 3 legions - 6,000 troops each - Lollian disaster (VP 97)
○ Losing of standards
Presented at Marcus Lollius’ fault
- Campaign in Spain
3
Q
How successful was his Political and administrative reforms?
A
First Constitution Settlement
- Keeping Egypt
- Dio Cassius (53.4)
○ His desire to rule for life was evident but he was careful not to say that - Change in name ‘Augustus’ - “revered one”
- Doorposts could be decorated with laurel and a civic crown and the shield of virtue
○ RG34 - State was again controlled by the Senate and the people RG34
○ Only true that constitutional governance by consuls resumed - Strabo 17.3.25
○ All provinces without military presence were administrated by the senate
○ ‘Super province’ given to Augustus
§ Military presence for Auctoritas “influence”
§ Egypt as well for the wealth - Dio Cassius 53.11
○ Some realised his intentions but were willing to accept it - VP 2.89
○ Ancient form of the republic was brought back - Main thing is he gains lots of Auctoritas from this settlement
Second Constitutional Settlement
1. The need for an heir because him being close to death 2. “Mais imperium proconsulare” § Ultimate command over every province of the Empire § “Power than greater than that of a proconsul” § Works even inside Rome (within the pomerium - Romes city walls) § CAN BE TRANSFERRED - NO LONGER ASSOCIATED WITH A POLITICAL OFFICE / TITLE 3. “Tribunicia Potestas” - Tacitus § “Power of a tribune” § Veto legislation § Propose legislation § Sacrosanct person (can’t be assaulted legally) § Representative of the common people (historically ‘Tribunis plebis’/Tribune of the plebs) § CAN BE TRANSFERRED - NO LONGER ASSOCIATED WITH A POLITICAL OFFICE / TITLE § AUGUSTUS DATES HIS OWN REIGN IN TERMS OF ‘YEARS OF TRIBUNE POWER HELD’ 4. “Consular Imperium” 5. Powers of a Censor a. Able to reform the senate and political powers
Moral reforms
- Lex Julia Law
○ To stabilize and encourage marriage
○ Adultery became a public crime
○ Certain privileges of being married - Equites opposition to marriage laws
○ Suetonius tells us that the Equites demonstrated against the Lex Julia
○ Augustus responds by getting his grandchildren to sit on his knee at the public games showing a typical family
§ Lex Julia is amended in 9AD Lex Pappia Poppaea (by unmarried consuls)
§ Early years betrothals to circumvent Lex Julia - Laws surrounding slaves and foreign romans
○ Limit foreign elements of Romans
○ Informal method of freeing slaves that left them without legal status
○ Trying to purify the Roman race in order to increase the value of Roman citizenship - Created more Equestrian positions
○ Board of Grain after the Grain crisis
○ Fire department in Rome
○ Increased the number of patricians (RG) - Senatorial changes
○ Limit on numbers/property qualification allowance (RG , Suetonius)
○ Privy council - Suetonius
○ Additional praetors - VP - City administration
○ Praefectus urbi - Suetonius
○ Divides city into administrative units
○ Praetorian guard
○ Increasing Pomerium (disrupted) in Tacitus but not RG
○ Grain crisis (curator annonae)
○ Vigiles - firemen
4
Q
How far did Augustus’ building projects secure his popularity?
A
- Temples
○ Restoration of temples (82 RG) or (300 Virgil)
○ Temple / Nikopolis at Actium (Strabo)
○ Shield of Aeneas
○ Mars Ultor - relationship to JC (pietas)
§ Makes Augustus seems successful in war
§ Parthian standards get placed there
○ Ara Pacis
○ Pantheon (with statues of Julius Ceasar - God and Augustus and Agrippa)- “found Rome built of bricks but left it clothed in marble” - RG 28
- Secular Edifices
○ Restoration of theatre of Pompey and Marcellus (RG 19)
§ Regularly used by ordinary citizens so would help him gain popularity there
○ Aqueducts (Strabo 5.3.8)
○ Aqua Virgo for the baths of Agrippa
○ Saepta Julia (an assembly and voting enclosure)
5
Q
How did Augustus use religion to promote his position?
