The last two chapters explored how Roman thinkers used the metaphor of the body politic to respond to the increasing turbulence of Late Republican politics. Chapter 1 began with the Fable of the Belly, which figured the senate and people as interdependent parts of an autonomous organism. As civil strife exposed the difficulty of achieving consensus within this structural framework, however, imagery of a body that had lost its physical coherence began to proliferate. Chapter 2 traced a moralizing tradition that identified vices as contagions that had spread from the elite to the citizenry at large. Both chapters foregrounded the pivotal year of 63 bce, when Catiline and Cicero articulated two rival visions of the res publica on the senate floor. Catiline described the senate and people as two separate bodies that should be governed by different heads, challenging the ideal of civic unity and revealing his monarchical ambitions. Cicero rejected his proposal by comparing Rome to an organism sickened by statesmen acting against its interests. Identifying Catiline and his co-conspirators as malignancies in need of amputation, he portrayed himself as a civic healer dispensing remedies on behalf of the Republic. He maintained this persona even after his consulship came to an end, suggesting that exemplary statesmanship could serve as a solution to civil strife. He thereby joined Catiline in using organic imagery to rethink the relationship between the statesman and res publica.

Between the Battle of Actium and the Year of the Four Emperors, Roman thinkers reimagined the shape of their political community in response to the implementation of sole rule. In a process that began under Augustus, became explicit under Tiberius, and peaked under Nero, the models of the healer and the head of state converged around the figure of the princeps. Their divergent Republican pasts, however, invested them with very different Imperial trajectories. Thanks in large part to Cicero, the ideal of the civic healer had already been integrated into normative political language. As a result, it could be used to describe the nascent Principate with relative ease. Horace and Vergil took the first steps in this direction, while Ovid more fully exploited the political resonance of medical metaphors. It was only under Tiberius, however, that such rhetoric began to be systematically tied to the end of the civil wars. The head of state metaphor, in contrast, had regal connotations that located it outside the boundaries of acceptable political language. To employ it in relation to Augustus would have been an admission of his seizure of power and a violation of the still dominant paradigm of Roman Republicanism. Yet for a discourse community steeped in organic imagery, the comparison was ripe for exploitation. The next two chapters show how those writing under the early Principate responded to this quandary. Unwilling to use capital symbolism in relation to the present, they instead incorporated it into their narratives of the Republican past. By investing the head of state metaphor with the ancestral pedigree that it historically lacked, they eventually made it available for contemporary usage.

This story begins with Livy, whose first pentad identifies three phases in the life cycle of the Roman body politic: a regal corpus governed by a caput, an autonomous organism akin to that described in the Fable of the Belly, and a reconciliation of these two models under the exemplary leadership of Camillus. The carefully crafted imagistic arc culminates in the celebration of Camillus as the caput rei Romanae. Arguing that Rome has always relied on extraordinary statesmen for its success, Livy’s narrative resolves the apparent paradox of a Republican head of state. When the late Augustan poet Cornelius Severus praised Cicero as the patriae caput, he applied Livy’s historical lesson to more recent events. Around the same time, Ovid took the bold step of calling Augustus the caput orbis. Mining the ambiguity latent in this symbolism, his exilic poetry reveals an imagistic framework in the midst of transition. The fact of this transition confirms that Roman thinkers were under no illusions about the constitutional changes wrought after Actium. Figurative speech provided an avenue to explore them without transgressing the boundaries of a discourse community that remained committed to traditional modes of expression. In the place of a radical rupture in political language was a more gradual process of adaptation and accommodation over the span of half a century.

The Curative Powers of the Princeps

Over the course of the Principate, Augustus became the prototypical healer of the body politic in Roman political discourse. According to Tacitus, the supporters who gathered at his funeral justified his seizure of power in these terms: non aliud discordantis patriae remedium fuisse quam ut ab uno regeretur (“There was no other remedy for the strife-ridden country than to be ruled by one man,” Tac. Ann. 1.9.4). Identifying sole rule as the only viable remedy for discord, Tacitus articulates a key tenet of the apologia for the Principate that became normative during the second century ce.Footnote ¹ Dio puts the same sentiment in the mouth of Tiberius, whose eulogy for his adoptive father compares him to a physician: ὥσπερ τις ἰατρὸς ἀγαθὸς σῶμα νενοσηκὸς παραλαβὼν καὶ ἐξιασάμενος, ἀπέδωκε πάντα ὑμῖν ὑγιᾶ ποιήσας (“Like a good doctor taking hold of and curing a body that has grown ill, he handed back everything to you after making it healthy,” Cass. Dio 56.39.2).Footnote ² Tacitus and Dio were not alone in tracing the origins of this rhetorical tradition back to the Augustan era, but contemporary evidence suggests that the portrayal of the first princeps in these terms only emerged under Tiberius.Footnote ³ Those writing under Augustus were more circumspect about the long-term stakes of his position. They instead invoked the theme of healing in generalized terms, assigning curative powers to the princeps without explicitly tying them to the end of the civil wars. Even so, they facilitated the process by which Cicero’s ideal of the civic healer made its way into the burgeoning paradigm of Imperial panegyric. Their efforts exemplify the gradual reworking and renegotiation of Republican political language in a new constitutional context.

