It was part of Augustus’ policy to seem to keep wholly within the lines
of the constitution. Hence his refusal to accept any extraordinary
office. Yet his tribunitial power was new and extraordinary. Tacitus’
comment is caustic, _Ann._, III, 56: “That specious title (the
tribunitial power) importing nothing less than sovereign power, was
invented by Augustus at a time when the name of king or dictator
was not only unconstitutional but universally detested. And yet a
new name was wanted to overtop the magistrates and the forms of the
constitution.”
[37] Dio, LIV, 16, names three laws promulgated by Augustus in 736: one
took cognizance of bribery by candidates for office; a second dealt
with extravagance; and a third was for the encouragement of matrimony.
[38] ᵃ in 736 Agrippa was associated with Augustus for five years. Cf.
Dio, LIV, 12; Vell. II, 90; Tac. _Ann._ III, 56.
ᵇ in 741 Agrippa again for five years. Cf. Dio, LIV, 12, 28.
ᶜ in 748 Tiberius for five years. Cf. Dio, LV, 9; Vell. II, 99; Suet.
_Tib._ 9, 10, 11.
ᵈ in 757 Tiberius for ten years. Cf. Dio, LV, 13; Vell. II, 103; Tac.
_Ann._, I, 3, 10.
ᵉ in 766 Tiberius for an indefinite time. Cf.
Dio, LVI, 28.
[39] Suet. _Aug._ 27: “He administered the triumvirate for
organizing the commonwealth through ten years.” Cf. C. I. L. I, p. 461
and p. 466. The first triumvirate lasted from Nov. 27, 711, to Dec. 31,
716; the second from Jan. 1, 717, to Dec. 31, 721. But cf. c. 34, N. 1.
[40] Cf. Dio, LIII, 1. This title had been conferred upon the senior
senator who had served as censor. Its only privilege was the right
of speaking first in debate. The honor had fallen into abeyance with
the death of Catulus in 694. It is readily seen how the revival of
such a title and of the right to express his views before any other
senator, gave Augustus a quasi-constitutional initiative in the senate.
Gradually the title dropped its second part, and “prince” began to have
something of its modern significance. Cf. Tacitus, _Ann._ III, 53,
for Tiberius’ view of its meaning.
Augustus’ notation of time here, “through forty years,” is similar to
the “thirty-seventh year of the tribunitial power” in Chap. IV, or “the
seventy-sixth year” of Chap. 36.
[41] He was made _pontifex_ in 706 by Julius Cæsar. Cf. Cic.
_Phil._ V, 17, 46; Vell. II, 59. For his taking the office of
_pontifex maximus_ cf. c. 10, N. 3.
[42] The date of Augustus’ assumption of the augurate is discussed by
Drumann, IV, 250. Coins are the chief witnesses, and their testimony is
confused. The date probably was 713 or 714.
[43] A coin of Augustus (Cohen, _Jul._ 60; _Aug._ 88) has
_imp. Cæsar divi f. III vir iter. r. p. c. cos. iter. et tert
desig._, which fixes the time as between 717 and 720; it has also
the tripod, the symbol of the quindecemvirate.
[44] We can say only that Augustus received this dignity before
738; for there is a coin of that year showing the _simpulum_,
the _lituus_ and the tripod, the symbols respectively of the
three foregoing offices, and the _patera_, or bowl, that of the
septemviral office. The four colleges thus associated are the chief
ones. Cf. Chap. 9.
[45] The name of Augustus is twice found in the _Acta Fratrum
Arvalium_, once in May, 767, in recording a vote, and in Dec., 767,
in the record of the nomination of his successor.
[46] Tacitus says the Titian Sodality was instituted by Titus Tatius
for keeping up the Sabine ritual. Cf. _Ann._ I, 54. The record
here is all that is known of Augustus’ connection with it.
[47] The fetials had charge of the formalities in declaring war and
peace. Dio L, 4, says that Augustus went through the old-fashioned
ceremonies in declaring war against Cleopatra.
These three colleges had fallen into abeyance in the time of Cicero.
