Emperor Augustus

Although Julius Caesar acted in many ways like a monarch, the change from Roman Republic to Roman Empire dates from the accession to the role of head of state of Gaius Octavius (later Gaius Julius Caesar, but generally known as Octavian), with the title Caesar Augustus. This took place in 27 BC, but the process of turning Octavian into Augustus had been a long and painful one.


The rise of Octavian

Octavian was born on 23rd September 63 BC. His mother was a niece of Julius Caesar, but Caesar’s will adopted him as son and heir. However, the power in the land at the time of Caesar’s death by assassination in 44 BC was his partner as consul, Marcus Antoninus, known more generally as Mark Antony.

Mark Antony was about twenty years older than Octavian and came from a much more distinguished family. Under the Republic, the highest power was exercised by two consuls who were elected from the Senate to serve one-year terms of office. With Caesar dead, Mark Antony became the effective leader of Rome but did not continue to rule in the dictatorial way that Caesar had done.

Instead a triumvirate was formed, the members being Mark Antony, Octavian and Marcus Aemilius Lepidus, a former deputy of Julius Caesar. However, this was, in effect, a dictatorship by three men rather than one.

The triumvirate faced a challenge from two of the assassins of Julius Caesar, Brutus and Cassius, who were defeated at the two battles of Philippi in 42 BC. However, this victory strengthened Mark Anthony far more than it did Octavian. Mark Anthony established a power base in the east leaving Octavian to deal with risings in the west.

Having dismissed Lepidus from the triumvirate without consulting Anthony, Octavian was now the power in the west and he and Anthony were rivals for ultimate power. Anthony’s personal behaviour shocked many Romans with his self-indulgence, most notably in his notorious relationship with the Egyptian Queen Cleopatra. Octavian traded on these stories of Antony’s licentiousness and set himself up as the more wholesome alternative, while at the same time ruling the west with some degree of compassion and common sense.

In 32 BC, when the triumvirate was in any case due to expire, Octavian engineered an excuse to declare war on Mark Anthony. Octavian showed considerable skill as a general and was able to outmanoeuvre Anthony, scoring a decisive victory at the naval Battle of Actium in September 31 BC. Anthony fled and, a year later, committed suicide together with Cleopatra when Octavian’s army entered Alexandria.


Octavian becomes sole ruler as Augustus

Octavian was now the undisputed ruler of Rome. During the following years one source of authority after another was handed to him by the Senate, thus creating the position of Emperor that his successors would hold for more than 400 years. In January 27 BC the Senate conferred on him the title of Augustus, which is the name by which he is generally known as Emperor.

However, Augustus gained power gradually and subtly, and was able to perform the remarkable trick of appearing to be restoring the old republic while at the same time ensuring that it could never return.

Augustus established his position by making some wise decisions that were aimed at getting people to accept the new status quo rather than be impelled to fight against it. Although he was a dictator in all but name, he did not act like one and rejected the title when it was offered to him (in 23 BC). For one thing, he saw himself primarily as Rome’s “first citizen” and he refused to accept any form of divine status such as had been accorded to Julius Caesar.

Another important element of his rule was that he made good use of deputies who took some of the burden of government off his shoulders. In particular he gave certain powers to two old friends of his, Maecenas and Agrippa, who had very different personalities and actually disliked each other, but whose presence at the top of the government made it clear that there was room in Augustus’s regime for talented people to make a real contribution. Maecenas did much to encourage the arts and Agrippa was a brilliant military commander.


Augustus the reformer and consolidator

Augustus’s position was not completely secure. In 22 BC a conspiracy of senators aimed to assassinate him and, although the attempt was bungled, it led Augustus to give serious thought to who should succeed him. He had no male children of his own and originally planned that Agrippa should be his heir. However, he also looked to the next generation as providing a possible successor and promoted the interests of the two sons of his third wife, Lucia, namely Tiberius and Drusus.

Augustus was careful not to take risky military gambles. He therefore began his rule in 27 BC by securing the status of Spain within the Empire, and later took action to ensure peaceful relations with Parthia (modern day Iraq and Syria). He knew that direct Roman rule in Palestine would lead to constant trouble and so installed a puppet king, Herod the Great, to rule on his behalf.

