The Changed Form of Poetry: Dante's Interaction with Ovid in the Divine Comedy Taryn Power McGill

The Changed Form of Poetry: Dante’s Interaction with Ovid in the Divine Comedy.

Taryn Power, McGill

Ovid refuses to be left in Hell, or perhaps Dante refuses to leave him there. He first

enters the Comedy’s stage as Dante enters limbo: he is third of the five great pagan poets who

invite Dante to join their number and whom Dante must abandon to continue his journey. Ovid

is mentioned by name only one more time, and then only for Dante to bid him “ Taccia” as

Dante’s poetics of transformation outmatch his own. However silenced Dante may bid him be,

Ovid’s words find their way into Dante’s verse throughout his climb up Mount Purgatory and

into the earthly Paradise, which appears as a ghostly reflection of Ovid’s Golden Age. At the

outset of the final cantica , as Dante — both as the pilgrim within the story and as the poet who

tells it — prepares to step into Paradise, he performs two metamorphoses, very much in the

Ovidian mode. To express the transhumanization of the pilgrim, Dante uses Ovid’s Glaucus; to

express the apotheosis of the poet, he turns to the tale of Marsyas. These two allusions within

the Paradiso ’ s first canto provide a starting point for examining Dante’s relationship to Ovid as

one which goes beyond mere allusion, but one in which he is actively engaged in competition

and in subversion of the pagan poet’s work. Through his interactions with the Ovidian themes of

metamorphosis, exile, and the nature of poetry, Dante presents his vision for an evolved poetic

tradition, which itself becomes a means of Christian apotheosis.

Dante’s transformation of the theme of changing forms is perfectly exemplified by the

story’s crowning moment of transformation: Dante the pilgrim’s ascent into heaven. After the

Purgatorio , whose theme is essentially “spiritual metamorphoses” and which, fittingly, uses the

Metamorphoses as its “key pagan subtext,” 126 this ultimate transformation is both unsurprisingly

Ovidian and surprisingly subtle. Dante uses the story of Glaucus from the thirteenth book of the

Metamorphoses : a fisherman who “changed, tasting the herb that made / Him a companion of the

other sea gods,” 127 to explain the transformation that he experiences, ascending into heaven after

looking into Beatrice’s eyes. Here, an Ovidian metamorphosis is reinterpreted as a Christian

spiritual ascent — a moment of “passing beyond the human”, as Mandelbaum translates Dante’s

term “ trasumanar. ” 128 Dante himself invents this term for a process which “cannot be worded.” 129

Not only does this use of Ovid’s work recontextualize and Christianize the metamorphosis, it

reinforces an idea Dante has already introduced in the Inferno . There, he boldly complains that he

“do[es] not envy” the pagan master of mutata forma , for Dante, unlike Ovid, can “transmute two

natures, face to face, so that both forms were ready to exchange their matter.” 130 Though the

allusion to “two natures” might seem to be an assertion of a strictly Christian understanding

through allusion to the doctrine of Hypostatic union, this passage, as Hawkins points out, is

followed by one which is entirely “descriptive (that is, Ovidian)” in its treatment of a multitude

of gruesome transformations. 131 It is a poetic challenge to Ovid, but, as the poem is still trapped

in Hell, it only goes so far as to prove Dante’s ability to compete within Ovid’s poetic tradition;

the Paradiso ’ s metamorphosis, though lacking the direct claim of superiority, is much more bold in

its implication. Here, Dante challenges Ovid and the pagan poetic tradition he represents. He

creates a new form of — and even a new term for — transformation, which Ovid could never

126 Maristella Lorch and Lavinia Lorch, “Metaphor and Metamorphosis: Purgatorio 27 and Metamorphoses 4, ” in Dante and Ovid: Essays in Intertextuality, ed. Madison U. Sowell (New York: Medieval and Renaissance Texts and Studies, 1991), 100. 127 Dante Alighieri, The Divine Comedy: Paradiso, I:68-9, trans. Allen Mandelbaum, (New York: Columbia University Libraries). All passages from Dante are taken from this version, unless otherwise stated. 128 Paradiso, I:70. 129 Paradiso, I:70-1. 130 Inferno, XXV:100-2. 131 Peter S. Hawkins, “The Metamorphosis of Ovid, ” in Dante and Ovid: Essays in Intertextuality, ed. Madison U. Sowell (New York: Medieval and Renaissance Texts and Studies, 1991,) 22.

achieve. This concept of spiritual ascent is a foreign concept to pagan poetry, as it cannot truly

be understood “until grace grant you the experience.” 132 Dante uses Ovid’s narrative as a sort of

earthly example of a higher form of metamorphosis that neither he nor the other pagan poets of

limbo could hope to describe.

While the story of Glaucus portrays Dante the pilgrim’s transformation, an earlier

Ovidian allusion presents a transformation of the poet himself. In the middle of his invocation

of Apollo at the beginning of the canto, Dante recalls the story of Marsyas:

Enter into my breast; within me breathe the very power you made manifest when you drew [ traesti ] Marsyas out from his limbs’ sheath. 133 If the reader is familiar with this myth, its presence within the Paradiso must strike them as odd.