Augustus undoubtedly revived them. Cf. Suet. _Aug._ 31. Such
restoration, and religious conservatism in general, as even in the case
of Domitian, marks the policy of the emperors for two hundred years,
and was one of their favorite methods of posing simply as restorers of
the good old times.
[48] In 725. The Saenian law, passed by the people in 724, authorized
this proceeding, and the senate’s decree followed. Hence the order,
“people and senate.” Cf. Tac. _Ann._ XI, 25; Dio, LII, 42. An
earlier creation of patricians is assigned by Dio to the year 721.
But he is probably mistaken, as Tacitus, in the passage just noted,
says that Claudius was obliged to create more patricians, “because the
number had declined even after being recruited by the dictator Cæsar
under the Cassian law, and by Augustus the _princeps_ under the
Saenian law.” Such a creation was not a right of the principate. Cæsar
and Augustus did it by special authorization of people and senate.
Claudius did it in virtue of his censorship, and this status continued
till Domitian absorbed the censorship in the principate, and assumed
the right as a permanent one.
[49] During most of the republican history the senate numbered,
ideally, three hundred. In Cicero’s time it had over four hundred
members. Julius Cæsar raised it to about nine hundred. Suet.
_Aug._, 35, says: “By two separate scrutinies he (Augustus)
reduced to their former number and splendor the senate, which had been
swamped by a disorderly crowd; for they were now more than a thousand,
and some of them very mean persons, who, after Cæsar’s death, had been
chosen by dint of interest and bribery, so that they had the name of
Orcini among the people.” They were also called Charonites, because
they owed their elevation to the last will of Cæsar, who had gone into
Orcus to Charon. Dio, XL, 48, 63, tells of freedmen in the senate and,
XLIII, 22, of a private soldier; Gell., XV, 4, of a muleteer, cf.
Juvenal, _Sat._ VII, 199.
Dio, LII, 42, cf. LIII, 1, tells of the first scrutiny, in 725-6. A
hint from Augustus was enough to cause the withdrawal first of sixty,
then of one hundred and forty senators. He also tells, LIV, 13, 14,
of a further revision in 736, by which the number was brought down to
six hundred. He assigns a third sifting to 743 (LIV, 35), and a fourth
to 757 (LV, 13). Mommsen, however, is inclined to connect the three
revisions of Augustus with the censuses of 726, 746 and 767, and to
regard those of 736 and 757 as extraordinary, and therefore not named
by Augustus, in his desire to appear entirely within constitutional
lines. Cf. Mommsen, _R. G._, p. 35.
[50] Suetonius evidently depends on this inscription when he says,
_Aug._ 27: “Three times he took the census of the Roman people,
the first and third times with a colleague, the second time alone.”
This first census was in 725-6. Cf. Dio, LII, 42; LIII, 1; C. I. L.
IX, 422, _imp. Cæsar VI, M. Agrippa II cos.; idem censoria potestate
lustrum fecerunt_.
The lustrum was strictly the expiatory offering made at the close
of the census. The census had not been taken for forty-one years.
The number of Roman citizens of military age in 684 had been given
as but 450,000. This census of 726 reported 4,063,000. Probably the
vast apparent increase rose from the fact of the earlier enumeration
counting only such as presented themselves before the censors in the
city, while at the later time the citizens throughout the empire were
counted. Clinton, _Fasti Hellenici_, III, 461, estimates a total
free citizenship of more than 17,000,000. The total population of the
empire at this time, including citizens, allies, slaves and freedmen,
has been estimated at 85,000,000. Cf. Merivale, _Rom._ cc. XXX,
XXXIX.
The Greek of the inscription here reads erroneously 4,603,000.
[51] In 746. The result, 4,233,000, shows a gain of 170,000.
[52] In 767. Just before the death of Augustus. Result, 4,937,000; gain
since 746, 704,000.
