Augustus

Also known as: Octavius / Octavius Caesar / deified Augustus / the deified Augustus / young Caesar · Family: Roman Empire · Role: emperor · First appears: Annals I (1)

After the civil wars, Augustus assumed sovereign dominion over the Roman Commonwealth and established its government under the title of Prince, or Chief of the Senate. He raised his sister’s son Claudius Marcellus to the offices of Pontiff and Aedile, preferred Marcus Agrippa to two successive consulships, and relied on Agrippa as a soldier and companion of his victories. He adopted Lucius and Caius, the sons of Agrippa, into the Julian family and Caesar name, adopted Tiberius as his son and imperial colleague, and placed Germanicus over eight legions on the Rhine, compelling Tiberius to adopt him. At the same time, he banished his surviving grandson Agrippa Postumus to Planasia, though he later secretly visited him there with Fabius Maximus as his only companion.

Accounts of his rise describe Augustus levying an army while still a private youth, extorting the consulship, and seizing the armies of Hirtius and Pansa after their deaths. He was accused of betraying Pompey and Lepidus, defeating Brutus and Cassius, and ensnaring Anthony through treaties and the marriage of his sister Octavia. A hostile account also accused him of taking Tiberius Nero’s pregnant wife, while Augustus’s law subjected libels to penalties after the writings of Cassius Severus. He entrusted the government of Rome and Italy during the civil wars to Cilnius Maecenas, appointed Marcus Hortalus a bounty to marry and preserve his family, and enlarged Herod’s kingdom after his victory.

Augustus died at Nola, in the same village, house, and chamber where his father Octavius had died. His will appointed Tiberius and Livia as heirs, adopted Livia into the Julian family as Augusta, and his death was announced at the same moment as Tiberius’s accession. “As soon as the funeral of Augustus was over, a temple and divine worship were forthwith decreed him”; thereafter Tiberius completed and consecrated the temples Augustus had begun, while later accounts continued to describe Augustus as deified and to trace the imperial succession through Marcellus, Agrippa, Tiberius, and the descendants of Augustus.