Critics

Question 1

Scullard: First Triumvirate

Answer 1

“The ultimate origin of the civil war”

Question 2

Zanker on the prima porta

Answer 2

“The Parthian motif”
“intimate association” between imagery on breastplate and motifs in the Carmen Seculare
Victory in Parthia is celebrated as the prerequisite and consequence of the GA

Question 3

Nicholls on the Ara Pacis

Answer 3

“The imagery of the benefits of peace

Fits with Augustan poets msgs of “peace and plenty”

Question 4

Nicholls on the forum of Augustus

Answer 4

“Both republican and regal”

corner defect shows not “kingly” but a “citizen respectful of his fellows citizens”

Question 5

Jenkyns on his image split

Answer 5

Highlights the juxtaposing features of Augustus’ rule

Question 6

Beard on similar image in all statues

Answer 6

“Mask of power”

Question 7

Jenkyns on statues

Answer 7

Like Alexander the Great all Aug’s statues have the same un-aging face which
“Godlike in his immutability”

Question 8

Goldsworthy on poetry

Answer 8

Poetry: “mark of a truly civilised man”

Doesn’t believe it contains veiled subversion or criticism of August

Question 9

Jenkyns on poets

Answer 9

“As propagandists poets were useless”

“power to transmit glory of future generations”

Question 10

Beard on the mausoleum

Answer 10

1- an aggressive assertion of the emperors power

2- commitment burial in Rome

Question 11

Smith on the Sebasteion

Answer 11

• emperors represented are powerful warrior divinities … near equal partners of old divinities
• “Olympian Emperor Gods”
• Hellenistic heroic style
• borrowed from Rome

Question 12

Galinsky on the secular games

Answer 12

17BC
Shouldn’t be taken out of context, it follows “corner stone” of Augs programme (moral reforms 18BC)
GA isn’t “passive bliss” not a “god given blessing” - depended on moral effort of Romans, especially ruling class

Question 13

Galinsky: laurel, oak and Apollo

Answer 13

L & O = emblems originally associated with victory and war. Laurel was Apollos’ sacred tree
Apollo was patron god of the victorious in non military pursuits as well
“Victorious Apollo” - Propertius

Question 14

Horsfall on Suetonius

Answer 14

Presents to us a “more humane, human, agreeable princeps”

Question 15

Zanker on Augustus and Apollo

Answer 15

Apollo stood for “discipline and morality” & “purification and punishment of … excess”
After victory ➡️ singer, lure player, god of peace and reconciliation
Prophetic god ➡️ proclaimed new age
Seen in poem the temple of palatine Apollo

Question 16

Zanker on Greek models

Answer 16

theorises that the art Augs principate appealed to the style of the Greek classical period, viewed as one of moral superiority.
mirroring this style implied Augs reign was also one of morality

Question 17

Wallace Hadrill: Actium

Answer 17

• a battle for roman values, to save Rome from a frontal assault in its gods, its ideals, its moral fabric.
• the threat was not a tipsy Antony but the evil incarnate in Cleopatra
• victory of Roman decency over barbarism
• Antony scarcely named from RG to poetry accounts by Virgil, Horace and Propertius
• Antony a Roman in-Romaned

Question 18

Beard on Cleopatra

Answer 18

Regal and seductive

Unnatural (undertakes male military responsibilities)

Question 19

Beard: Antony vs Aug

Answer 19

Augustus exploited idea of clash between his “deep rooted Roman traditions” and Antony’s “oriental excess”

Question 20

Wallace Hadrill on Augustus’ names re Caesar

Answer 20

Conventions of Roman names ‘vehicle for mystification’ … implication that descendants of a god should inherit divinity

Question 21

Stanier “imperator”

Answer 21

Indication of military prowess suited him well at the time when control of the legions was crucial

Question 22

Beard on Augs adoption

Answer 22

Caesar was Octavian’s passport to power

Question 23

Galinsky RG

Answer 23

Important for what it says as well as what it omits

Question 24

Beard on RG

Answer 24

Rose tinted

Ignores murderous illegalities

Question 25

Cooley on RG

Answer 25

Point of reference for later authors moulding their accounts of his era

Question 26

Witschel Augs self image

Answer 26

Had to play a number of divergent roles

• senators wanted to be treated as equals
• plebs want “super patron”
• soldiers want victorious general
• many in empire saw emperor deserving of cultic worship