Ovid’s version of the story in the Metamorphoses , which Dante’s word choice reveals as the most

likely source, is one which would appear to be more consistent with the horrors of Inferno . Upon

being defeated in a musical competition by Apollo, the satyr Marsyas is skinned alive:

His skin is stripped off the surface of his body, and he is all one wound: blood flows down on every side, the sinews lie bare, his veins throb and quiver with no skin to cover them: you could count the entrails as they palpitate, and the vitals showing clearly in his breast. 134 Ovid writes that Marsyas screams all the while, asking, “ Quid me mihi detrahis ?” — “Why do you

tear me from myself?” 135 It is this line which Dante quotes most directly, his verb traesti being a

more or less direct translation of the Latin detrahis . It is on this line that the comparison of these

two narratives balances. The immediate difference is that, in Ovid, Marsyas’ torture separates

him entirely from himself. Marsyas is reduced to “one wound”; as his body is pulled apart, his

self is entirely destroyed . The metamorphosis Ovid depicts is that of Marsyas’ blood and his

mourners’ tears which become a river; 136 Marsyas himself does not persist in any form, although

132 Paradiso, I:72. 133 Paradiso, I:19-21. 134 Ovid, Metamorphoses, VI:387-90, trans. Frank Justus Miller, (Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 1916). 135 Metamorphoses, VI:386. 136 Metamorphoses, VI:395-400.

many of the victims in the Metamorphoses are granted a form of continued life, even if it is

perverse or tragic. This transformation is not present in Dante’s reading. Rather, he imagines a

different transformation altogether. Marsyas is not torn from himself but merely from his “limb’s

sheath.” Marsyas remains whole as he is pulled from his body, in a version of his death which

mirrors the explanation Statius gives in the previous cantica : when the soul “quits the flesh” it

continues “all of itself ” to either the shore of the Archeron or Tiber 137 — this is to say, the soul

simply disposes of the unnecessary flesh yet remains whole as it passes onto the next life. As

Levenstein explains, he “transforms Marsyas’ literal disembodiment” into “spiritual

embodiment.” 138 Marsyas becomes a martyr figure who witnesses divine power: he suffers, but

ultimately, just as in the Glaucus story, his transformation is reimagined as one of spiritual ascent.

Marsyas, however, does not parallel the Dante who is a character within the poem but

Dante the poet. This Dante desires the same fate as Marsyas: he asks Apollo: “ entra nel petto mio, e

spira tue ” 139 — a passage rendered in English varyingly as begging for Apollo’s power, 140 music, 141

or simply his breath, 142 but always asking for him to act “ sì come quando Marsïa traesti .” 143 In light

of Ovid’s text, Dante’s choice of the losing side in the Marsyas story seems to reject obvious

explanation. Levenstein points out that in Ovid, poetic competitions are deliberate moments of

“heightened poetic self reflection.” 144 The competition between the Pierides and Calliope, an

allusion to which Dante himself uses at the outset of the previous cantica , is a perfect example of

such a meta-poetical moment. In the story of Marsyas, however, Ovid himself does not seem to

137 Purgatorio, XXV:79-85. 138 Jessica Levenstein, “The Re-Formation of Marsyas in Paradiso 1, ” in Dante for the New Millenium, ed. Teadolinda Barolini and H. Wayne Storey (New York: Fordham University Press, 2003), 413. 139 Paradiso, I:19. 140 Paradiso, I:19, trans. Allen Mandelbaum. 141 Paradiso, I:19, trans. Dorothy Sayers, 1949. 142 Paradiso I:19, trans. Henry Wadsworth Longfellow, 1867. 143 Paradiso, I:20. 144 Jessica Levenstein, “Resurrecting Ovid's Pierides: Dante's Invocation to Calliope in "Purgatorio" 1.7-2, ” in Dante Studies, with the Annual Report of the Dante Society, 126 (2008): 2.

engage in the same degree of self-reflection. Beyond writing that Marsyas is “conquered in a

contest on Pallas’ reed” 145 by Apollo, he offers no account of the competition at all, focusing

instead on the punishment in all its brutality which forwards a theme of artistic hubris and its

heavy consequences. Brian Reynolds reads the incorporation of this myth in the Paradiso as an

effort on the part of Dante to present the same warning, begging for humility as he strives to

represent the celestial realm of Paradise. 146

Dante, however, while invoking Marsyas as an example, claims that “here I shall take as

crown the leaves / of which my theme and you [Apollo] shall make me worthy” 147 : he is clearly

competing in a contest he expects to win. This, as well as his reorientation of the myth as an

example of divine inspiration, of the sort Dante himself desires, resists Reynolds’ reading. Rather,

this passage is, to use Hawkins’ description, a “violent act of poetic revision” that Dante

commits against Ovid. 148 He subverts Ovid’s narrative of hubris into one of vision: Dante

becomes the instrument of Apollo, who breathes through him as if he were a flute. This form of

divine inspiration allows him to “show the shadow of the blessed realm” of which any one else

who has seen it “can not speak.” 149 Dante reimagines the story of Marsyas not as a competition

between Apollo and Marsyas but as a competition between himself and every other poet,

especially Ovid, whose story he actively corrects. In preemptively claiming the laurel wreath for

himself, he announces to the reader that he will succeed where no poet has before.