We might begin by asking whether Augustus played a role in the circulation of medical imagery in relation to his rule.Footnote ⁴ While there is little evidence that he actively encouraged his representation in these terms, he did cultivate a privileged relationship with Apollo, a deity linked to medicine, that might have pointed thinkers in this direction. As we saw in the last chapter, the relationship between the Julian gens and cult of Apollo went back to the fifth century bce. Caesar likely advertised the connection during his dictatorship, but it was Octavian who made it central to his public persona. By vowing the Temple of Apollo on the Palatine in 36 bce, he tied his victory in the civil wars to the god’s protection.Footnote ⁵ Apollo’s connection to healing became relevant when Gaius Sosius, an Antonian partisan, began restoration on the Temple of Apollo Medicus in 34 bce. T. P. Wiseman suggests that Sosius transformed the temple into “the monumentum of an enemy of the new regime.”Footnote ⁶ Whether Roman viewers interpreted the resulting monument in relation to the antipathy of the triumviral era or the clemency of Octavian, who pardoned Sosius, it is clear that Apollo Medicus had taken on a degree of political import.Footnote ⁷ Octavian’s connection to the temple was flagged through its dedication date, which was his birthday, and its pedimental sculptures, which featured an Amazonomachy applicable to his victory over Cleopatra.Footnote ⁸ It was reinforced through the circulation of the story about Atia’s coupling with Apollo, which identified the temple as the site of his conception.Footnote ⁹ The figurative significance of the relationship, however, was left to others to articulate.Footnote ¹⁰

In the first book of the Odes, published in 23 bce, Horace ties the medicinal powers of Apollo to the civic renewal over which the new princeps presided.Footnote ¹¹ This project takes center stage in Od. 1.21, which addresses Apollo, Diana, and Latona, the triad featured on the Palatine Temple of Apollo. Encouraging a chorus of children to direct their prayers towards these deities, Horace suggests that they will persuade Apollo to expel disease from the people and princeps: hic bellum lacrimosum, hic miseram famem | pestemque a populo et principe Caesare in | Persas atque Britannos | vestra motus aget prece (“He, moved by your prayer, will drive mournful war, terrible famine, and disease away from the people and Caesar as princeps and towards the Persians and Britons,” Hor. Od. 1.21.13–6).Footnote ¹² The traditional SPQR is replaced by populus et princeps, a revision of Republican political language that collapses the distinction between Rome’s citizenry and its first citizen.Footnote ¹³ The vitality of both is safeguarded by Apollo, who uses his healing powers to end violence at home and direct it towards enemies abroad.Footnote ¹⁴ The future tense of the verb, in turn, conveys confidence in the realization of this wish. Alluding to the Temple of Apollo Palatinus through his choice of dedicatees yet evoking the Temple of Apollo Medicus through his prayer, Horace integrates both monuments into a celebration of civic restoration. He returns to Apollo’s curative capacities in Od. 1.31, which addresses a prayer for health to the god, and Od. 1.32, in which Apollo’s lyre acts as a salve. While these poems address healing on a more personal level than Od. 1.21, they also assert the relevance of public life to the private pursuit of poetry.Footnote ¹⁵ They link Horace’s well-being with that of Rome, which is secured by the favor of Apollo. Insofar as the god’s beneficence stems from the honorific efforts of the princeps, the health of the res publica indirectly depends upon him.

Horace further develops this theme in the Carmen Saeculare, commissioned by Augustus for performance at the Secular Games in 17 bce.Footnote ¹⁶ The poem foregrounds imagery of a res publica that has been restored to its ancestral vitality.Footnote ¹⁷ After celebrating the abundance of crops nourished by Jupiter’s salubrious showers and breezes, Horace urges Apollo to put down his spear and become a pacific god.Footnote ¹⁸ Leaving “the Actian Apollo behind,” as Richard Thomas puts it, Horace recasts him as a god of peace.Footnote ¹⁹ Among the roles that he will now play is that of a healer: qui salutari levat arte fessos | corporis artus (“He who alleviates the wearied limbs of the body with his healing art,” Hor. Carm. saec. 63–4). Tying his medicinal abilities to the longevity of Rome, Horace continues, si Palatinas videt aequus aras, | remque Romanam Latiumque felix | alterum in lustrum meliusque semper | prorogat aevum (“If he looks favorably upon the Palatine altars, he extends Rome’s affairs and Latium’s fortune for another cycle and ever better age,” Hor. Carm. saec. 65–8). As the one who has secured the divine favor that will prolong the lifespan of the res publica, Augustus assumes implicit responsibility for the health of the body politic.Footnote ²⁰ This idea was reinforced by the prayer that the princeps delivered on the second night of the games, which enjoined the gods to increase the maiestas and imperium of the Roman people and secure their victoria and valetudo.Footnote ²¹ His supplication worked alongside Horace’s poem to harness the curative powers of Apollo on behalf of a renewed res publica.

At first glance, Vergil seems to complicate Horace’s effort to link the curative properties of Apollo to the figure of Augustus. A well-known passage from Aeneid 12 links the inefficacy of Apollonic medicine to the Julian gens. Describing how the physician Iapyx fails to heal Aeneas of the wound inflicted by Turnus, Vergil writes, multa manu medica Phoebique potentibus herbis | nequiquam trepidat (“With his healing hand and the potent herbs of Phoebus, he bustles about in vain,” Verg. Aen. 12.402–3). Implicating the god in the failure but providing no explanation for it, he simply comments, nihil auctor Apollo | subvenit (“Apollo’s counsel provides no help,” Verg. Aen. 12.405–6). Scholars have long puzzled over this scene, which seems to challenge the privileged relationship between Apollo Medicus and the ancestors of Augustus.Footnote ²² Yet Julia Hawkins points out that by deemphasizing Apollo’s curative abilities, Vergil is able to reassign them to Aeneas’ own mother.Footnote ²³ Disturbed by her son’s pain, Venus journeys to Crete to retrieve the medicinal herb dittany. Steeping it in river water and applying it to his wound, she cures her son in secret: occulte medicans (Verg. Aen. 12.418). Vergil’s characterization of Venus as a healer well-versed in botanical lore finds no parallel in extant Latin literature, though Hawkins points out that the goddess was linked to medical botany in the cult practices of the Greek East.Footnote ²⁴ Perhaps evoking this association, Vergil grants the Julian gens its own ancestral healing knowledge.Footnote ²⁵ He thereby joins Horace in connecting the princeps to the medical arts via a divine intermediary.Footnote ²⁶ Characteristic of a tradition that is just beginning to develop rather than one that is fully fledged, their shared project laid the conceptual groundwork for later engagements with this theme.