Augustus took active steps to reform the morals of Rome by encouraging the institution of marriage and punishing sexual offences. Adultery was made a crime and upper class men whose wives produced three or more children were given political preference. Augustus also encouraged religion by restoring the cults of the gods and building new altars and temples.

To reward Romans for behaving themselves, there were plenty of lavish spectacles; new entertainment venues were built and old ones improved. Augustus’s building programme was extensive, including Rome’s first public library and a portico for the display of works of art. Augustus boasted that he had found a city of brick and transformed it into one of marble.

Another major reform was that of the army, such that a proper career structure was introduced with a guaranteed retirement package for soldiers who had served at least 20 years. Augustus knew that a loyal army was essential for the future stability of the Empire.

However, the later years of Augustus’s rule were marred by the greatest disaster ever to befall the Roman military, which was the loss of three whole legions (the 17th, 18th and 19th) in the Teutoburg Forest of northwest Germany. In 9 AD the commander Quinctilius Varus was lured into a trap set by a supposedly loyal German chieftain and the legions were wiped out to a man. This disaster determined Augustus to set the river Rhine as one of the limits of the Empire, others being the rivers Danube and Euphrates.

Augustus died on 19th August 14 AD, at the age of 75. The month had already (in 8 BC) been renamed in his honour (it was previously Sextilis as the sixth month of the old, ten-month calendar). Tiberius was ready to step into his shoes as Rome’s second Emperor.

© John Welford

Horace, a celebrated Roman poet

On 8^th December 65 BC the famous Latin poet Horace was born in southern Italy. Quintus Horatius Flaccus was destined to become the poet laureate of Rome under Emperor Augustus, but he was lucky to have lived long enough to get that far, considering his backing of the wrong side in his youth.

He came from humble stock, his father being a freed slave, but he was given an excellent education, including being sent to Athens which was the intellectual hub of the Roman world.

While he was in Athens, Julius Caesar was assassinated in 44 BC and Horace took the side of the republicans who had committed the murder for fear that Caesar would make himself king. Horace fought at the two battles of Philippi in Greece, at which the conspirators were defeated by the forces of Mark Antony and Octavian (who later became Emperor Augustus).

In the second battle, Horace saved himself by running from the field. In later life he was to write the notorious line (the “old lie” as Wilfred Owen was to call it many centuries later), “Dulce et decorum est, pro patria mori” – how sweet and noble it is to die for one’s country. Clearly, he was not thinking such elevated thoughts as he fled from the battle!

Horace returned to Italy where he made a living of sorts from writing poetry. This brought him to the attention of the then poet laureate Virgil, who in turn introduced him to Maecenas, a close associate of Octavian.

Maecenas gave Horace a country house, in which he poured out a huge corpus of poetry, including his famous odes, satires and epodes. He also composed “Ars Poetica”, a treatise on the art of poetry that was to be influential on European poetry right through to modern times.

Horace was introduced to Augustus, whom he had fought against at Philippi, and was elevated to the laureateship when Virgil died. Augustus was clearly prepared to overlook Horace’s former life and accept him for what he was, namely a highly gifted poet.

Horace died at the age of 56, not long after his benefactor Maecenas had done so.

Horace gave the world several phrases that are still used today, notably “carpe diem” (seize the day) and “concordia discors” (harmony in discord).

© John Welford

Marcus Aurelius becomes Emperor of Rome, 161 AD

On 7^th March 161 AD Marcus Aurelius became Emperor of Rome on the death of his predecessor Antoninus Pius.

Marcus Aurelius was the last of the “five good emperors” who ruled the empire during a period of relative stability, and without giving way to greed or paranoia, for 84 years. (The three who preceded Antoninus were Nerva, Trajan and Hadrian).

Antoninus chose his successor wisely and gave him every opportunity to learn what the job entailed. Marcus was therefore able to take over the reins of power smoothly – indeed, Antoninus had already delegated many of them to Marcus before he died.

Marcus Aurelius is known to history as the “philosopher emperor” thanks to the collection of sayings that he left behind him and which are known as his “Meditations”. These were jottings made for his own benefit and many were probably not original to him although he clearly agreed with their general tone and meaning. They summarised the Stoic principles of treating triumph and disaster with equal disdain, and of playing a constructive role in public affairs.