This is not to say, however, that, by entering into competition with him, Dante is striving

towards the same goal as Ovid. Stepping away from the Paradiso for the moment, it is necessary

to examine Dante also as a poet of exile in order to understand the context and, thus, the

145 Metamorphoses VI:384. 146 Brian Reynolds, “Morphing Mary: Pride, Humility, and Transformation in Dante ’ s Rewriting of Ovid, ” in Dante Studies, with the Annual Report of the Dante Society, 126 (2008): 24. 147 Paradiso, I:26-7. 148 Hawkins, “The Metamorphosis of Ovid” , 33. 149 Paradiso, I:6, 24.

implications of the Commedia for the poet. Janet Smarr points out that even in Dante’s immediate

reception, as far back as the early works of Boccaccio, “the poet in exile, struggling to redeem

himself ’ is a theme which joins Ovid and Dante in the literary tradition (Smarr, 140). 150 The

Commedia certainly tells a tale of exile; reading it as an Ovidian tale is both tempting and, in part

supported by the poem: the frozen lake in the lowest pit of Hell borrows its description, Picone

notes, from the literary trope of the frozen sea which Ovid invents to describe the winter

landscape of Tomis, his place of exile. 151 Dante alludes to Phaethon and Icarus, both used in

Ovid’s Tristia as parallel narratives to his own exile, in order to express the fear he feels on

descending into the Circles of Fraud. 152 Dante, however, through conscious subversion of Ovid’s

narrative and re-orienting of the Exile’s longing for homecoming, seems to encourage a reading

of his work in contrast to, rather than in harmony with Ovid.

One such contrast is their differing perspectives on the city from which they are exiled.

This contrast is proof of Dante’s correction of Ovid’s exile narrative into one of Christian exile,

pilgrimage and, ultimately, homecoming. Ovid begins his Tristia by instructing his book to return

to Rome where its “master is not allowed to go” 153 and his addresses to the book show his clear

longing for the “loved places” of this “great” city. 154 His idealization of Rome could not be more

strikingly different from Dante’s denunciation of Florence in the Inferno : “Florence, rejoice, [...]

all the deep Hell rings with thy name.” 155 Herein lies the fundamental difference in the narratives

of the two poets: Ovid’s treats his physical exile from Rome as a sort of poetic death, while

Dante’s narrative, though the poet himself is in physical exile, focuses on the spiritual exile of the

150 Janet Levarie Smarr, “Poets of Love and Exile, ” in Dante and Ovid: Essays in Intertextuality, ed. Madison U. Sowell (New York: Medieval and Renaissance Texts and Studies, 1991,) 140. 151 Michelangelo Picone, “Ovid and the Exul Inmeritus, ” in Dante for the New Millenium, ed. Teadolinda Barolini and H. Wayne Storey (New York: Fordham University Press, 2003), 399. 152 Tristia, I.i:80-83; Inferno, XVII:106-110. 153 Tristia, I.i:2. 154 Tristia, I.i:15. 155 Inferno, XXVII:1-3.

Christian pilgrim from his true home in Paradise. Ovid, in telling his narrative of exile in the

Tristia , hopes to be allowed to return to the earthly city of Rome; Dante the poet, in narrating

Dante the pilgrim’s journey in the Commedia , hopes to win himself a heavenly homecoming to the

celestial realm of Paradise, hinted at by his longing for the pseudo-martyrdom he gives to

Marsyas. Dante’s engagement with the pagan poet of exile, then, functions as a correction of the

pagan narrative of exile, wherein the goal of the exile poem becomes an ascent to heaven not a

return to his city of birth.

Beyond correcting the desired role of poetry in changing its author’s fate, Dante

envisions a new role for poetry itself. Returning again to the first canto of the Paradiso , which

through its lengthy invocation of Apollo for artistic inspiration, functions as a declaration par

excellence of Dante’s poetic ability and achievements. The final book of the Metamorphoses closes

with a similar passage, where Ovid summarizes the ultimate goals of this work — and of his

poetic corpus as a whole. He writes:

And now my work is done, which neither the wrath of Jove, nor fire, nor sword, nor the gnawing tooth of time shall ever be able to undo. [...] Still in my better part I shall be borne immortal far beyond the lofty stars and I shall have an undying name. Wherever

Rome’s power extends over the conquered world, I shall have mention on men’ s lips, and, if the prophecies of bards have any truth, through all the ages shall I live in fame. 156 To Ovid, poetry is a means of achieving actual immortality for himself. He claims, “I shall be

borne immortal” and “I shall live in fame.” His work does not continue separate from him, but

as his “better half.” As Reynolds rightly points out, no parallel assertion exists in the Commedia , 157

even in the aforementioned first canto of Paradiso . What Dante claims as his goal is no more than

to record faithfully the nature of paradise: it is his “theme” as well as divine inspiration, as

allegorized through the story of Marsyas, which will win him the laurel crown. There is no