The earliest extant author to explicitly attribute healing powers to the princeps was G. Valgius Rufus, a member of Maecenas’ literary circle and suffect consul in 12 bce.Footnote ²⁷ The Elder Pliny reports that he left behind an unfinished treatise on medicinal herbs that was dedicated to Augustus. Summarizing its contents, Pliny writes, inchoata etiam praefatione religiosa, ut omnibus malis humanis illius potissimum principis semper mederetur maiestas (“His devout preface began with the hope that the maiestas of that princeps especially would always heal all human ills,” Plin. Nat. Hist. 25.4). Whereas Vergil and Horace implicitly connect Augustus to healing through Venus and Apollo, Valgius Rufus posits a more direct relationship. He promises to convey literal medical knowledge to the princeps, who already possesses figurative knowledge about healing mankind. In a particularly revealing formulation, he attributes these curative capacities to Augustus’ maiestas rather than his personage. A key constitutional innovation of the Principate was the evolution of maiestas from an attribute of the Roman people to one of the princeps. This transfer indicated the practical relocation of governing authority from the collective to the individual.Footnote ²⁸ Valgius Rufus reflects and reinforces the conceptual shift through the verb medeor, which frames the maiestas of Augustus as a boon to the res publica.Footnote ²⁹ Invoking the ills of humanity rather than those of Rome, however, he still stops short of portraying Augustus as an explicitly civic healer.

Ovid provides the most direct, yet also most ambivalent, evidence for Augustus’ curative capacities. Repeatedly figuring his expulsion from Rome as a wound (vulnus), his exilic poetry revolves around the search for a cure.Footnote ³⁰ The programmatic importance of this quest emerges in the opening poem of the Tristia, which asserts, namque ea vel nemo, vel qui mihi vulnera fecit | solus Achilleo tollere more potest (“For either no one is able to heal these wounds, or, in the fashion of Achilles, only the one who gave them to me can,” Ov. Tr. 1.1.99–100).Footnote ³¹ Ovid uses the tale of Telephus, who was wounded and healed by the spear of Achilles, as a mythological model for his quest to be absolved by the one who hurt him.Footnote ³² Identifying Augustus as both the source of and remedy for his wounds, he exposes the porous boundary between healing and harming. He returns to this idea in Book 5, explaining, Telephus aeterna consumptus tabe perisset, | si non, quae nocuit, dextra tulisset opem (“Telephus would have perished, consumed by an eternal infection, had not the hand that harmed him brought him aid,” Ov. Tr. 5.2.15–6). Making the analogous powers of Achilles and Augustus explicit, he continues, et mea, si facinus nullum commisimus, opto, | vulnera qui fecit, facta levare velit (“And my wounds, if I have committed no crime, I beg that he who made them be willing to heal them,” Ov. Tr. 5.2.17–8). In granting Augustus the ability to alleviate his injuries, Ovid portrays him as a healer in more explicit fashion than Horace or Vergil. Yet he also suggests that his medicinal powers derive from the same authority that allowed him to cause harm in the first place.Footnote ³³ Which path the princeps selects seems less important than the fact that he alone gets to decide.Footnote ³⁴

Whereas the Tristia chips away at the salience of the boundary of healing and harming, the Epistulae ex Ponto expresses skepticism towards the efficacy of medicine and its practitioners. This theme comes to the fore in Pont. 1.3, a poem addressed to G. Vibius Rufinus that stands out for its sustained medical imagery.Footnote ³⁵ Ovid opens the poem with the prospect of healing, thanking his addressee for restoring strength to a body wounded by a terrible blow (acerbo saucius ictu, Ov. Pont. 1.3.7).Footnote ³⁶ As quickly as he introduces the prospect of recovery, however, he withdraws it again: non tamen exhibuit tantas facundia vires, | ut mea sint dictis pectora sana tuis (“Nevertheless, your eloquence is not so strong that my heart is healed by your words,” Ov. Pont. 1.3.11–2).Footnote ³⁷ Rejecting the notion that time might act as a salve, he continues, tempore ducetur longo fortasse cicatrix: | horrent admotas vulnera cruda manus (“Perhaps one day a scar will form; the bloody wound shies from the application of a hand,” Ov. Pont. 1.3.15–6).Footnote ³⁸ Ovid crafts a striking personification of his wound, which shrinks away from the surgeon’s scalpel.Footnote ³⁹ Its hesitation stems from the limitations of medicine in curing inveterate diseases: non est in medico semper relevetur ut aeger: | interdum docta plus valet arte malum (“It is not always in the power of a physician to alleviate the sick: sometimes a disease is stronger than a learned art,” Ov. Pont. 1.3.17–8). Ovid’s earlier portrayal of Augustus as a healer inflects the pessimism of this poem with political significance. It raises the possibility that the damage inflicted by the princeps exceeds the therapy that he is able – or willing – to provide. His healing hand, the subject of so much attention in the Tristia, largely recedes from view in the Epistulae ex Ponto. It is replaced by imagery of a wound left to fester: vulneris id genus est quod, cum sanabile non sit, | non contrectari tutius esse puto (“The wound is of such a sort that, since it cannot be cured, I think it safer not to be touched” Ov. Pont. 2.2.57–8).Footnote ⁴⁰ Although the symbolism is oriented towards Ovid’s personal experience of the political world, it carries troubling ramifications for all those whose well-being depends upon the beneficence of the princeps.