[53] Suetonius, _Aug._ 34, relates his endeavors to compel
matrimony. In Chap. 89, Suetonius writes: “In reading Greek or Latin
authors he paid particular attention to precepts and examples which
might be useful in public or private life. These he used to extract
verbatim, and give to his domestics, or send to the commanders of the
armies, the governors of the provinces, or the magistrates of the city,
when any of them seemed to stand in need of admonition. He likewise
read whole books to the senate, and frequently made them known to the
people by his edicts; such as the orations of Quintus Metellus ‘For
the Encouragement of Marriage,’ and those of Rutilius ‘On the Style
of Building;’ to show the people that he was not the first who had
promoted those objects, but that the ancients likewise had thought them
worthy of their attention.” Cf. Livy, _Ep._ LIX; Gell., I, 6.
[54] These games were first held in 726, and every fourth year
thereafter. The expression “every fifth year” counts the year of the
games as the fifth of the old series and also the first of the new.
The consuls, or rather the consul Agrippa, Augustus not holding games
in his own honor, celebrated the games of 726, the pontifices those of
730, the augurs those of 734, the quindecemvirs those of 738, and the
septemvirs those of 742. Cf. c. 7, N. 6. These games are mentioned by
Dio, LIII, 1, 2; LIV, 19; Pliny, _Hist. Nat._ VII, 48, 158; Suet.
_Aug._ 44. They came to a close with the life of Augustus. We do
not hear of them in connection with any subsequent emperor. Vows for
his good health had a special fitness, for according to Suetonius,
_Aug._ LXXXI, he was almost an invalid. “During his whole course
of life he suffered at times dangerous fits of sickness. He was subject
to fits of sickness at stated times every year, for about his birthday
he was commonly indisposed. In the beginning of spring he was attacked
with an inflammation of the midriff; and when the wind was southerly,
with a cold in his head. By all these complaints his constitution was
so shattered that he could not readily bear heat or cold.”
[55] Cf. Suet. _Aug._ 59 and 98; Hor. _Carm._ IV, 5, 33; Dio,
LI, 19.
[56] Dio writes of the year 725, LI, 20: “When letters were brought
about Parthian affairs it was decreed that he should be named in the
hymns exactly as were the gods.” Tiridates, a Parthian pretender,
sought the aid of Augustus. Cf. Chap. 32, and Dio, LI, 18. Augustus
balanced Tiridates against Phraates, the legitimate monarch, who sent
an embassy, and gave his son to Rome as a hostage.
[57] In 718, when Lepidus had been overthrown, the tribunitial
power had been given to Octavian, as formerly to Julius, for life.
Inviolability of person was one of the privileges of the tribunate.
Cf. Oros. VI, 18, 34; Dio, XLIX, 15; LI, 18; LIII, 32. These two later
statements relating to the years 724 and 731, Mommsen thinks have to
do, the former with the extension of the tribunitial power beyond the
city, and the latter to the making it annual, as well as perpetual, so
that the years of the principate could be reckoned by it. Cf. Chap.
4, note 31. Cf. also App. _B. C._ V, 132, and for a discussion of
the tribunitial power as an expression of the principate, cf. Mommsen,
_Röm. St._ II, 833, ff.
Wölfflin, cf. textual note, suggests, to fill the gap confessedly left
by Mommsen’s emendation, a reading which would be translated “that my
person should be sacrosanct.”
[58] Augustus here characteristically avoids the name of Lepidus.
The latter “in the confusion and tumult had seized the supreme
pontificate,” cf. Livy, _Ep._ CXVII, “by craft,” cf. Velleius II,
63; “Antony transferred the election of the pontifex maximus from
the people to the priests again, and through them initiated Lepidus,
almost entirely neglecting the customs of the fathers.” Cf. Dio, XLIV,
53. Lepidus dying in 741, cf. Dio, LIV, 27, Augustus entered upon the
office Mar. 6, 742. Cf. C. I. L., I. p. 387. It was unlawful to deprive
a living man of this office, cf. App., _B. C._, V, 131.
[59] October 12, 735. In C. I. L. I. p. 404, is found an inscription
of that date: _Feriae ex senatus consulto, quod eo die imp. Cæsar
Augustus ex transmarinis provincis urbem intravit araq(ue) Fortunae
reduci constituta._ There are also gold and silver coins (Eckhel VI,
100; Cohen, _Aug._ nos. 102-108) with the inscription, _Fortunae
reduci, Cæsari Augusto senatus populusque Romanus_, Dio, LIV, 10,
tells that Augustus after having arranged matters in Sicily, Greece,
Asia and Syria, returned to Rome, and that many honors were decreed
to him, but that he would accept none of them, “but that an altar
should be consecrated to Fortune the Restorer, that the day should be
accounted a feast day, and that it should be called the Augustalia.”