156 Metamorphoses, XV: 871-879. 157 Reynolds, “Morphing Mary, ” 22.

mention in this passage of Dante’s own “high genius,” 158 which he invokes at the outset of the

Inferno , nor does he make any mention of his eternal fame, as Ovid does, he simply hopes that his

poetry might inspire “better voices” as “Great fire can follow a small spark” 159 — a new,

Christian poetic tradition which transcends the limits of the earlier pagan tradition as exemplified

by Ovid. This is the only hint of any desire to “live in fame” in the Ovidian sense. In short, he

desires to raise his verse to the contemplation of the divine, to transform poetry into a means of

vision. This is what Levenstein calls “the most sublime of all metamorphoses” 160 : an apotheosis

of the Poet and poetry itself.

Active engagement with Ovid, the great pagan poet of myth and exile, allows Dante’s

Divine Comedy to appear as a transformed vision of metamorphosis, exile, and of poetry itself. At

the outset of the Paradiso , Dante’s invocation of poetic inspiration provides a perfect example of

this apotheosis, showing Dante’s corrected vision of metamorphosis as spiritual ascent or even

martyrdom, which is also echoed in Dante’s re-interpretation of Ovid’s narrative of exile as

pilgrimage and eventual spiritual homecoming. Using the language of Ovidian artistic

competition, Dante enters his Commedia into competition with the pagan poetry exemplified by

Ovid, and claims his victory. Ultimately, the goal of Paradiso ’ s first canto is one which pervades

the entire work: the transhumanization of poetry, which allows it to carry the poet and the reader

into paradise. Poetry must pass beyond the earthly realm in which even the most revered poets

of antiquity are trapped. The Comedy is a self-conscious act of creating a new form of poetry,

both in a new language and for a new, Christian world. This transformation is just as imperative

for the poet Dante as the embrace of divine wisdom over earthly reason is for his pilgrim

counterpart within the poem. However, unlike reason, poetry in its new form can, must, and will

158 Inferno, II:27. 159 Paradiso, I:35. 160 Levenstein, “The Re-Formation of Marsyas, ” 112.

carry the poet all the way up to the Empyrean heaven: Dante the poet requires it; thus, he makes

it so.

Bibliography

Alighieri, Dante. The Divine Comedy . Translated by Allen Mandelbaum. New York:

Columbia University Libraries, 1994. https://digitaldante.columbia.edu/dante/divine-comedy/.

Hawkins, Peter S. “The Metamorphosis of Ovid.” In Dante and Ovid: Essays in Intertextuality , edited by Madison U. Sowell, 18-34. New York: Medieval and

Renaissance Texts and Studies, 1991.

Levenstein, Jessica. “The Re-Formation of Marsyas in Paradiso 1.” In Dante for the New Millenium, edited by Teadolinda Barolini and H. Wayne Storey, 408-421. New York:

Fordham University Press, 2003.

Levenstein, Jessica. “Resurrecting Ovid's Pierides: Dante's Invocation to Calliope in "Purgatorio" 1.7-2.” Dante Studies, with the Annual Report of the Dante Society 126 (2008):1-19.

Lorch, Maristella and Lavinia Lorch. “Metaphor and Metamorphosis: Purgatorio 27 and Metamorphoses 4.” In Dante and Ovid: Essays in Intertextuality , edited by Madison U. Sowell, 100-121. New York: Medieval and Renaissance Texts and Studies, 1991.

Ovid. Tristia: Ex Ponto . Translated by Arthur Leslie Wheeler. Revised by G.P. Goold. Loeb Classical Library 151. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1988.

Ovid. Metamorphoses . Translated by Frank Justus Miller. Revised by G. P. Goold. 2 vols.

Loeb Classical Library 42. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1916.

Picone, Michelangelo. “Ovid and the Exul Inmeritus .” In Dante for the New Millenium, edited by Teadolinda Barolini and H. Wayne Storey, 489-407. New York: Fordham

University Press, 2003.

Reynolds, Brian. “Morphing Mary: Pride, Humility, and Transformation in Dante's

Rewriting of Ovid.” Dante Studies, with the Annual Report of the Dante Society 26(2008):21-55

Smarr, Janet Levarie. “Poets of Love and Exile.” In Dante and Ovid: Essays in Intertextuality , edited by Madison U. Sowell, 139-151. New York: Medieval and

Renaissance Texts and Studies, 1991.

New Kids on the Block: Depictions of Hostage Children on the Ara Pacis Augustae and Provincial Relationships in Augustus’s Early Principate.

Neha Rahman, McGill

A key tenet of Rome’s lasting and peaceful relationships to the provinces in the Imperial

period is codified in images of young hostages on Augustus’s monument to an age of peace.