Ovid’s medical metaphors complicate the panegyrical overtones of earlier Augustan poetry, mining the ambiguities latent in a rhetorical tradition that proliferated amid the conflicts of the Late Republic. Those writing under Tiberius did not sustain his line of critique, though it would emerge once more under Claudius and Nero. They instead began to make explicit that at which the Augustan poets only hinted: that the establishment of the Principate had cured a body politic ravaged by civil strife. Yet it was only in hindsight that they could perceive Rome’s regeneration so clearly. Those who lived through the civil wars were enthusiastic at the prospect of Augustan healing but uncertain of its long-term ramifications. Their reticence makes an important point about political discourse during this era. Many of the linguistic and conceptual innovations that strike us as “Augustan” in fact crystallized under Tiberius. Only after Rome had been at peace for half a century did its thinkers begin to see sole rule as the remedy for civil war. In the formative years of the Principate, this lesson was far from self-evident.

Historicizing the Head of State

In the preface to his monumental history, Livy advertises his interest in reprising and reworking the theme of moral and civic decline considered in the last chapter.Footnote ⁴¹ He combines organic and structural metaphors to contrast Rome’s illustrious past with its degenerate present, writing, labante deinde paulatim disciplina velut dissidentes primo mores sequatur animo, deinde ut magis magisque lapsi sint, tum ire coeperint praecipites, donec ad haec tempora quibus nec vitia nostra nec remedia pati possumus perventum est (“Then let [the reader] note how, with discipline slipping bit by bit, at first morals crumbled, as it were, then declined more and more, then began to accelerate headlong, until we arrived at the present times, when we can bear neither our vices nor their cure,” Liv. Praef. 9).Footnote ⁴² Like Sallust and Varro, Livy figures moral corruption as a disease that has infected the Roman citizenry at large.Footnote ⁴³ Whereas they remain silent on the question of a cure, he confirms the existence of remedia that might restore Rome to health. The treatments to which he alludes have long been debated; Augustus’ failed marriage legislation was once viewed as a likely referent, but one-man rule has since gained interpretive favor.Footnote ⁴⁴ In my view, however, the ambiguity is productive. It reflects the uncertainty of the era, in which neither the long-term rule of Augustus nor the establishment of a new constitutional form were clear.Footnote ⁴⁵ Unwilling to take an explicit stance on these questions, Livy leaves it to his readers to fill in the blanks. His use of the plural works to similar ends, allowing for the possibility of multiple remedies that operate at different levels in the text.Footnote ⁴⁶ Foremost among them in the preface is the practice of historiography, the therapeutic power of which is conveyed through adjectives of good health (salubre ac frugiferum, Liv. Praef. 10). By examining the customs and policies that enabled the ancestral vitality of the body politic, he suggests, readers might be able to chart a course back to its contemporary regeneration.

In the first pentad of his history, Livy depicts a civic organism that changes its shape in response to constitutional developments. This arc begins with Romulus, who is identified as the king and father of the city in Book 1 (regem parentemque urbis Romanae, Liv. 1.16.3).Footnote ⁴⁷ Equating his establishment of the law with the creation of a body politic, Livy writes, rebus divinis rite perpetratis vocataque ad concilium multitudine quae coalescere in populi unius corpus nulla re praeterquam legibus poterat, iura dedit (“After divine matters were properly established and the crowd was called to the assembly, he gave it a system of law, for it was not able to coalesce into the body of a single people by any means except through laws,” Liv. 1.8.1). Like Cicero’s Scipio, Livy makes a clear distinction between a crowd (multitudo) and a people (populus); the former might reside in the same place, but the latter share the same values.Footnote ⁴⁸ The codification of these values into a legal system enables the realization of a civic community.Footnote ⁴⁹ The key term corpus, reinforced through the verb coalesco, signifies the shift. This cohesive organism serves an ideal that the Roman citizenry will struggle to sustain over the course of the first pentad.Footnote ⁵⁰

The unity of the body politic established by Romulus is first called into question in the power vacuum created by his death.Footnote ⁵¹ Faced with choosing a new king, the Romans and Sabines begin to sort themselves along ethnic lines. The problem, Livy explains, is that each side wants the new king to be drawn from its own body: sui corporis creari regem volebant (Liv. 1.17.2). The emergence of these separate bodies looks back to the Rape of the Sabine Women, a crisis only recently resolved through the merging of two rival political communities into one: civitatem unam ex duabus faciunt (Liv. 1.13.4).Footnote ⁵² Although this legend rendered Rome a city doubled from its earliest years (geminata urbe, Liv. 1.13.5), it was still able to achieve concord under the command of Romulus. In his absence, however, division threatens to devolve into factionalism (factionibus inter ordines certabatur, Liv. 1.17.1). Drawing on the language of Late Republican politics, Livy locates the Romans and Sabines in the roles later played by the senate and people. He describes a body politic predicated upon social divisions but able to overcome them under specific historical conditions. With the removal of these conditions, however, civic cohesion is called into question.

The potential conflict between the Romans and Sabines soon finds resolution through their mutual commitment to kingship as the best form of government. Their consensus on this question allows them to overcome the divergence of their private interests: in variis voluntatibus regnari tamen omnes volebant (“Amid their various wishes, all nevertheless wanted to be ruled,” Liv. 1.17.3). Livy rearticulates this wish figuratively as the shared desire for a head: et esse igitur aliquod caput placebat (“And it was therefore pleasing that there be some sort of head,” Liv. 1.17.4). The leading citizens settle upon Numa Pompilius, who takes on the constitutional role of king and the figurative role of head of state. Livy stresses these dual roles at his inauguration, where the augur prays, ‘Iuppiter pater, si est fas hunc Numam Pompilium cuius ego caput teneo regem Romae esse … ’ (“Father Jupiter, if it is right that this Numa Pompilius, whose head I hold, be king of Rome … ” Liv. 1.18.9).Footnote ⁵³ Setting up a parallel between Numa, caput, and rex, Livy confirms the initially regal resonance of capital imagery in his narrative. By tying it to an exemplary founder of the res publica, however, he strips it of the negative associations familiar from Late Republican discourse. Monarchy and its attendant symbolism serve as the initial solution to discord, which becomes a recurrent theme in subsequent books.Footnote ⁵⁴