A
- Temples
○ Restoration of temples (82 RG) or (300 Virgil)
○ Temple / Nikopolis at Actium (Strabo)
○ Shield of Aeneas
○ Mars Ultor - relationship to JC (pietas)
§ Makes Augustus seems successful in war
§ Parthian standards get placed there
○ Ara Pacis- Personal connection to the Gods
○ ‘divi filius’
§ Seen writen on coins
○ ‘Augustus’ revered one
○ Descent from Venus - Prima Porta
○ Birthday on calendar
○ Worshipped as a God - not in Rome!
§ Numen rather than anything else - altar L17
§ Augustan Lares at crossroads in Rome - Priesthood’s
○ Pontifex Maximus
§ After death of Lepidus (12BC)
§ Elected with record crowds
○ Multiple priesthood - coin L1 - RG
- Personal connection to the Gods
6
Q
To what extent was Augustus relationship with the senate mutually beneficial?
A
- Defining the senate
○ Raised property requirement
○ Reduction in number
○ Creation of senatorial council
○ Senate rules (more structure in the senate)- Limiting senatorial power
○ Restriction on senate entering Egypt
○ Senatorial council
○ Division of provinces into ”imperial” and ”senatorial”
○ ‘Imperium proconsulare marius’ - Supportive elements
○ Allowing equestrians to fulfil roles + role senate
○ Allowing ‘demoted’ senators to keep senatorial trappings ( still have the perks - dress, seats )
○ Relinquishing of the consulship in 23BC (mutual benefit)
○ Financially supports struggling senators - Areas of conflict
○ Grain crisis
§ Senate fail to do anything about it
§ Barracked into senate house
○ Conspiracies
Caepius and Murena and Cinna
- Limiting senatorial power
7
Q
To what extent did Augustus maintain a positive relationship with the Equites?
A
- Provincial governer of Egypt
- Redefined the political order
○ Giving equites more power and less to the Senate - Demonstration against Morality laws
○ Lex Julia wasn’t popular amongst the Equites - Created more Equestrian positions
○ Board of Grain after the Grain crisis
○ Fire department in Rome
○ Increased the number of patricians (RG) - Building reforms
○ Restoration of theatre of Pompey and Marcellus (RG 19)
§ Regularly used by ordinary citizens so would help him gain popularity there
○ Aqueducts (Strabo 5.3.8)
○ Aqua Virgo for the baths of Agrippa
○ Saepta Julia (an assembly and voting enclosure) - Loads of games
○ Ludi saeculares / secular games
Suetonius 39-40- Augustus cross-examined every Equites on his personal affairs
- 14 rows at theatre
Suetonius 34 - Lex Julia revised but still protested by the Equites at public entertainment
Tacitus, Annals 2.59 - Banned certain equites from entering Egypt
- Distrust in equites as we knows their power
Tacitus 1.2.1 - Tacitus is very pessimistic man
- “Bread and circuses”
- Slowly increasing his power but in secret to stop him being seen as dictator
Coin L10 - Augustus brings peace and prosperity to Rome
○ Favoured as a result - Ara Pacis
RG 5 - Offered dictatorship but declines it
- However, did assist in becoming superintendent of grain to solve the crisis
RG15 - Money to people from Caesar
- 300 sesterces
- Never fewer than 250,000 citizens
RG 17 - 170 million sesterces to the military treasury
RG 22-23 - Extravagant games
- 10,000 men fought in the games
- Beasts
- Centennial games
- Naval battle of Salamis on the Tiber
Lex Julia Law - Protested by the Equites as they didn’t want the strict laws on marriage
- However, it was revised showing Augustus cared and listened but also they still didn’t agree after changes making him unpopular
- Redefined the political order
8
Q
To what extent did Augustus hold a positive relationship with ordinary citizen?