Kathleen Lamp proposes that in the ancient world, rhetoric and political propaganda were

embedded into the built environment, and she cites art historian Diane Favro who argues that

“learned Romans were predisposed to look for an underlying, coherent narrative,” within the

many monuments that the wealthy and powerful constructed. 161 The Ara Pacis is no different. In

particular, this monument has much to say about the unique and manifold roles of young people

in Rome’s early principate. In Augustus’s Res Gestae , he tells us that in 13 BCE, the Senate

ordered that an altar to the deity “peace” be built in honour of the princeps’ return from

successful missions in Spain and Gaul. 162 Around the same time, his trusted advisor and fellow

general Agrippa would have returned from campaigns in the East, particularly Bosporus and

Pontus. 163 In 9 BCE, three years after Agrippa’s death, the temple was officially “dedicated” with

a sacrifice. 164 Though Agrippa could not have been at the official procession that inaugurated the

temple, he is still prominently displayed in its image program. This indicates both that the images

for the Ara Pacis were likely planned and drawn up before Agrippa’s death, and that regardless of

his literal absence, the art on the Ara Pacis meant to emphasize the people closest to the

161 Lamp, 4. 162 Lamp, 2. 163 Rose, 455. 164 Ryberg, 84.

emperor. This paper focuses on the north and south friezes of the Ara Pacis where the emperor’s

family and close friends are displayed. These are also known as the “processional friezes,” as they

show likely two frames of the same occasion of sacrifice. 165 This event, critical to the functioning

of Roman religion, normally mandated that participants dress a certain way. For kids, this

generally meant wearing the toga as well as the bulla , a talisman of protection that free-born and

especially wealthy children wore until around the age of fifteen. 166 However, on the south frieze,

there is an image of a boy wearing a diadem who tugs on the toga of a figure identified as

Agrippa. 167 Above him is a woman who also wears a diadem, thought to be his mother. 168

Though he has been identified as Gaius Caesar, Augustus’s grandson, Charles Rose disagrees and

cites this Eastern headgear, as well as his shoes, 169 as the reason this boy is better interpreted as a

hostage from one of the Eastern provinces. On the north frieze, there is a young boy in

particularly Gaulish dress, with his buttocks exposed and a torque (type of Celtic wire necklace).

170 Previously identified as another grandson of Augustus’s, Lucius Caesar, Rose also argues that

his distinctive costuming, totally inappropriate for a Roman in an occasion such as a sacrifice,

demonstrates that these children rather symbolize hostages, and say more about imperial foreign

policy than dynasty and succession.

Evidence for the practice of friendly hostage-taking also exists from the time of the

Roman Republic, when prisoners of war would often become the guests of wealthy and

prominent Roman families. 171 An example of such a hostage is the Roman writer Polybius, taken

during the Third Macedonian War (171-168 BCE), who went on to be a tutor to the Scipio

165 Ryberg, 81. 166 Kleiner and Buxton, 32. 167 Rose, 455. 168 Rose, 455. 169 Rose, 456. 170 Rose, 459-460. 171 Roselaar, 191.

family, and to write a pro-Roman work of history. 172 Polybius represents the ideal outcome for a

Roman hostage: that they be inundated with positive ideas about the Roman Empire, and that

they be empowered to share those ideas. This method was especially effective when applied to

elite children, who could be molded in the image of an ideal Roman citizen as they grew up, 173

and could eventually be sent back to their land of origin to rule as automatically friendly clients

to Rome. 174 Examples of such child hostages include Juba II of Numidia, who was captured by

Julius Caesar and paraded in his triumph over Africa. 175 Augustus made him king of Numidia and

Mauretania once he had come of age, raised among the imperial children. 176 He was also married

to Cleopatra Selene, another child hostage, the daughter of Cleopatra VII and Marc Antony who

was paraded in Augustus’s triumph following the Battle of Actium. 177 Notably, both of these

children were featured in parades, just as the potential hostage children shown on the Ara Pacis.

The altar’s processional friezes are very clearly related to a sacrifice, scholars have evoked

triumphal processions in analyzing these images, as triumphs gradually became less common in

the imperial period. 178 Their resonance, especially for the induction of foreign parties into Rome,

still manifests in the image program of the altar of peace. Apart from the spectacle of hostage

taking, the tangible success of this system made it one invaluable to Roman imperialism,

particularly its soft-power tactics. Emma Dench uses this political science term in understanding

Roman interactions with the provinces:

Imperial relationships were brokered in part through traditional, ostensibly voluntary networks that maintained connection and ordered power and proximity in the Mediterranean world, including friendship, gift-exchange and ‘kinship diplomacy.’ 179

172 Roselaar, 191. 173 Kleiner and Buxton, 68. 174 Isayev, 253. 175 Kleiner and Buxton, 26. 176 Kleiner and Buxton, 26. 177 Kleiner and Buxton, 26. 178 Kleiner and Buxton, 28. 179 Dench, 23.

The use of this kind of diplomacy to forge relationships with the provinces, alongside

Rome’s reliance on violence, was one of the ways Rome’s empire was able to grow to be so large

and so long-lasting. Augustus, as the princeps, claiming to lead Rome’s empire into a great period

of peace and prosperity, also understands that his actions are making Rome more cosmopolitan.

Unlike famous figures of the Republic like Cato the Elder who balked at the influx of foreign

influence, Augustus had to acquiesce to it in some ways, in order to rule as successfully as he did.