The association of the head with kingly command reappears in the relationship that Livy constructs between Rome and the territory under its control. He first figures Rome as the head of the world upon the apotheosis of Romulus, who appears in a vision to Proculus Julius and commands, ‘Abi, nuntia’ inquit ‘Romanis, caelestes ita velle ut mea Roma caput orbis terrarum sit’ (“‘Go now,’ he said, ‘announce to the Romans, that the heavens wish my Rome to be the head of the whole world,’” Liv. 1.16.7).Footnote ⁵⁵ As Claude Nicolet points out, these words mark the first instance of the caput orbis figure in Latin literature.Footnote ⁵⁶ They are used to naturalize Rome’s imperial prerogative, an idea that becomes even more explicit in a later scene of Latin surrender: ea erat confessio caput rerum Romam esse (“This constituted a confession that Rome was the head of everything,” Liv. 1.45.3).Footnote ⁵⁷ Rome’s occupation of this role is traced back to the discovery of a human head in the soil of the Capitoline Hill.Footnote ⁵⁸ While Late Republican writers were familiar with this legend, as we saw in Chapter 1, they oriented it towards the etymology of Capitolium rather than the project of empire. Livy, in contrast, declares, quae visa species haud per ambages arcem eam imperii caputque rerum fore portendebat (“Such a sight not at all ambiguously portended that it would be the citadel of empire and the head of the world,” Liv. 1.55.6).Footnote ⁵⁹ His words establish the programmatic importance of the caput as a signifier of Roman hegemony in the text, one that recurs at the ends of Books 1, 5, and 30.Footnote ⁶⁰ It operates both externally and internally in the first pentad, denoting the absolute authority that Rome exercises over its empire and that the rex exercises over the res publica.Footnote ⁶¹ As long as the body politic remains under regal rule, this symbolism can operate unproblematically in both contexts.

Because Livy links the head of state metaphor to the rule of kings, the expulsion of Tarquinius Superbus prompts a shift in the shape of the body politic. Livy encourages this reading by framing the foundation of the Republic as a process of organic maturation. If liberty had been achieved too soon (libertatis immaturae, Liv. 2.1.3), he explains, the young res publica would have succumbed to civil strife. Like a wheat field, it had to ripen before it could harvest the fruits of liberty: dissipatae res nondum adultae discordia forent, quas fovit tranquilla moderatio imperii eoque nutriendo perduxit ut bonam frugem libertatis maturis iam viribus ferre posset (“The res publica – not yet grown – would have been destroyed by discord; yet the peaceful moderation of command fostered and nurtured it to such a point that it was able to bear the fruits of liberty with its strength already matured,” Liv. 2.1.6).Footnote ⁶² Livy’s description of the kings rearing the young res publica merges a metaphor of farming with one of human development.Footnote ⁶³ A similar metaphor appears in Cicero, who portrayed Romulus raising a novus populus from the crib (in cunabulis) to young adulthood (adultum iam et paene puberem, Cic. Rep. 2.21). Both thinkers compare monarchy to parental supervision to posit the necessity of sole rule to the constitutional development of Rome. Yet whereas Cicero envisions a community that nears maturity by the end of Romulus’ reign, Livy proposes a longer period of development. In doing so, he establishes civic strength (vires) as a precondition for Republican governance. Only a body politic that has achieved the former, he suggests, can reap the rewards of the latter.

Livy identifies discord as the primary threat that the Republic faces in its early years. Nearly as soon as self-governance is implemented, factionalism takes root between the patricians and plebeians. It is initially tied to the problem of debt bondage, which produces a form of class-based resentment akin to a disease: civitas secum ipsa discors intestino inter patres plebemque flagrabat odio (“The political community was at war with itself and burning with intestinal hatred between the senate and people,” Liv. 2.23.1).Footnote ⁶⁴ The fever metaphor implicit in flagro becomes more pronounced as popular resentment festers (invidiamque eam sua sponte gliscentem) and bursts into flame (accendit) via the body of an old man covered in scars (Liv. 2.23.2). His decrepit frame, marked by filth (squalore), paleness (pallore), and emaciation (macie), signifies the plight of the plebeians in microcosm (Liv. 2.23.3). Comparing usurers to a gangrenous infection (velut tabem), the old man offers his own injuries as proof of their rapacity (Liv. 2.23.6). Only after unrest spreads through the city (passim totam urbem pervadit, Liv. 2.23.7) does the senate meet to discuss a potential cure (remediis, Liv. 2.23.15). Yet their debate is interrupted by news of an impending Volscian attack, an external threat that finally prompts the senate and people to recognize that discord has divided their community into two (duas ex una civitate discordia fecerat, Liv. 2.24.1).Footnote ⁶⁵ Importing a familiar signifier of civil strife into his portrait of the fifth century bce, Livy confirms that the structural conflict between the senate and people was woven into the fabric of the Republic from its origins. While some Roman writers stressed its generative nature, Livy more often represents it as an obstacle to the realization of civic health.Footnote ⁶⁶ Writing in the aftermath of the civil wars, he was highly attuned to the vulnerability of a political community whose internal differences prevented the realization of common ends.

