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6 - Court Politics and Imperial Imagery in the Roman Principate

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  09 November 2020

By
Benjamin Kelly
Edited by
Amy Russell  and
Monica Hellström
Amy Russell
Affiliation:
Brown University, Rhode Island
Monica Hellström
Affiliation:
University of Durham
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Summary

This chapter examines the role that the Roman imperial court played in the genesis of imperial imagery intended for public display. It argues that the realities of court society have implications for hypothetical reconstructions of who commissioned, designed, and approved such images: ostensibly independent sites of decision-making – ‘senate’, ‘inner circle’, ‘moneyers’, ‘emperor’ – were deeply interconnected. Furthermore, the influence and power of different individuals and groups at court ebbed and flowed, and although such changes never guaranteed particular images, they set new limits on what was possible. With controversial images, artists and their patrons could also exploit the fact that viewing is always conditioned by the viewer’s background knowledge and assumptions, so different audiences could be encouraged to see different things in the same image. A detailed case study of public images of the emperor in the presence of members of his guard units is used to illustrate how some images became more (and then less) possible over time, and how different types of viewers were invited to see varying things in the same image.

Keywords

Imperial courtpublic imageryemperorpraetoriansGermani corporis custodes
Type
Chapter
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The Social Dynamics of Roman Imperial Imagery , pp. 128 - 158
Publisher: Cambridge University Press
Print publication year: 2020

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