180 As his empire grew the impetus was to keep the chances of revolt as low as possible, and the

tactics which he used to do so were thus enshrined in the monumentalized rhetoric he

established all around Rome.

The Ara Pacis Augustae profers a version of peace in line with Augustus’ policy of

fostering lasting relationships with local provincial elites through the taking of young hostages.

As these hostages would be raised in elite Roman households, they would adopt pro-Roman

ideologies and take these favourable ideas back to their localities, thus creating a soft power tactic

of lasting Roman imperial influence. This paper emphasizes the interpretive possibility of the

young kids in foreign dress as hostages, and the overall monumentalization of Augustus’ imperial

policy. It conducts a close reading of the “Eastern” hostage on the south frieze and the

“Western” hostage on the north frieze, bringing in the context of campaigns in those respective

provinces at the time and what their monumentalization meant for Rome’s broader relationship

with its empire.

The first image we will discuss is of a young boy on the south processional Frieze (see

figure 1 in appendix), who could be anywhere from five to ten years old. At this age, a Roman

boy would be expected to wear the bulla , a protective talisman that indicated their freeborn status

180 Kleiner and Buxton, 77.

and that they were to remain unaccosted as young slave children often were. 181 However, this

young boy does not appear to be wearing this charm, that is visible on other children on the Ara

Pacis such as the young boy identified as Drusus, the son of Tiberius (fig. 2). Instead, he wears a

diadem on his forehead, a marker of Eastern royalty. 182 His hair is also dissimilar to the other

more clearly Roman children on the Ara Pacis as it is shoulder-length, in “corkscrew” shaped

curls. 183 Such a style was favoured among young boys in the Greek East, and even held particular

exotic sexual appeal in Rome. 184 This might be further evidence that this boy is indeed

non-Roman, as there was a slight taboo within Rome’s own pederastic culture of attraction

towards fellow Roman citizens, 185 thus the way one kept one’s hair was an important visual tool

to reaffirm Roman citizenship, and discourage sexual interest. 186 Apart from the hair, diadem,

and shoes, this boy’s clothes evoke the costume of the Phrygian deity Attis instead of a toga

praetexta, and he also wears a torque necklace around his neck. 187 Rose notes that altogether the

style of this young boy’s portrait is “paralleled in [those] of Eastern kings, specifically those of

the Bosporus and Parthia.” 188

There is thus a compelling amount of evidence from just a visual analysis that this young

boy is not Gaius Caesar, the grandson of Augustus with whom he has commonly been identified,

but rather that this image evokes a hostage from the Eastern provinces, prominently displayed in

procession with the royal family. This image evokes the way such hostages would be paraded in

triumphal processions and yet transplants them into an intimate familial context. The artistic

technique evokes the political one. This immersion into Roman culture was the goal of

181 Glancy, 12. 182 Rose, 456. 183 Rose, 456. 184 Bartman, 267. 185 Olson, 188-189. 186 Olson, 188-189. 187 Rose, 456. 188 Rose, 456.

hostage-taking. Also notable in this section of the frieze is that a woman who stands above the

young boy, at whom he gazes up, is also wearing this familiar diadem. Though her toga and

head-covering are far more appropriate for the Roman religious occasion, the diadem that links

them both suggests not only a family connection but also a fellow foreign guest within the

Imperial family. To understand this Eastern child and his potential mother, it is crucial also to

put the Ara Pacis into context with Agrippa’s campaigns in the Eastern provinces of the Roman

empire at this time. Agrippa was not only Augustus’s lieutenant and consul of Rome three times

(in 37 BCE, 28 BCE, and 27 BCE) but also Augustus’s son in law. 189 In 13 BCE, Agrippa had

just returned from a campaign in the Upper Danube region, which became the Roman province

of Pannonia, 190 and the year before that he had conducted campaigns in Pontus and the

Bosporus. 191 Rose focuses on these latter campaigns and theorizes that the woman is meant to

represent Queen Dynamis from Pontus and Bosporus and her son. Though it was not common

for mothers and sons to be taken in as hostages at once, Isayev shows that women could play the

same role as children, perceived as vulnerable and amenable to changing loyalties by the

fundamentally patriarchal Roman political modus operandi. 192 The presence of this

maybe-Dynamis does not quite challenge the overall interpretation of this figure as an eastern

hostage, but it does connect the presence of this hostage more closely to Agrippa, as an

identifiable figure from one of his most recent campaigns. Since this boy also happens to be

clutching the toga of the figure on the processional frieze identified as Agrippa, much

scholarship has found that associating this boy with Gaius Caesar and establishing a father-son

link is the most straightforward explanation. 193 However, once again, understanding the boy as a

189 Kleiner and Buxton, 68. 190 Ryberg 87-88. 191 Rose, 458-459. 192 Isayev, 257-258. 193 Rose, 455.

result of Agrippa’s foray into the provinces, their proximity and intimacy is also legible as a

promise of Pontus and Bosporus’s loyalties in the future. The child represents a new generation

and a chance for long-lasting peace and friendship with the province. Embedded within the altar

of Peace, the child’s presence distracts from the war it directly references, the violence it took for

that child to get there. Augustus’s foreign policy is thus monumentalized. A promise of future

friendly relationships with the provinces changes the focus from the enmity that preceded it and

ultimately promotes Augustus’s image as a singularly clement and peace-loving emperor.