It is within this context that Menenius Agrippa delivers the Fable of the Belly in Book 2.Footnote ⁶⁷ Although the myth existed independently of Livy’s narration, it gains interpretive significance from the thematic framework in which it is situated.Footnote ⁶⁸ Menenius crafts his speech in response to the problem of the doubled res publica, which finds practical expression in the withdrawal of the plebeians to the Sacred Mount. Seeking to naturalize concord in a political community inclined towards its opposite, he cites the example of the human body. The body might seem like the perfect illustration of cooperation and harmony, he explains, but it was not always this way: tempore quo in homine non ut nunc omnia in unum consentiant, sed singulis membris suum cuique consilium, suus sermo fuerit (“There was a time when all the parts in a person did not agree as one, as they do now, but individual members had their own judgment and their own speech,” Liv. 2.32.9). The members fell into disagreement because they lacked a shared sense of the greater whole to which they contributed. Each could only see itself, a point underscored through the repetition of suus throughout the fable. Their blinkered perspective led them to suspect injustice in the distribution of responsibilities between the belly, which seemed to eat all the food, and the members, which seemed to do all the work in procuring it: indignatas reliquas partes sua cura, suo labore ac ministerio ventri omnia quaeri, ventrem in medio quietum nihil aliud quam datis voluptatibus frui (“The other parts were aggravated that everything was obtained for the belly by their care, by their effort and aid, and that the belly, resting in the middle, did nothing but enjoy the pleasures it was given,” Liv. 2.32.9). Rather than detailing the contributions of each of the aggrieved members, as Dionysius does (Dion. Hal. Ant. Rom. 6.86.2), Livy sacrifices specificity to construct a simple dichotomy that maps onto the patrician–plebeian divide. Embarking on an ill-fated plot to starve the belly, the members demonstrate the unviability of a political community that prioritizes individual interests over collective needs.Footnote ⁶⁹

In explaining the rebellion of the members as the result of an error in judgment rather than a response to inequity, Menenius confirms the senatorial orientation of his analogy.Footnote ⁷⁰ He suggests that the aim of the members’ strike was not to redistribute resources within the body, but to subjugate the belly: hac ira, dum ventrem fame domare vellent, ipsa una membra totumque corpus ad extremam tabem venisse (“Because of this anger, while they wanted to subdue the belly with hunger, every one of the members and the whole body wasted away,” Liv. 2.32.10).Footnote ⁷¹ The key word tabes puts Menenius in dialogue with the scarred old man, who used the same metaphor to describe patrician greed.Footnote ⁷² Menenius counters his claim by suggesting that plebeian discontent is a disease too. It is not only exploitative creditors, but also ungrateful borrowers, who threaten the vitality of the Republic. Less important than the assignation of blame, however, is the mutual recognition of interdependence.Footnote ⁷³ As parts of one organism, he suggests, neither the belly nor members could exist on their own. As soon as the members came to appreciate that fact, they abandoned their revolt and yielded their individual autonomy to the collective good. According to Livy, the plebeians soon followed suit: comparando hinc quam intestina corporis seditio similis esset irae plebis in patres, flexisse mentes hominum (“By comparing in this way how the intestinal sedition of the body was similar to the anger of the plebeians towards the patricians, he changed the minds of men,” Liv. 2.32.12). Reinvesting themselves in a political order predicated upon their subordination, they descended from the Sacred Mount and reestablished the civic unity towards which the speech aims.Footnote ⁷⁴ The subsequent creation of the tribunate validates their decision, confirming their ability to achieve legal protections without challenging senatorial prerogative.Footnote ⁷⁵ In this way, Menenius Agrippa’s retelling of the Fable of the Belly justifies a paternalistic model of politics in which the rights of the people are secured through their deference to the senate.Footnote ⁷⁶

Livy positions the Fable of the Belly as a new model of the body politic that represents the transition from monarchical to Republican governance.Footnote ⁷⁷ He stresses the stakes of the transition by omitting the caput from Menenius’ analogy, despite its inclusion in other versions of the myth.Footnote ⁷⁸ No longer able to rely on a king to secure concord, the patricians and plebeians must now achieve this ideal on their own. Livy initially expresses faith in their ability to do so, declaring the problem of discord to have been “cured” in the aftermath of the First Secession (domi sanata discordia, Liv. 2.34.1). Observing the Romans from afar, however, their Etruscan enemies are less convinced. They are among the first to identify discordia intestina (Liv. 2.44.7) as an obstacle standing between Rome and the realization of its imperial ambitions: principesque in omnium Etruriae populorum conciliis fremebant aeternas opes esse Romanas nisi inter semet ipsi seditionibus saeviant (“And the leading men in the councils of all the Etrurian peoples were grumbling that Rome’s power would be permanent unless they turned against each other through dissensions,” Liv. 2.44.8). They elaborate upon this idea within the imagistic parameters set by the text, identifying discord as a poison uniquely capable of killing empires: id unum venenum, eam labem civitatibus opulentis repertam ut magna imperia mortalia essent (“This was the one poison, the one instability found in wealthy civic communities that could make great empires mortal,” Liv. 2.44.8).Footnote ⁷⁹ In their evocation of a sick body with venenum and an unstable building with labes, the Etruscans employ the same metaphors of decline that structure Livy’s preface. The resonance confirms the contemporary stakes of the questions with which the first pentad engages. Foremost among them is whether the realization of civic cohesion is feasible in a political community that lacks the unifying command of a head of state.

Livy uses the speech of the Etruscans to engage in a familiar debate in Greek and Roman philosophy over the susceptibility of political communities to the cycles of growth and decay that afflict other organisms.Footnote ⁸⁰ In his influential theory of anacyclosis, Polybius employs a biological analogy to explain the constitutional trajectories of monarchy, aristocracy, and democracy, all of which experience cycles of growth, acme, and decline in accordance with natural law.Footnote ⁸¹ The advantage of Rome’s mixed constitution lay in its ability to slow, but not avert, the cycle.Footnote ⁸² Polybius makes this clear when he promises to provide his readers with knowledge not only of Rome’s birth (τῆς συστάσεως), growth (τῆς αὐξήσεως), and peak (τῆς ἀκμῆς), but also of its future degeneration (τῆς εἰς τοὔμπαλιν ἐσομένης ἐκ τούτων μεταβολῆς, Polyb. 6.9.12–13). Just as this πολιτεία arose naturally, he asserts, so too will it decline naturally: κατὰ φύσιν ἕξειν καὶ τὴν εἰς τἀναντία μεταβολήν (“It will also have its contrary decline according to nature,” Polyb. 6.9.13).Footnote ⁸³ Polybius goes on to identify two vices that contribute to the decline of the mixed constitution: the love of office and the extravagant display of wealth (Polyb. 6.57.6).Footnote ⁸⁴ He thereby anticipates, and perhaps serves as the inspiration for, Sallust’s portrayal of ambitio and avaritia as the primary diseases responsible for the degeneration of the Roman body politic.Footnote ⁸⁵

