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Res Gestae Divi Augusti

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Res Gestae Divi Augusti
The Monumentum Ancyranum was inscribed on the walls of the Augusteum in Ankara, Turkey. It is the most complete copy of the Res Gestae.
General Information
DynastyJulio-Claudians
ScriptLatin and Greek majuscule
LanguageClassical Latin and Ancient Greek
ConditionExtant
CultureAncient Rome
Discovery
Place foundVarious
Current locationRoman Empire
Contents of the Inscription
AuthorAugustus
Location and Status

Res Gestae Divi Augusti (Eng. The Deeds of the Divine Augustus) is a monumental inscription composed by the first Roman emperor, Augustus, giving a first-person record of his life and accomplishments.[1] The Res Gestae is especially significant because it gives an insight into the image Augustus presented to the Roman people. Various portions of the Res Gestae have been found in modern Turkey. The inscription itself is a monument to the establishment of the Julio-Claudian dynasty that was to follow Augustus.[2]

Structure

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The text consists of a short introduction, 35 body paragraphs and a posthumous addendum. The paragraphs are conventionally grouped into four sections:[3] political career, public benefactions, military accomplishments and a political statement.

The first section (paragraphs 2–14) is concerned with Augustus' political career; it records the offices and political honours that he held. Augustus also lists numerous offices he refused to take and privileges he refused to be awarded. The second section (paragraphs 15–24) lists Augustus' donations of money, land and grain to the citizens of Italy and his soldiers, as well as the public works and gladiatorial spectacles that he commissioned. The text is careful to point out that all this was paid for out of Augustus' own funds. The third section (paragraphs 25–33) describes his military deeds and how he established alliances with other nations during his reign. Finally the fourth section (paragraphs 34–35) consists of a statement of the Romans' approval for the reign and deeds of Augustus. The appendix is written in the third person rather than first person used in the previous sections, and is likely not by Augustus himself, but written for the benefit of provincial readers of the text.[4] It summarizes the entire text, lists various buildings that he renovated or constructed and states that Augustus spent 600 million silver denarii (24 million gold aurei) from his own funds during his reign on public projects. Ancient currencies cannot be reliably converted into modern equivalents, but it is clearly more than anyone else in the empire could afford. Augustus consolidated his hold on power by reversing the prior tax policy beginning with funding the aerarium militare with 170 million sesterces of his own money. In order to depcit himself as the most generous of all the Romans.[5][6]

  • Drawing of the Res Gestae Divi Augusti
    Drawing of the Res Gestae Divi Augusti

History

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The text was completed just one month before Augustus' death (19 August AD 14), although most of its content was written years earlier and likely went through many revisions.[7] Augustus left the text with his will, which instructed the Senate to set up the inscriptions. The original, which has not survived, was engraved upon a pair of bronze pillars and placed in front of Augustus' mausoleum, alongside further inscriptions that described the achievements of other members of his family.[8] Many copies of the text were made and carved in stone on monuments or temples throughout the Roman Empire, some of which have survived; most notably, almost a full copy, written in the original Latin and a Greek translation was preserved on a temple to Augustus in Ancyra (the Monumentum Ancyranum of Ankara, Turkey); while others have been found at Apollonia (in Greek) and Antioch (in Latin), both in Pisidia.[9] The Greek versions of the text found at these sites are not word for word translations of the corresponding Latin text, as they contain several errors and contain phrases more comprehensible to their provincial audience than the original Latin.[10]

Content

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The text is not a full account of the years between 44 BC, the assassination of Augustus' adoptive father Julius Caesar, and AD 14, the year in which he died. Instead, it is a personal account of the first Emperor's life and those achievements that he decided to be worth remembering by the Roman people.[11] It is an independent self-depiction that is written in a literary form which is unique to the ancient world, and it must be read as such.[12] This period of history is seen from Augustus' perspective and the author presents facts that relate only to himself. Augustus' enemies are never mentioned by name.[13] Caesar's murderers Brutus and Cassius are called simply "those who killed my father". Mark Antony and Sextus Pompey, Augustus' opponents in the East, remain equally anonymous; the former is "he with whom I fought the war," while the latter is merely a "pirate". One writer, Werner Eck, says that it cannot be stated that Augustus made any false statements.[12] Any comprehensive understanding of this period of Roman history should be supplemented by statements from other ancient sources, archaeology, and inscriptions.

The introduction and first two pararagraphs of the inscription found at the Monumentum Ancyranum of Ankara read as such:

...Below is a copy of the acts of the Deified Augustus by which he placed the whole world under the sovereignty of the Roman people, and of the amounts which he expended upon the state and the Roman people, as engraved upon two bronze columns which have been set up in Rome.

At the age of nineteen, on my own initiative and at my own expense, I raised an army by means of which I restored liberty to the republic, which had been oppressed by the tyranny of a faction. For which service the senate, with complimentary resolutions, enrolled me in its order, in the consulship of Gaius Pansa and Aulus Hirtius, giving me at the same time consular precedence in voting; it also gave me the imperium. As propraetor it ordered me, along with the consuls, "to see that the republic suffered no harm." In the same year, moreover, as both consuls had fallen in war, the people elected me consul and a triumvir for settling the constitution.

