The Augustus bimillennium has come
2014 is the year of Octavian Augustus. He died the 18th of August 14 A.D. in Nola, on his way back to Rome from the island of Capri. The most gifted, successfull and talented political man of human history passed away. A ruler of immense talent and with a revolutionary vision: the Empire. It is the end of his life but also the rising of a new era.
His official last words were, “I found Rome a city of clay but left it a city of marble”. According to his wife Livia and his adopted son Tiberius, however, his last words were others, “Have I played the part well? Then applaud as I exit.” Maybe both are true, nobody will ever know... Augustus’ body was brought back to Rome in state and, on the day of the funeral, all businesses in Rome closed out of respect for the emperor. The emperor’s body was cremated and his ashes interred in his mausoleum, now known as the Augusteo.
Modern Rome will remember him with an unique exposition:
AUGUSTUS - 18 October
2013 - 9 February 2014
exhibition
devised by Eugenio La Rocca
curated by Eugenio La
Rocca, Claudio Parisi Presicce, Annalisa Lo Monaco, Cécile Giroire e Daniel
Roger
The exhibition is
organized by Azienda Speciale Palaexpo - Scuderie del Quirinale in association
with the Musei Capitolini, Rome, and the Réunion des musées nationaux - Grand
Palais and Musée du Louvre, Paris.
The
exhibition at the Scuderie del Quirinale to mark the 2,000th anniversary of
Augustus's death tells the parallel stories of his dazzling career and of the
birth of a new era. The adopted son and
great-nephew of Julius Caesar, Augustus was a man endowed both with exceptional
charisma and with extraordinary political intuition. Where even Julius Caesar had failed, he
succeeded in putting an end to the decades of internecine strife that had
brought the Roman Republic to its knees, and in inaugurating a new political
era: the Empire.
His reign,
which lasted over forty years, was to be the longest in the city's entire
history. Under Augustus the Empire
achieved its greatest expansion, spreading to cover the whole of the
Mediterranean basin, from Spain to Turkey and from the Maghreb to Greece, and
Germany. The details of his life and
dazzling career are known to us both from the emperor himself and from
historians as Velleius Paterculus, Suetonius, Tacitus and Cassius Dio. In fact there are very few other Roman
emperors for whose life we have such a large number of written sources.
This allows
us to reconstruct the stages of a political career in the course of which
Augustus held all of the most important public offices, and at the same time to
track the disastrous series of deaths in his family that robbed him, in the
space of a few decades, both of Agrippa, his son-in-law and deputy, and of the
heirs designated to succeed him: his
nephew Marcellus, the son of his sister Octavia, and Gaius and Lucius Caesar,
the sons of Julia and Agrippa.
Thus on his
death the Empire passed into the hands of Tiberius, the son of his third and
much-loved wife Livia. The end of civil
strife was skilfully marketed as an era of peace, prosperity and abundance. It was then that such crucial concepts as
pax, pietas and concordia began to circulate, sung by poets of the calibre of
Virgil, Horace and the entire coterie of intellectuals gathered around
Maecenas.
The
exhibition at the Scuderie del Quirinale will be using a selection of works of
art of the highest artistic quality including statues, portraits, household
objects in bronze, silver and glass, golden jewellery and precious stones, to
offer visitors the chance to explore the emperor's life and career, which
coincided with the birth a new artistic culture and language that continues
even today to lie at the very root of Western civilisation.
18 October 2013 - 9 February 2014exhibition devised by Eugenio La Roccacurated by Eugenio La Rocca, Claudio Parisi Presicce, Annalisa Lo Monaco, Cécile Giroire e Daniel RogerThe
exhibition is organized by Azienda Speciale Palaexpo - Scuderie del
Quirinale in association with the Musei Capitolini, Rome, and the
Réunion des musées nationaux - Grand Palais and Musée du Louvre, Paris
The exhibition at the Scuderie del
Quirinale to mark the 2,000th anniversary of Augustus's death tells the
parallel stories of his dazzling career and of the birth of a new era.
The adopted son and great-nephew of Julius Caesar, Augustus was
a man endowed both with exceptional charisma and with extraordinary
political intuition. Where even Julius Caesar had failed, he succeeded
in putting an end to the decades of internecine strife that had brought
the Roman Republic to its knees, and in inaugurating a new political era: the Empire.
His reign, which lasted over forty
years, was to be the longest in the city's entire history. Under
Augustus the Empire achieved its greatest expansion, spreading to cover
the whole of the Mediterranean basin, from Spain to Turkey and from the
Maghreb to Greece, and Germany. The details of his life and dazzling
career are known to us both from the emperor himself and from historians
as Velleius Paterculus, Suetonius, Tacitus and Cassius Dio. In fact
there are very few other Roman emperors for whose life we have such a
large number of written sources.
This allows us to reconstruct the stages
of a political career in the course of which Augustus held all of the
most important public offices, and at the same time to track the
disastrous series of deaths in his family that robbed him, in the space
of a few decades, both of Agrippa, his son-in-law and deputy, and of the
heirs designated to succeed him: his nephew Marcellus, the son of his
sister Octavia, and Gaius and Lucius Caesar, the sons of Julia and
Agrippa.
Thus on his death the Empire passed into
the hands of Tiberius, the son of his third and much-loved wife Livia.
The end of civil strife was skilfully marketed as an era of peace, prosperity and abundance. It was then that such crucial concepts as pax, pietas and concordia
began to circulate, sung by poets of the calibre of Virgil, Horace and
the entire coterie of intellectuals gathered around Maecenas.