Cicero revised Polybius’ theory of anacyclosis to allow for the possibility, if not probability, of an immortal res publica. In the Pro Rabirio Perduellionis, he urged his fellow citizens to be on guard against intestinal ills (intestinis malis) if they desire an immortal political community (immortalem hanc civitatem) and permanent empire (aeternum hoc imperium, Cic. Rab. Perd. 33).Footnote ⁸⁶ In the Pro Marcello, he cast the immortal res publica as an ideal put at risk by its dependence upon the mortal Caesar: doleoque, cum res publica immortalis esse debeat, eam in unius mortalis anima consistere (“I am saddened that the res publica depends upon the life of one man, since it should be immortal,” Cic. Marcell. 22). Both speeches suggest that Romans should work towards the goal of civic immortality but warn of significant obstacles to its realization.Footnote ⁸⁷ Cicero makes a similar point in the third book of De Republica, where Laelius says, tamen de posteris nostris et de illa immortalitate rei publicae sollicitor, quae poterat esse perpetua si patriis viveretur institutis et moribus (“Yet I worry about our descendants and about that immortality of the res publica, which could be eternal, if life were conducted according to ancestral habits and customs,” Cic. Rep. 3.41). James Zetzel argues that Laelius’ counterfactual denies the realizability of civic immortality in the present; Rome “could be, but is no longer, eternal.”Footnote ⁸⁸ His pessimistic reading of the passage is echoed by Atkins, who stresses the disjuncture between Laelius’ words and his insistence upon the contingency, temporality, and change that govern human affairs. “In assigning the attribute of eternality to political affairs,” he writes, “Laelius is reduced to grasping at straws.”Footnote ⁸⁹ Even as Cicero pursues a more optimistic line of analysis than Polybius, then, he too confronts the unlikelihood of a res publica immortalis. Livy’s Etruscans draw on this tradition in their identification of discord as the poison that will make Rome mortal. As long as class-based antagonisms continue to fester, the Republican body politic will eventually begin to decline.

At the conclusion of Book 2, Livy confirms the prescience of the Etruscans’ analysis. Reporting the return of discord to a body politic only recently reunified through the Fable of the Belly, he details a conflict between the patricians and plebeians that nearly reaches the point of bloodshed. In an effort to calm the anger of the consul Appius Claudius and restore order, his fellow senators urge him to recognize the fractured state of their community: dum consules tribunique ad se quisque omnia trahant, nihil relictum esse virium in medio; distractam laceratamque rem publicam (“While the consuls and tribunes were all taking everything for themselves, no strength was left to be shared; the res publica had been ripped apart and mangled,” Liv. 2.57.3). Livy crafts their words in unmistakable dialogue with Sallust, who describes factionalism in the Late Republic in the same terms: res publica, quae media fuerat, dilacerata (Sall. Iug. 41.5). Yet the similarity of their language belies a difference in their political perspectives. As we saw in Chapter 1, Sallust correlates the res publica dilacerata with a period of decline caused by the downfall of Carthage. Prior to this point, he represents the struggle between the senate and people as conducive to civic vitality. Livy, in contrast, describes discord as a weakness rather than strength of the Republic from its foundation. He consistently identifies it as a malum, morbus, contagio, and venenum that prevents the realization of consensus upon which a healthy body politic is based.Footnote ⁹⁰ It is for this reason that Kapust classifies Livy as a “consensualist” rather than “antagonistic” Republican.Footnote ⁹¹ The organic imagery of the first pentad supports this view; it frames the patrician–plebeian divide as an obstacle to, rather than component of, Rome’s success.

Book 3 uses the descent of a plague to literalize the failure of the organic ideal laid out by Menenius Agrippa.Footnote ⁹² Livy heralds the arrival of an annus pestilens (Liv. 3.6.2) that sees the spread of a morbus through the countryside and city. Counted among the dead are both consuls, as well as most of the senators and men of military age. Summing up the scope of the catastrophe, he writes, deserta omnia, sine capite, sine viribus (“Everything was abandoned, without a head and without strength,” Liv. 3.7.1). The caput, appearing for the first time since Book 1, denotes the absence of political leadership in Rome, which has been deprived of its magistrates and leading citizens. As discord brews within this power vacuum, L. Quinctius Cincinnatus proposes the appointment of a dictator, explaining, non ita civitatem aegram esse ut consuetis remediis sisti possit; dictatore opus esse rei publicae (“The sickness in the civic community was not one that could be cured with typical remedies; the res publica needed a dictator,” Liv. 3.20.8). He does not call for a head of state, suggesting the unavailability of this regally inflected symbol in Republican political discourse. He instead invokes the Ciceronian ideal of a civic healer able to remediate ills both literal and figurative. His fellow citizens are initially unwilling to consider his proposal, fearful of concentrating so much power into the hands of one man. As the threat of enemy armies grows too large to ignore, however, they realize their mistake. Persuading him to leave his farm and return to Rome, they appoint him to the dictatorship (Liv. 3.26–9). His subsequent success within this role confirms the efficacy of individual authority, as opposed to patrician–plebeian cooperation, in remediating the problem of civil strife.Footnote ⁹³

