Augustus
Born Octavian, this adopted son and primary heir of Julius Caesar became the first official emperor of the Roman Empire.
Who is Augustus?
Attached to Augustus's right leg, a small cupid riding this marine creature highlights his family's claimed descent from the goddess Venus.
What is a dolphin?
Commissioned by the Senate in 13 BC to celebrate Augustus's return from Hispania and Gaul, this "Altar of Augustan Peace" sits in Rome as a masterpiece of Imperial propaganda.
What is the Ara Pacis (Augustae)?
During the sack of Troy, Aeneas escapes the burning city carrying his father Anchises on his back and holding the hand of this young son.
Who is Ascanius (or Iulus)?
Roman women paid top coin for small vials containing the sweat and dirt scraped off the bodies of these famous arena performers to use as a beauty face cream.
Who are gladiators?
Formed in 43 BC, the political alliance known as the Second Triumvirate consisted of Octavian, Mark Antony, and this third Roman statesman.
Who is Marcus Aemilius Lepidus?
The stance of this 1st-century statue of Augustus borrows heavily from Polykleitos's classical Greek masterpiece known as the Doryphoros, or "Spear Bearer."
What is contrapposto?
Started by Emperor Vespasian in 72 AD and completed by his son Titus, the Colosseum gets its official name from this imperial ruling dynasty.
What is the Flavian Dynasty?
Aeneas is guided through the Underworld by this prophetess of Apollo, whom he meets at her temple in Cumae.
Who is the Cumaean Sibyl (or Sibyl)?
According to the biographer Suetonius, the eccentric emperor Caligula planned to appoint Incitatus—who was this type of animal—as a Roman consul.
What is a horse?
This key legal power granted to Augustus in 23 BC gave him the veto power and personal inviolability traditionally reserved for Roman plebeian officials.
What is tribunicia potestas (or tribunician power)?
Resting on his right shoulder, Commodus holds this signature bludgeoning weapon associated with the Twelve Labors of Hercules.
What is a club?
The famous Hadrianic Baths built between 120–137 AD are located in this grand North African coastal city in modern-day Libya, the birthplace of Emperor Septimius Severus.
What is Leptis Magna?
Aeneas exits the Underworld through the Gate of False Dreams, which is crafted from this luxurious material rather than horn.
What is ivory (or the Gate of Ivory / Porta Eburnea)?
Under early Roman law, if a man was convicted of parricide (killing his own father), he was sewn into a leather sack with a dog, a viper, a monkey, and this farm bird before being thrown into the sea.
What is a rooster?
Augustus banished his only biological daughter, Julia the Elder, to the island of Pandateria after she violated his harsh strictures against this crime.
What is adultery?
Unlike the calm, timeless idealization of Augustus or the extravagant myth-making of Commodus, Philip the Arab's portrait relies on this stark, hyper-realistic Republican portrait style to convey psychological tension.
What is verism (or veristic sculpture)?
Sailors from the Roman imperial fleet were stationed atop the Colosseum to operate this massive retractable canvas awning that shielded spectators from the sun.
What is the velarium?
Before taking her own life on a funeral pyre, Queen Dido utters a famous curse promising eternal hatred between Carthage and Aeneas’s descendants, foreshadowing these historical conflicts.
What are the Punic Wars?
Romans flavored almost every dish with garum, an intensely salty, fermented condiment made from the decaying intestines of these creatures.
What are fish?
Augustus spent decades trying to secure a successor; after the early deaths of Marcellus, Agrippa, Gaius, and Lucius, he was ultimately succeeded by this stepson.
Who is Tiberius?
The two weeping female figures flanking the central scene on the Prima Porta breastplate represent conquered provinces—specifically Hispania and this region, whose submission was marked by the closing of the Gates of Janus.
What is Gaul (Gallia)?
The interior of the Pont du Gard's covered water channel was coated with a red, waterproof mortar called opus signinum to prevent leaks and slow down the build-up of this white mineral crust deposited by hard water.
What is calcium carbonate (or limescale/calcite)?
Turnus’s refusal to return Pallas’s body for burial without spoils, and Aeneas's subsequent vengeful rage, directly mirror the tragic dynamic between these two rival heroes in Homer's Iliad.
Who are Hector and Achilles?
Tablet 291 from Vindolanda (a settlement on Hadrian's wall) is famous for containing one of the earliest known Latin texts written by a woman—an invitation to one of these social events.
What is a birthday party?