The sections below are from the Res Gestae Divi Augusti, or the official autobiography of Augustus. Read
all the sections below and write a reaction paper discussing your take on Augustus’ actions in regard
marriage within the Empire. Paper should be 400-500 words, Times New Roman 12pt font, one inch
margins, double spaced. If you use additional sources they need to be footnoted within your paper, as
well as footnoting the Res Gestae Divi Augusti when necessary.
1. Identify the author, the title of the work, and timeframe.
2. Place the quote in its historical context (150-200 words)
3. Explain its broader significance to our understanding of the past (150-200 words)
4. Why did Augustus attempt such social reforms as his laws on marriage?
5. In what ways was Augustus’ actions important to the unification of the Empire?
The Res Gestae Divi Augusti (“the achievements of the deified Augustus”) are the official autobiography of
Augustus, the man who had renovated the Roman Empire during his long reign from 31 BCE to 14 CE. The text
tells us how he wanted to be remembered. It is best summarized in the full title: “the achievements of the deified
Augustus by which he placed the whole world under the sovereignty of the Roman people, and of the amounts
which he expended upon the state and the Roman people”. In other words – it is propaganda.
The text, which was inscribed on two columns near the Mausoleum of Augustus in Rome, has survived as an
inscription in the Temple of Roma and Augustus in modern Ankara (ancient Ancyra), which is currently in use
as a mosque. The text, which was first published by the famous botanist Charles de l’ Écluse (or Clusius; 1526-
1609), is not complete, but there are other copies from Central Anatolia (from a/o Antioch in Pisidia and
Apollonia in Pisidia). The first scholar to combine all fragments and publish a proper scholarly edition was
Theodor Mommsen (1883²). The translation offered here, made by F.W. Shipley, was copied from
LacusCurtius, where you can also find the Greek and Latin text.
The sum total of the money which he contributed to the treasury or to the Roman plebs or to discharged soldiers
was 600,000,000 denarii. The new works which he built were: the temple of Mars, of Jupiter Tonans and
Feretrius, of Apollo, of the Deified Julius, of Quirinus, of Minerva, of Juno the queen, of Jupiter Libertas, of the
Lares, of the Di Penates, of Youth, of the Mother of the gods, the Lupercal, the state box at the circus, the
Senate-house with the Chalcidicum, the Augustan Forum, the Basilica Julia, the theater of Marcellus, […] the
grove of the Caesars beyond the Tiber. He restored the Capitol and sacred buildings to the number of eighty-
two, the theater of Pompey, the aqueducts, the Flaminian Way. The expenditures provided for theatrical shows,
gladiatorial sports, for exhibitions of athletes, for hunts of wild beasts, and the naval combat, and his gifts to
colonies in Italy, to cities in the provinces which had been destroyed by earthquake or conflagration, or to
individual friends and senators, whose property he raised to the required rating, are too numerous to be
reckoned.
Cassius Dio: On Augustus’ Speech in Favor of Marriage, 3rd Century CE
5 Yet, if one were to name over all the worst crimes, the others are as naught in comparison with this one you
are now committing, whether you consider them crime for crime or even set all of them together over against
this single crime of yours. For you are committing murder in not begetting in the first place those who ought to
be your descendants; you are committing sacrilege in putting an end to the names and honours of your
ancestors; and you are guilty of impiety in that you are abolishing your families, which were instituted by the
gods, and destroying the greatest of offerings to them, — human life, — thus overthrowing their rites and their
temples. Moreover, you are destroying the State by disobeying its laws, and you are betraying your country by
rendering her barren and childless; nay more, you are laying her even with the dust by making her destitute of future inhabitants. For it is human beings that constitute a city, we are told, not houses or porticos or market-
places empty of men.
“Bethink you, therefore, what wrath would justly seize the great Romulus, the founder of our race, if he could
reflect on the circumstances of his own birth and then upon your conduct in refusing to beget children even by
lawful marriages! How wrathful would the Romans who were his followers be, if they could realize that after
they themselves had even seized foreign girls, you are not satisfied even with those of your own race, and after
they had got children even by enemy wives, you will not beget them even of women who are citizens!…
7 For surely it is not your delight in a solitary existence that leads you to live without wives, nor is there one of
you who either eats alone or sleeps alone; no, what you want is to have full liberty for wantonness and
licentiousness. Yet I allowed you to pay your court to girls still of tender years and not yet ripe for marriage, in
order that, classed as prospective bridegrooms, you might live as family men should; and I permitted those not
in the senatorial order to wed freedwomen, so that, if anyone through love or intimacy of any sort should be
disposed to such a course, he might go about it lawfully. And I did not limit you rigidly even to this, but at first
gave you three whole years in which to make your preparations, and later two. Yet not even so, by threatening,
or urging, or postponing, or entreating, have I accomplished anything. For you see for yourselves how much
more numerous you are than the married men, when you ought by this time to have provided us with as many
children besides, or rather with several times your number. How otherwise can families continue? How can the
State be preserved, if we neither marry nor have children? For surely you are not expecting men to spring up
from the ground to succeed to your goods and to the public interests, as the myths describe! And yet it is neither
right nor creditable that our race should cease, and the name of Romans be blotted out with us, and the city be
given over to foreigners — Greeks or even barbarians. Do we not free our slaves chiefly for the express purpose
of making out of them as many citizens as possible? And do we not give our allies a share in the government in
order that our numbers may increase? And do you, then, who are Romans from the beginning and claim as your
ancestors the famous Marcii, the Fabii, the Quintii, the Valerii, and the Julii, do you desire that your families
and names alike shall perish with you?…
9 “Therefore, fellow-citizens, — for I believe that I have now persuaded you both to hold fast to the name
of citizens and to secure the title of men and fathers as well, — I have administered this rebuke to you not
for my own pleasure but from necessity, and not as your enemy nor as one who hates you but rather
loving you and wishing to obtain many others like you, in order that we may have lawful homes to dwell
in and houses full of descendants, so that we may approach the gods together with our wives and our
children, and in partnership with one another may risk our all in equal measure and reap in like degree
the hopes we cherish in them. How, indeed, could I be a good ruler over you, if I could endure to see you
growing constantly fewer in number? How could I any longer be rightfully called father by you, if you
rear no children? Therefore, if you really hold me in affection, and particularly if you have given me this
title not out of flattery but as an honour, be eager now to become both men and fathers, in order that you
may not only share this title yourselves but may also justify it as applied to me.”