The location near the Porta Capena was chosen, because it was through
that gate Augustus would enter the city, coming by the Appian Way from
Brundisium. The altar was dedicated on Dec. 15, C. I. L. X, 8375. Cf.
Dio, LI, 19; App. _B. C._ II, 106.
[60] Dio, LIV, 10, relates that in this year there were great tumults
in connection with the consular comitia, and no election was possible.
In consequence of this the senate sent messengers to Augustus urging
him to deal with the trouble. Q. Lucretius, one of the delegates, was
named consul by Augustus on the spot where they met. It is Mommsen’s
idea (_R. G._, p. 48) that the story of Dio, and the statement of
Augustus relate to the same event, and that Augustus was not willing
to admit that so late in his reign, such disturbances could be, and
that he therefore conveys the impression that what was really an appeal
for aid was rather an embassy of honor. This Mommsen thinks quite in
keeping with the general character and method of Augustus. Bormann, on
the other hand (_Schr. Nach._, p. 29), sees no conflict in the two
accounts. He believes that Dio narrates truthfully enough an earlier
deputation sent to Augustus, possibly at Athens, some time before
his return, and that Lucretius was named consul there by Augustus.
Then, some time later, the deputation of honor, as recorded in the
inscription, was sent into Campania.
[61] That this annual sacrifice was instituted July 4, 741, appears
from C. I. L., I, 395. _Feriae ex. s. c. quod eo die ara Pacis Augustae
in campo Martio constituta est Nerone et Varo cos._ Cf. Fasti of
Præneste, Jan. 30, C. I. L., I, 313, for day of the actual dedication;
also Ovid, _Fasti_ I, 709; Dio, LIV, 25.
This altar was probably on the Flaminian Way by which Augustus returned
from Gaul.
[62] The exact conditions necessary for the closing of the temple,
viz., “peace won by victories” were first made known in 1882 by this
perfected text of the _Res Gestæ_.
[63] Cf. Livy, I, 19; Varro, V, 165. The temple of Janus (or as the
Romans called it, Janus, without the word temple,) (cf. Latin text and
Livy, l. c., and Horace, Carm, IV, 15, 9,) had been closed first under
Numa and again after the first Punic War.
[64] Augustus first closed it in 725, after Actium. Cf. Livy, l. c.;
Dio, LI, 20; Vell., II, 38; Victor, _De Viris Ill._, LXXIX, 6;
Plut. _De Fort. Rom._, 9; Oros., VI, 20, 8. C. I. L. I, p. 384,
supplies the day, January 11. In 728 it was opened again, on account of
the war with the Cantabri. Cf. Dio, LIII, 26, Plutarch, l. c. A second
time it was closed in 729, cf. Dio, l. c.; Oros., VI, 21, 1. The time
of its next opening cannot be determined; but in all probability it was
reopened that very year, on account of the Arabian campaign. Dio, LIV,
36, records that in 744 the Senate decreed that it should be closed,
but that a Dacian rebellion interfered. But Dio must be mistaken, for
Drusus was then in the midst of his German campaign. But after the
campaigns of Drusus and Tiberius in Germany, closed in 746, up to 753,
when Gaius Cæsar started for Armenia, the temple might well have been
closed. Parts of Dio are lost here, which may have mentioned such
closing. The birth of Jesus Christ, 749, falls in this period of peace.
Cf. Milton’s _Nativity Hymn_. When it was opened for the third
time cannot be said. Tacitus says it was opened when Augustus was an
old man. But it can hardly have remained shut after the opening of the
Armenian war in 753. Augustus was then sixty-two years old. That age
may possibly suit the expression of Tacitus. Horace _Ep._, II, 1,
255, and _Carm._, IV, 15, 9, mentions the closing of the temple.