Those who slew my father I drove into exile, punishing their deed by due process of law and afterwards when they waged war upon the republic I twice defeated them in battle.[14]

The style of the work is varied across the different texts, in different languages. In Latin inscriptions the text focuses on the imperial strength of Rome and its role as a global empire, to which Augustus is credited as being the key reason for. However, in contrast the Greek version instead chooses to gloss over such remarks and re-phrases the tributes and conquest of the provinces as less harsh or even removing such as parts, even the beginning of the Greek text omits lines about Romans conquest. Various other instances emerge such as how Greeks often simplify Roman ideas or customs for Greek readers.[8]

Reception

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The first European translations of the Res Gestae came possibly from an Ambassador from the Holy Roman Empire to the Ottoman Sultan, though at first only parts could be read as the rest remained behind homes built by locals against the temple walls. However, by the 20th century most of these had been removed and the new government under Atatürk which was used to highlight the culture and history of his new state.[8]

However, by the 1920s the Fascist movement in Italy had co-opted the Res Gestae and other symbols of Roman imperialism to help justify their conquest and to inspire other Italians to fight for the fatherland. The Res Gestae then in 1937 for the two thousand year anniversary of the birth of Augustus, Mussolini used the ancient text in order to add legitimacy to his political and when Hitler visited it he adored the work too.[8]

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Res Gestae Divi Augusti in the Temple of Augustus and Rome
  • Illustration of the 1st part of the latin Res Gestae in the on the north wall of the pronaos of the Augusteum
    Illustration of the 1st part of the latin Res Gestae in the on the north wall of the pronaos of the Augusteum
  • 2nd part of the Res Gestae in the Monumentum Ancyranum on the south wall
    2nd part of the Res Gestae in the Monumentum Ancyranum on the south wall
  • Interior view of the south wall of the pronaos
    Interior view of the south wall of the pronaos
  • Photograph of the north wall interior
    Photograph of the north wall interior
  • Photograph of the south wall interior
    Photograph of the south wall interior
  • Front view of the cella (looking NE). The latin Res Gestae is on the interior of the pronaos walls and the greek translation is on the outside of the south wall.
    Front view of the cella (looking NE). The latin Res Gestae is on the interior of the pronaos walls and the greek translation is on the outside of the south wall.

See also

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References

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  1. ^ Augustus (14 May 2009). Res Gestae Divi Augusti. Cambridge University Press. ISBN 978-0-521-84152-8.
  2. ^ Keppie, Lawrence (1991). Understanding Roman Inscriptions. Routledge. p. 131. ISBN 978-1-134-74617-0.
  3. ^ However, there are other possible groupings; see discussion in Scheid, "Introduction", XXXVI–XLIII.
  4. ^ E. Cooley, Alison (2009). Res Gestae Divi Augusti Text, Translation, and Commentary. Cambridge University Press. p. 19. ISBN 978-0-521-60128-3.
  5. ^ Aug. RG 17.2
  6. ^ de Ste Croix, G.E.M. (1981). The Class Struggle in the Ancient Greek World: From the Archaic Age to the Arab Conquests. Cornell University Press. p. 362. ISBN 978-0-8014-1442-8.
  7. ^ Richardson, J. S. (2012). Augustan Rome 44 BC to AD 14. Edinburgh University Press. pp. 197–198. ISBN 978-0-7486-5533-5.
  8. ^ a b c d E. Cooley, Alison (2009). Res Gestae Divi Augusti Text, Translation, and Commentary. Cambridge University Press. p. 6. ISBN 978-0-521-60128-3.
  9. ^ Eck, W. (2007) The age of Augustus. 2nd edn. Oxford: Blackwell, p. 169 ISBN 978-1-4051-5149-8
  10. ^ E. Cooley, Alison (2009). Res Gestae Divi Augusti Text, Translation, and Commentary. Cambridge University Press. pp. 26, 29. ISBN 978-0-521-60128-3.
  11. ^ Eck, 2006 131
  12. ^ a b Eck, 2006 133
  13. ^ Eck, 2006 171
  14. ^ "AUGUSTUS, Res Gestae". Retrieved 12 February 2022.

Further reading

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  • Barini, Concetta (1937), (in Ancient Greek and Latin) Res Gestae Divi Augusti ex Monumentis Ancyrano, Antiocheno, Apolloniensi, Rome.
  • Cooley, Alison (2009), (in English) Res Gestae divi Augusti: Text, Translation and Commentary, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2009. ISBN 978-0-521-84152-8
  • Gagé, Jean (1935), Res gestae divi Augusti ex monumentis Ancyrano et Antiocheno latinis, Paris.
  • Mommsen, Theodor (1865). Res gestae Divi Augusti ex monumentis Ancyrano et Apolloniensi. Berolini: Weidmannos, 1865.
  • Scheid. John (2007). (in French) Res Gestae Divi Augusti: hauts faits du divin Auguste. Paris: Belles Lettres, 2007. ISBN 978-2-251-01446-3
  • Volkmann, Hans (1942), Res gestae Divi Augusti Das Monumentum Ancyranum, Leipzig.
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