The exhibition at the Scuderie del Quirinale will be using a selection of works of art of the highest artistic quality
including statues, portraits, household objects in bronze, silver and
glass, golden jewellery and precious stones, to offer visitors the
chance to explore the emperor's life and career, which coincided with
the birth a new artistic culture and language that continues even today
to lie at the very root of Western civilisation.
18 October 2013 - 9 February 2014exhibition devised by Eugenio La Roccacurated by Eugenio La Rocca, Claudio Parisi Presicce, Annalisa Lo Monaco, Cécile Giroire e Daniel RogerThe
exhibition is organized by Azienda Speciale Palaexpo - Scuderie del
Quirinale in association with the Musei Capitolini, Rome, and the
Réunion des musées nationaux - Grand Palais and Musée du Louvre, Paris
The exhibition at the Scuderie del
Quirinale to mark the 2,000th anniversary of Augustus's death tells the
parallel stories of his dazzling career and of the birth of a new era.
The adopted son and great-nephew of Julius Caesar, Augustus was
a man endowed both with exceptional charisma and with extraordinary
political intuition. Where even Julius Caesar had failed, he succeeded
in putting an end to the decades of internecine strife that had brought
the Roman Republic to its knees, and in inaugurating a new political era: the Empire.
His reign, which lasted over forty
years, was to be the longest in the city's entire history. Under
Augustus the Empire achieved its greatest expansion, spreading to cover
the whole of the Mediterranean basin, from Spain to Turkey and from the
Maghreb to Greece, and Germany. The details of his life and dazzling
career are known to us both from the emperor himself and from historians
as Velleius Paterculus, Suetonius, Tacitus and Cassius Dio. In fact
there are very few other Roman emperors for whose life we have such a
large number of written sources.
This allows us to reconstruct the stages
of a political career in the course of which Augustus held all of the
most important public offices, and at the same time to track the
disastrous series of deaths in his family that robbed him, in the space
of a few decades, both of Agrippa, his son-in-law and deputy, and of the
heirs designated to succeed him: his nephew Marcellus, the son of his
sister Octavia, and Gaius and Lucius Caesar, the sons of Julia and
Agrippa.
Thus on his death the Empire passed into
the hands of Tiberius, the son of his third and much-loved wife Livia.
The end of civil strife was skilfully marketed as an era of peace, prosperity and abundance. It was then that such crucial concepts as pax, pietas and concordia
began to circulate, sung by poets of the calibre of Virgil, Horace and
the entire coterie of intellectuals gathered around Maecenas.
The exhibition at the Scuderie del Quirinale will be using a selection of works of art of the highest artistic quality
including statues, portraits, household objects in bronze, silver and
glass, golden jewellery and precious stones, to offer visitors the
chance to explore the emperor's life and career, which coincided with
the birth a new artistic culture and language that continues even today
to lie at the very root of Western civilisation.
18 October 2013 - 9 February 2014exhibition devised by Eugenio La Roccacurated by Eugenio La Rocca, Claudio Parisi Presicce, Annalisa Lo Monaco, Cécile Giroire e Daniel RogerThe
exhibition is organized by Azienda Speciale Palaexpo - Scuderie del
Quirinale in association with the Musei Capitolini, Rome, and the
Réunion des musées nationaux - Grand Palais and Musée du Louvre, Paris
The exhibition at the Scuderie del
Quirinale to mark the 2,000th anniversary of Augustus's death tells the
parallel stories of his dazzling career and of the birth of a new era.
The adopted son and great-nephew of Julius Caesar, Augustus was
a man endowed both with exceptional charisma and with extraordinary
political intuition. Where even Julius Caesar had failed, he succeeded
in putting an end to the decades of internecine strife that had brought
the Roman Republic to its knees, and in inaugurating a new political era: the Empire.
His reign, which lasted over forty
years, was to be the longest in the city's entire history. Under
Augustus the Empire achieved its greatest expansion, spreading to cover
the whole of the Mediterranean basin, from Spain to Turkey and from the
Maghreb to Greece, and Germany. The details of his life and dazzling
career are known to us both from the emperor himself and from historians
as Velleius Paterculus, Suetonius, Tacitus and Cassius Dio. In fact
there are very few other Roman emperors for whose life we have such a
large number of written sources.
This allows us to reconstruct the stages
of a political career in the course of which Augustus held all of the
most important public offices, and at the same time to track the
disastrous series of deaths in his family that robbed him, in the space
of a few decades, both of Agrippa, his son-in-law and deputy, and of the
heirs designated to succeed him: his nephew Marcellus, the son of his
sister Octavia, and Gaius and Lucius Caesar, the sons of Julia and
Agrippa.
Thus on his death the Empire passed into
the hands of Tiberius, the son of his third and much-loved wife Livia.
The end of civil strife was skilfully marketed as an era of peace, prosperity and abundance. It was then that such crucial concepts as pax, pietas and concordia
began to circulate, sung by poets of the calibre of Virgil, Horace and
the entire coterie of intellectuals gathered around Maecenas.
The exhibition at the Scuderie del Quirinale will be using a selection of works of art of the highest artistic quality
including statues, portraits, household objects in bronze, silver and
glass, golden jewellery and precious stones, to offer visitors the
chance to explore the emperor's life and career, which coincided with
the birth a new artistic culture and language that continues even today
to lie at the very root of Western civilisation.
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