Paper Summary:

This paper opens with the line: "Politics is as much a game of appearances as it is a story of realities." This is essentially the central thesis the writer works with to understand the two competing perspectives of Augustus' reign. These perspectives are "Res Gestae Divi Augusti" by Augustus and "Annals" by Tacitus. It ventures on to show how these competing notions are a metaphor for the competitive voice of truth.

From the Paper:

"Nevertheless, Tacitus in his Annals is quick to see other motives behind all of this apparent public spiritedness. Tacitus frequently speaks of plans by Augustus that go awry. He relates how Augustus attempted to secure the succession in his own family and was thwarted by the deaths of his heirs. He also viciously attacks Livia as an emblem of almost pure evil, weaving intricate plots that threaten to undermine both her husband and the good of the state. Tacitus uses the outcome of these machinations as a way of showing that true goodness cannot be suppressed. As Goodyear notes in the Annals, Tacitus employs unusually strong and vicious language in his condemnation of Livia's removal of Agrippa Postumus, a move that results in Germanicus becoming heir. At the same time Tacitus reveals his own partiality to Germanicus, an individual whom he clearly considers capable of restoring the "the real" Rome. 1 Propriety and loyalty to tradition are regular themes in Res Gestae Divi Augusti. Augustus recites the list of temples he has restored or founded. He thrusts aside the idea that he wishes to be worshipped by telling the story of how he took all the silver statutes that had been set up to him and had them sold and substituted for golden offerings to the gods - offerings that he re-dedicated on behalf of both the original donors and also himself. 2 Augustus means for these actions to be a sign that he is restoring the timeless values of the republic under which all citizens played a role in government and all worked for the general good. Tacitus presents Augustus' deeds as empty gestures, purposeful re-workings of the past to serve the needs of the present. Augustus takes the customs of former times and redefines them so that they no longer have the meaning they once held: "Tacitus portrays a new state from which the old values are absent and in which the vocabulary of the republic is perverted to a new use. How then can his reinstatement of republican values have any meaning?" 3 In the opinion of Tacitus, Augustus is actually using the past to create an entirely different sort of Rome. The past is familiar to the people, by using its forms and terminology, Augustus can make novel ideas seem acceptable. In particular, he can make acts of tyranny seem like necessary things, actions that conform with long established practice."

Sample of Sources Used:

• Achievements of the Divine Augustus. Trans. Brunt, P.A. & Moore, J.M. London: 1967.
• Goodyear, F.R.D. The Annals of Tacitus. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1972.
• Haynes, Holly. The History of Make-Believe: Tacitus on Imperial Rome. Berkeley, CA: University of California Press, 2003.
• O'Gorman, Ellen. Irony and Misreading in the Annals of Tacitus. Cambridge, England: Cambridge University Press, 2000.

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