The second image we will discuss is on the north processional frieze. This child appears

significantly younger than the one on the south frieze, about toddler age (fig.3). In the past,

scholars have identified this boy as Lucius, another grandson of Augustus. 194 However, his

foreign dress is even more obvious and remarkable than the previous example. Once again, his

hair is long, loose, and curly, and again, he does not wear a toga praetexta. These features do not

appear in any other depiction of Lucius Caesar, immediately disassociating the two. 195 This boy

wears a small shift and faces away from the spectator in such a way that exposes his buttocks.

Rose notes that “such a presentation of a member of the imperial family is unprecedented at any

time during the Roman Imperial period.” 196 Another unique feature of this young boy is that he

wears no shoes, and is the only figure on either procession to lack footwear. 197 Finally, the boy

also wears a torque necklace, similar to the boy on the south procession, but it is in a slightly

different style, a little plainer, as if, Rose argues, “the designers wanted to indicate that these

children were associated with two different regions in which torques formed part of the

traditional costume.” 198 Another famous sculpture on which the torque is featured, and is slightly

194 Rose, 459-460. 195 Rose, 459-460. 196 Rose, 459-460. 197 Rose, 459-460. 198 Rose, 459-460.

easier to see, is the Dying Gaul , displayed in Rome’s Capitoline Museum (fig. 5). In Roman

sculpture the accessory is a key visual symbol to immediately associate with foreignness,

specifically foreigners from the Western Provinces.

Once again, the initial visual analysis reveals the emphatic foreignness of this young boy.

Looking closer and bringing in some comparative evidence however, there is even more hidden

significance in the way the boy is positioned. He looks up at the closest adult near him, as if for

guidance from a parent. Again, it establishes a family connection, it is a very natural position for

a child, as if seeking comfort from a parent when faced with the cacophony of public religious

performance typical of this kind of procession. However, Rose identifies this specific pose as a

sort of sculptural quotation, a reference to a very similar scene found on “the so-called

Boscoreale cups,” (fig. 6) a set of ornately decorated silver cups found in Boscoreale, near

Vesuvius. 199 In this image, several Celtic chiefs seem to offer their young sons as hostages to the

seated emperor Augustus. 200 One of these boys being offered as a hostage is in the exact same

position as the young boy on the north processional frieze. Though these cups are dated to 79

CE, long after the construction of the Ara Pacis, they embed this same young boy in a more

direct scenario of hostage taking, an image of what happens before these kids get to Rome. This

scene of offering one’s child as hostage is once again referenced in coinage from 8 BCE found in

Lugdunum, Gaul (fig.7), where a man holds out an infant to a seated emperor. Rose identifies

both of these examples as indications that the boy on the Ara Pacis was the result of this

“expression of loyalty” 201 on the part of their fathers who offered them to get a Roman

education and come back to rule in their home provinces with “pro-Roman policy.” 202 With

these two examples, it is clearly impossible to read this image without the context of Augustus’s

199 Kuttner, 6. 200 Rose, 460. 201 Rose, 460. 202 Rose, 460.

recent return from the Western provinces, particularly Gaul and Spain, that prompted the very

commissioning of the Ara Pacis by the Senate. 203 Much like the child on the southern frieze

emphasizes Agrippa’s military victory, this young boy is the parallel representation of Augustus’s

provincial campaigns. Rather than Gaius and Lucius, the grandsons and heirs, in this early part of

his rule, the presence of hostages on the Ara Pacis seems to emphasize these growing and

strengthening provincial relationships over the imperial concerns for an heir. Kleiner and Buxton

quote Severy who argues that “the monument is about dynasty only in a vague generalized way,”

204 generally invoking intergenerational glory with the presence of child images throughout as

well as a focus on the family. However, we might then find interpretive space for more pointed

allusions to current imperial foreign policy if we are to understand these young kids on the north

and south processional friezes as hostages from the provinces. Augustus thus invokes the future

of Rome and the future of his family in a way that is entirely embedded in the way the new

empire would deal with its provinces. The presence of hostage children on the Ara Pacis

promises a simultaneously linear (intergenerational) and lateral (international) dissemination of

Roman values. This is a powerful promise for peace that is rooted in a careful understanding of

Rome’s history of dealing with foreigners, as hostage-taking was a popular and time-tested

tradition dating back to the Republic. Keeping in mind that the senate commissioned this altar in

honour of Augustus, we can also read into this monument a tacit approval of his rule which

keeps some of the key tenets of the Republic that were particularly effective. In the end,

Augustus emerges looking like an establishment-approved and traditional ruler, even when he

was fundamentally changing Rome’s mode of governance.