Suetonius, _Aug._ 22, says: “Janus Quirinus, which had been shut
twice only, from the era of the building of the city to his own time,
he closed thrice in a much shorter period, having established universal
peace both by sea and land.” This is almost a literal transcript of the
_Res Gestæ_.
[65] Gaius and Lucius, the sons of Agrippa and Julia, the daughter of
Augustus, were born, the one in 734 (Dio, LIV, 8), the other in 737
(Dio, LIV, 18) and were adopted by their grandfather immediately after
the birth of the latter. Dio, LIV, 18, says: “Lucius and his brother
Gaius, Augustus at once adopted and made heirs of the empire, without
waiting till they grew to manhood, in order that he might be the more
secure against conspiracies.” The will of Augustus (Suet. _Tib._
23), speaks much as this chapter does of the death of the two Cæsars:
“Since harsh fortune has snatched from me my sons, Gaius and Lucius,
let Tiberius Cæsar be heir to two-thirds of my estate.” Suetonius,
_Aug._ 26, says that Augustus took his twelfth and thirteenth
consulships, for the purpose of introducing these two boys into the
forum.
[66] Dio, LV, 9, under the year 748 writes that these lads were wild
and insolent and that the younger, then eleven years old, actually
proposed to the people to make Gaius consul. Augustus appeared very
angry at this, saying it would be a public calamity for the consulship
to be borne by one of less age than that at which he himself had
assumed it, viz., twenty. Gaius was, however, designated consul in 749,
and Lucius in 752. Cf. Tac. _Ann._ I, 3; a coin of Rome has on
one side: _Cæsar Augustus, divi. f., pater patriæ_; on the other:
_C. L. Cæsares, Augusti f., cos. desig., princ. juvent._ (Eckhel
VI, 171). This must have been struck between Feb. 5, 752, when Augustus
received the title _pater patriæ_, and January 1, 754, when Gaius
entered upon his actual consulship. Cf. C. I. L. III, n. 323, and VI,
900.
Lucius died, Aug. 20, 755, and so did not reach the consulship to which
he had been elected. Gaius died in 757. Cf. Dio, LV, II; C. I. L. I. p.
472.
[67] Cf. Dio, LV, 9; C. I. L. I, p. 286 and 565.
[68] Dio, LV, 12, says: “The bodies of Lucius and Gaius were carried
to Rome by military tribunes, and the chief men of each city; and the
golden (sic) shields and spears, which they had received from the
knights when they assumed the _toga virilis_, were suspended in
the curia.”
The title of _princeps juventutis_ is somewhat difficult to
explain. The fact is attested by Zonaras, X, 35, and by an inscription
found near Viterbo (cf. Mommsen _R. G._, p. 53), which reads:
_C. Cæsari Aug. f.d.n. pontif. cos. design. principi juventut_,
“To Caius Cæsar, son of Augustus, nephew of the divine (Julius)
pontifex, consul designate, prince of the youth.” Mommsen sums up his
investigation of this (Cf. _R. G._ p. 54, ff.): the knights were
divided into _turmæ_, or troops, each officered by _seviri_,
three _decurions_ and three _optios_ or adjutants. Gaius
and Lucius were _decurions_ of the first _turma_, and their
title, “princes of the youth,” was a special one, and always thereafter
reserved for members of the imperial family. The title does not appear
to have been official, or formally bestowed, but was given by common
consent of the knights.
[69] Cf. Suet. _Cæs._ LXXXIII: “He (Cæsar) bequeathed to the Roman
people his gardens near the Tiber, and three hundred sesterces to each
man.” Dio, XLIV, 35, is peculiar, saying: “Cæsar left to the people his
gardens on the Tiber, and to each man one hundred and twenty sesterces,
as Augustus himself says, or as others say, three hundred sesterces
apiece.” May it be that Dio has reversed the facts here, and that it
was “others” who reported the smaller sum and Augustus the larger?
Augustus is substantiated, or followed, by Plut.; _Ant._, XVI,
_Brut._, XX; App. _B. C._, II, 143.
Three hundred sesterces equals about fifteen dollars. The date of
this disbursement is 710: its amount, supposing the minimum number of
receivers, 250,000, comes to $3,750,000.