However, the state of the empire did not allow Marcus to spend much time thinking lofty thoughts. He had to campaign long and hard to defend the empire against its enemies, most notably the Parthians who were threatening Rome’s eastern provinces.

When the Roman legions returned from fighting off the Parthian challenge they brought with them a deadly plague infection that swept through the empire and killed possibly as much of 10% of the entire population. Marcus consulted various oracles and prescribed anti-plague measures (mostly concerned with making appropriate sacrifices to various gods) as dictated by those oracles. Plague outbreaks tend to disappear as rapidly as they appear, so Marcus Aurelius was probably lucky to have reaped the credit for saving the empire from a terrible disease.

Although Marcus Aurelius ruled with wisdom and justice, he made a huge mistake by declaring his son Commodus to be his nominated successor and grooming him for the post in the same way that Antoninus Pius had groomed him. When Marcus Aurelius died in 180 the era of the good emperors was well and truly over.

© John Welford

Cicero meets his end, 43 BC

On 7th December 43 BC the orator and politician Cicero died at the hands of his enemies, aged 63. He had been a staunch defender of the old Roman Republic but backed the wrong side in the shenanigans that transformed the republic into an empire, and he paid the ultimate price for so doing.

He came from a wealthy family and was a noted lawyer, famed for his speeches and rhetorical style. He was elected to the Senate and became a consul, during which time he was active in defeating a conspiracy, led by a senator named Catiline, that aimed to overthrow the republic.

Once the ringleaders (with the exception of Catiline himself) had been arrested, Cicero condemned them in the Senate and ordered their immediate execution without trial. This made enemies for Cicero among the conspirators’ powerful friends.

Cicero backed Pompey in the civil war against Julius Caesar for the same reason that he detested the Catiline conspirators, namely that he saw Caesar as an enemy of the republic. Although he took no part in the plot to assassinate Caesar in 44 BC, he spoke in favour of the conspirators and against the new strong men, namely Mark Antony and Octavian (the future Emperor Augustus). He was particularly vehement in his condemnation of Mark Antony, whom he declared to be a criminal, a drunkard and a consorter with prostitutes.

In 43 BC the triumvirate that ruled Rome (Mark Antony, Octavian and Lepidus) drew up a list of undesirables whom they wished to eliminate. The list was headed by the assassins of Caesar but also included Cicero. Any Roman citizen who killed him could be assured of freedom from reprisal.

As Cicero fled from Rome in his litter he was overtaken by a group of soldiers. Knowing that he could not escape, he stuck his head out of the litter and asked a soldier to make a proper job of beheading him, which is what happened. 

© John Welford

The Roman festival of Hilaria

In Ancient Rome 3^rd November was the festival of Hilaria. As the name might suggest, hilarity was encouraged through the playing of practical jokes, thus making Hilaria the precursor of April Fool’s Day (in November!).

The festival owed its origin to Egyptian religion. The Romans, as they advanced their sphere of influence across the Mediterranean region, typically absorbed the cultures of the societies they incorporated in what would become the Roman Empire. Roman religion is largely based on that of the Greek world, but myths and legends from the even older civilization of Egypt also found a place in the Roman scheme of things.

The legend in question was that of Isis, Osiris and Seth, which blended fantasy and horror with a dose of incest for good measure. The somewhat savage prank played during the tale involved Seth tricking his brother Osiris into climbing into a chest, then throwing the locked chest into the sea, thus drowning him. He later recovered the body and cut it in into fourteen pieces which he scattered all over Egypt.

It’s hardly a laugh-a-minute story, but it was a good enough excuse for the Romans to enjoy themselves by playing practical jokes on each other, although it is to be hoped with much less fatal consequences.

Morally, it might be said, there’s not much difference between the Roman custom and that of the British who, two days after Hilaria, celebrate the hanging, drawing and quartering of 17^th century would-be assassin Guy Fawkes by lighting fireworks (lots of oohs and aahs) and baking potatoes in the embers of bonfires on which they have just burned effigies of the unfortunate Guy.

© John Welford