203 Lamp, 2. 204 Kleiner and Buxton, 69.

In reading the young boys on the north and south processional friezes as hostages, we

have seen how the Ara Pacis monumentalized a practice that stretched back into the Republican

period, officially recognizing it as an invaluable tool of soft-power for creating lasting Roman

alliances. Much of the purpose of the repeated depictions of children on this monument is to

emphasize, from every corner that one views it, that Augustus’s peace would be long-lasting, and

intergenerational. The presence of hostage children emphasizes that this “peace” extends well

past Rome and into the provinces. Though we know from Tacitus that this peace was

“bloodstained,” 205 the Ara Pacis was one of the many manifestations of Augustus’s rhetoric to

justify this violence. 206

205 Lamp, 13. 206 Lamp, 13.

Appendix

Figure 1 - South Processional Frieze, detail. Boy and Mother wearing Eastern Diadem.

Figure 2 - Young boy identified as Drusus, wearing toga praetexta and bulla.

Figure 3 - North Processional Frieze, detail. Toddler in Gallic costume.

Figure 4 - North frieze of the Ara Pacis, for context.

Figure 5 - The Dying Gaul in the Capitoline Museum, another example of a “torque” or “torc”

necklace.

Figure 6 - Boscoreale cup, child in a similar pose to the north processional frieze of Ara Pacis.

Figure 7 - coin from Lugdunum in Gaul showing chief offering son to emperor.

Bibliography

Baratte, F, photographer. “Augustus, Drusus, and the Princelings of Gallia Comata. Drusus and the Gallic chieftains with their infants.” Photograph. Berkeley: University of

California Press, 1995. From: Kuttner, Ann L. Dynasty and Empire in the Age of Augustus: The Case of the Boscoreale Cups. http://ark.cdlib.org/ark:/13030/ft309nb1mw/

Bartman, Elizabeth. “Eros’ Flame Images of Sexy Boys in Roman Ideal Sculpture in

Memoirs of the American Academy in Rome.” Supplementary Volumes, Vol. 1, The Ancient Art of Emulation: Studies in Artistic Originality and Tradition from the Present to Classical Antiquity . Edited by Elaine K. Gazda, 249 – 71. Ann Arbor: University of Michigan Press, 2002.

Dench, Emma. Empire and Political Cultures in the Roman World . Cambridge, United Kingdom: Cambridge University Press, 2018.

Glancy, Jennifer A. Slavery in Early Christianity . New York: Oxford University

Press. Oxford Scholarship Online, 2003. doi: 10.1093/0195136098.001.0001.

Isayev, Elena. Migration, Mobility and Place in Ancient Italy . Cambridge: Cambridge

University Press, 2017.

Kleiner, Diana E. E., and Bridget Buxton. “Pledges of Empire: The Ara Pacis and the

Donations of Rome.” American Journal of Archaeology 112, no. 1 (2008): 57-89.

Kuttner, Ann L. Dynasty and Empire in the Age of Augustus: The Case of the Boscoreale Cups . Berkeley: University of California Press, 1995. http://ark.cdlib.org/ark:/13030/ft309nb1mw/

Lamp, Kathleen. “The Ara Pacis Augustae: Visual Rhetoric in Augustus' Principate.” Rhetoric Society Quarterly 39, no. 1 (2009): 1-24.

McManus, Barbara F, photographer. “Agrippa and imperial family from the south frieze of

Ara Pacis, 13-9 BCE” Photograph. Rome, Ara Pacis Museum. 2007. From the personal website of Barbara McManus: Index of Images Part XV . http://www.vroma.org/images/mcmanus_images/index15.html

— “Antonia Minor and Drusus from the south frieze of Ara Pacis, 13-9 BCE” Photograph. Rome, Ara Pacis Museum. 2007. From the personal website of Barbara McManus: Index of Images Part XV . http://www.vroma.org/images/mcmanus_images/index15.htm

— “toddler in short tunic and torque from north frieze of Ara Pacis, 13-9 BCE” Photograph. Rome, Ara Pacis Museum. 2007. From the personal website of Barbara McManus: Index of Images Part XV . http://www.vroma.org/images/mcmanus_images/index15.html

— “north frieze of Ara Pacis, eastern end, 13-9 BCE” Photograph. Rome, Ara Pacis Museum. 2007. From the personal website of Barbara McManus: Index of Images Part XV . http://www.vroma.org/images/mcmanus_images/index15.html

Olson, Kelly. “Masculinity, Appearance, and Sexuality: Dandies in Roman

Antiquity.” Journal of the History of Sexuality 23, no. 2. (2014): 182-205.

Rabax63, photographer. “Dying Gaul (Head)” Photograph. Capitoline Museum. Rome.

Wikimedia Commons, 2017. From Wikipedia: Torc https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=64965675

Rose, Charles Brian. “"Princes" and Barbarians on the Ara Pacis.” American Journal of Archaeology 94, no. 3 (1990): 453-67.

Roselaar, Saskia T. “Roman State Prisoners in Latin and Italian Cities.” The Classical Quarterl y 62, no. 1 (2012): 189-200.

Ryberg, Inez Scott. “The Procession of the Ara Pacis.” Memoirs of the American Academy in Rome 19 (1949): 77-101.

Syme, Ronald. “Neglected Children on the Ara Pacis.” American Journal of Archaeology 88, no. 4 (1984): 583-89.