[70] The second (and the seventh, cf. Note 76) donations belong to the
year 725 and were connected with the triple triumph. Dio mentions the
two together, LI, 21. Four hundred sesterces is about twenty dollars.
[71] The third donation was in 730, on the return of Augustus after
subduing the Cantabri. Dio, LIII, 28, says: “Augustus gave the people
a hundred denarii (four hundred sesterces) apiece, but forbade the
distribution until his act should receive the sanction of the senate.”
It would seem to have been unlawful to give money to the people without
the consent of the senate. Probably this was a measure of precaution
against demagogues.
The term _congiarium_, which is transferred rather than translated,
means a gift, primarily of food or drink, and is derived from
_congius_, a measure holding about three quarts, which was perhaps
originally brought to be filled with grain or oil, or the like.
[72] Cf. c. 5 and Note 33. The date was 731.
[73] The fifth distribution was in 742. We learn from Dio, LIV, 29,
that in that year Agrippa died, leaving to the Roman people his gardens
and bath, and that Augustus, as his executor, not only turned over
these properties, but made a donation besides, as if it had been so
willed by Agrippa. Cf. C. I. L., I. p. 472.
[74] As c. 8 furnishes a basis for estimating the total population of
the empire, so here we have a guide to the number of people in the
city. Merivale, _History of the Romans_, c. XL, gives 700,000 as
the limit; Bunsen, 1,300,000; Gibbon, c. XXXI, 1,200,000.
[75] Sixty denarii is about twelve dollars. This donation of 749, and
the last one mentioned in this chapter, of 752, have been connected
with the introduction in those years of Gaius and Lucius Cæsar, into
the forum. Cf. c. 14. The amounts are the same in the two cases, and
they vary from the sum given at other times.
[76] Up to this point the donations have been enumerated in order of
time. But here, between the largesses to citizens in 749 and 752 is
introduced one given to veterans in 725. Why this break in the order?
Mommsen, _R. G._ p. 2 and 59, thinks that a first draft of this
inscription was prepared about 750. In this draft Augustus first
mentioned all his gifts to the city people; and at the end placed the
one gift to the soldiers. Then, when in 767, the document was brought
down to date, this later gift to the people was placed last, instead
of being interpolated after the civil donation of 749 and before the
military one of 725. But his reasoning has not convinced other scholars.
[77] Cf. Dio, LV, 10.
[78] Augustus omits any mention of his bounty to discharged soldiers.
Cf. Dio, XLVI, 46; XLIX, 14; LV, 6; Appian, V, 129. The total of the
donations in this list is 619,800,000 sesterces = about $30,990,000.
[79] Cf. c. 3; Dio, LI, 3, 4; Suet. _Aug._ 17. The last writer
says that there was a mutiny at Brundisium in a detachment sent there
immediately after Actium, and that they demanded reward and discharge.
Augustus was forced to come from Samos to settle the trouble. This was
in 724. There were 120,000 veterans to be provided for. Cf. c. 15.
600,000,000 sesterces was the compensation for the lands given to these
men, an average of 5000 sesterces ($250) for each holding. But not
all Italian proprietors were reimbursed. The Italians who had favored
Antony were simply dispossessed. To some other Italians were given
lands at Dyracchium and Philippi. His expenditure for land in Italy was
$30,000,000. As to colonies outside of Italy, Dio, LIV, 23, tells of
many settlements in Gallia (Narbonensis) and Iberia in 739. Eusebius
notes colonies at Berytus in Syria, and Patræ in Achaia, as founded in
739. Cf. _Chron._ ad. a. Abr. 2001; C. I. L. III, p. 95.
[80] The dates are 747, 748, 750, 751 and 752. The amount is
$20,000,000. It was in 741 (Dio, LIV, 25) that Augustus determined upon
a gift in money as a substitute for the assignments of land customary
up to that time. Why such payments began only in 747 is a matter of
conjecture; also why they ceased after 752. Probably because the years
742-746 were occupied with the German and Pannonian wars of Tiberius
and Drusus, and either there were no discharges, or else no money to
spare from the expenses of war. Again in 753 troubles began in the East.