A
Positives
○ Building reforms
○ Administrative reforms
○ Peace
○ Triple triumph
○ Games
○ Grain crisis
§ “bread and circuses”
○ Water
○ Money donations
○ Never any popular revolts
Negatives ○ Tacitus - only in power because fear of civil war if he was replaced ○ Lex Julia law ○ Individual revolts ○ Took away the vote of many people
9
Q
Personal Failings
A
- Obsession with control and perfection
○ Does it extremely well despite some small failings
○ Morality laws
○ Suetonius tells us that the Equites demonstrated against the Lex Julia
○ Augustus responds by getting his grandchildren to sit on his knee at the public games showing a typical family
§ Lex Julia is amended in 9AD Lex Pappia Poppaea (by unmarried consuls)
§ Early years betrothals to circumvent Lex Julia
○ Exile of Julia was extremely unpopular in the senate
○ Reasons for this
§ Chance of more unwanted heirs being created
○ Horace argues it wasn’t popular
○ Ovid is exiled
§ Poet who write inflammatory verses about sex and seduction, in contravention of the Lex Julia
§ Also made a mistake’ implicated in Julia scandal’
○ Taking a long time to understand he needs to take control of province
○ Marcus Primus case
§ Getting involved caused a conspiracy against him
○ Obsession with bloodline
§ Doesn’t prioritise his step kids (Tiberius and Drusus) despite them being good and proven leaders
§ Leads to a lack of a trained heir for his heir
10
Q
How impactful was Augustus’ challenges and oppositions on his reign?
A
- According to Dio Cassius. Senators maybe opposed 27BC constitutional settlement
- Marcus Primus
○ Campaigns outside territory - 23BC trial - Varro Murena conspiracy
- Marcus Lepidus plotted against Augustus Vellius Paterculus
- Sextus Pompeius
- Marcus Crassus
○ Spolia Opima - Cornelius Gallus ventures ‘too far’ from province in 23BC
- The Julia’s
○ Infidelity and eventually banished from Rome - Creating unity in a post-Civil War Rome
○ Post Julius Caesar - Lollian (16BC) and Varian (9AD) defeats
○ Varian disaster was the loss of 3 legions - 6,000 troops each - Crassus’ spolia opima
○ Disallowed but triumphal parade granted - General dependency upon him
○ Egnatius Rufus’ bid for consulship
○ Executed (but not by Augustus)
○ Augustus leaves Rome in 23BC
○ Famine /grain shortage in 22BC - Senate are barricaded inside the Senate House by an angry mob, and there are calls for Augustus to take on the dictatorship; Augustus refuses but does accept the role of ‘curator annonae’ (grain supervisor)
○ People demand that Augustus be consul in 21BC - refuse to hold another election until Agrippa comes back and sorts it out
○ 19BC - the people demand Augustus as consul again. The sole consul (as people refused to elect another) is put in a tricky position when somebody else (Rufus) runs for the vacant consulship. Rufus is accused of treason and executed before Augustus can come back and resolve things. - Grain crisis
○ Solves with cash (RG) - Equites opposition to marriage laws
○ Suetonius tells us that the Equites demonstrated against the Lex Julia
○ Augustus responds by getting his grandchildren to sit on his knee at the public games showing a typical family
§ Lex Julia is amended in 9AD Lex Pappia Poppaea (by unmarried consuls)
§ Early years betrothals to circumvent Lex Julia - Ovid is exiled
○ Poet who write inflammatory verses about sex and seduction, in contravention of the Lex Julia
Also made a mistake’ implicated in Julia scandal’
- Marcus Primus
11
Q
Family
A
- Tiberius
- Julia
- Julius Caesar
- Gaius and Lucius
- Promotion of himself
○ Divi filius
○ Fulfilment of Caesars will
○ Using Julia to connect families - Morality laws
○ Julia’s infedilty - Succession and Accession
○ Heavily used for this - Military reliance
12
Q
To what extent did Augustus successfully establish his succession?
A
Agrippa
- Signet ring in 23BC - Marries Julia in 21BC - Has children of Augustus' bloodline - Not noble birth - Same age as Augustus - Gets 'imperium maius proconsulare' and 'tribunicia potestas' - Dies in 12BC
Death of original heirs
- No blood-son as he only had one daughter with Livia - Marcellus ○ Next to Augustus during triple triumph VP 93 ○ First planned heir - Lucius and Gaius ○ Blood relatives - grandson ○ VP 99 mentions how they experienced limelight at the start of their political careers only because Tiberius went away ○ Died in 2, 4AD Tiberius - Proven and capable military leader ○ Success in Gallic provinces VP 121 ○ Campaigns in Germany (8-7BC) - Not blood related step-son - "falls out" with Augustus and goes into self-imposed exile ○ 6BC - 2AD ○ Only returns after the death of Gaius and Lucius - Adopted by Augustus ○ 4AD ○ Required to adopt Germanicus himself so that later Augustus would have his blood relatives on the throne