In Book 3, the Roman citizenry experiments with another solution to the conflict between the patricians and plebeians: the second decemvirate.Footnote ⁹⁴ Livy portrays this constitutional innovation as another stage in the life cycle of the body politic, writing, anno trecentesimo altero quam condita Roma erat iterum mutatur forma civitatis, ab consulibus ad decemviros (“In the three hundred and second year after the foundation of Rome, the shape of the political community changed again, from consuls to decemvirs,” Liv. 3.33.1). Although he notes that the significance of the change (mutatio) was lessened by its brevity (non diuturna), he devotes a significant portion of Book 3 to illustrating its corrosive effects.Footnote ⁹⁵ Looking back to the metaphor of the wheat field that announced the foundation of the Republic, he compares the decemvirate to a fruit that matured too quickly and began to rot: Laeta enim principia magistratus eius nimis luxuriavere; eo citius lapsa res est (“For the prosperous beginnings of this office ripened too quickly; it therefore quickly perished,” Liv. 3.33.2). The verb luxurio, used to describe both the excessive ripening of a plant and the swelling of a body, foregrounds the organic stakes of the decemvirate, which risks accelerating the life cycle of the res publica.Footnote ⁹⁶ The tyranny of the decemvirs culminates in the death of Verginia, which has long been interpreted as a figurative assault on the body politic.Footnote ⁹⁷ The deleterious effects of this constitutional innovation confirm its failure as a solution to the perennial problem of patrician–plebeian strife.

The corruption of the second decemvirate and the temporary nature of the dictatorship point to the need for a more permanent remedy for the perpetually beleaguered body politic. A speech delivered by the staunch patrician Appius Claudius in Book 5 confirms that it will not be found in the model of the civic healer. Comparing tribunes to physicians who profit by keeping their patients sick, he says, sic hercule, tamquam artifices improbi, opus quaerunt et semper aegri aliquid esse in re publica volunt, ut sit ad cuius curationem a vobis adhibeantur (“By Hercules, like quack physicians, they seek employment and always want there to be a disease in the res publica, so that there is something for you to invite them to cure,” Liv. 5.3.6).Footnote ⁹⁸ Exploiting Roman skepticism towards Greek medicine and its practitioners, Appius Claudius encourages his audience to view the tribunes with suspicion. Later in his speech, he addresses the tribunes directly and accuses them of treating the symptoms while worsening the disease: haec sunt, tribuni, consilia vestra, non hercule dissimilia ac si quis aegro qui curari se fortiter passus extemplo convalescere possit, cibi gratia praesentis aut potionis longinquum et forsitan insanabilem morbum efficiat (“These are your plans, tribunes, not at all different, by Hercules, than if someone should make a sick man’s disease lasting and perhaps incurable by granting his wish for food and drink, when he could have recovered immediately by allowing himself to be treated vigorously,” Liv. 5.5.12).Footnote ⁹⁹ His analogy recalls the conclusion of the First Catilinarian, when Cicero argues that expelling Catiline alone is akin to giving cold water to a feverish patient (Cic. Cat. 1.31). A treatment for the symptom rather than disease, the remedy will only worsen the condition of the body politic over time. The allusion allows Livy to import the factionalism of the Late Republic into his portrayal of Archaic politics once more. The inefficacy of the tribunician healers whom Appius Claudius castigates looks ahead to the failure of the senatorial healers upon whom Cicero calls. Whether representatives of the senate or people, the physicians to the body politic seem to exacerbate the social antagonisms they intend to remedy. This model of statesmanship therefore does not provide a viable way out of civil strife.

In Book 5, Livy explores a final possibility for remediating the patrician–plebeian divide: the physical separation of the Roman citizenry into two cities. Accomplished through a mass migration to Veii, the proposal is put forward by the tribunes amid multiplex seditio (Liv. 5.24.4). They argue that a political community can be divided into two parts without losing its unity: duasque urbes communi re publica incoli a populo Romano posse (“Two cities could be inhabited by the Roman people while the res publica remained shared,” Liv. 5.24.8). Yet the patricians recognize the impossibility of such a bargain, asking, quippe nunc in una urbe tantum dissensionum esse: quid in duabus urbibus fore? (“Seeing as there was so much dissension in one city, how much would there be in two cities?” Liv. 5.24.10). In their view, the literal division of the city would only magnify the symbolic dissolution of the res publica.Footnote ¹⁰⁰ On the day of the vote, they approach each of the tribes and beg them not to turn the Roman people into an exile bereft of its native soil: ne exsulem, extorrem populum Romanum ab solo patrio (Liv. 5.30.6). The comparison grants the plebeians a body of their own but one that is no longer Roman and therefore unworthy of inhabitance. The move to Veii is subsequently abandoned, proving that the senate and people have not lost their faith in the ideal of organic wholeness, but are simply unable to find a path to its realization.

Rather than exiling themselves, the tribunes instead inflict this punishment on M. Furius Camillus, a statesman whose prominence in the city derives from both his military exploits and his conciliatory politics.Footnote ¹⁰¹ Voluntarily leaving the city rather than participating in a sham trial, Camillus is last seen delivering a prayer that his ungrateful community recognize the error in its ways. Anticipating the events to come, Livy blames the Gallic Sack on the banishment of the one citizen who could have averted the disaster: expulso cive quo manente, si quicquam humanorum certi est, capi Roma non potuerat, adventante fatali urbi clade legati ab Clusinis veniunt auxilium adversus Gallos petentes (“After the expulsion of that citizen whose presence could have prevented the capture of Rome, if anything of human affairs is certain, deadly destruction approached the city and ambassadors arrived from Clusium seeking help against the Gauls,” Liv. 5.33.1). Without Camillus’ guidance, the Roman citizenry becomes paralyzed by discord yet again. Unable to agree upon the appointment of a dictator to respond to the marauding Gauls, it has only itself to blame for what comes next. In this way, Livy frames the destruction of the city as an act of figurative self-harm rooted in civil strife.Footnote ¹⁰²

The Sack of Rome marks the climax of Livy’s first pentad and the death of the civic organism operative in Books 2–5. Because Romans analogized their city to a physical body, with the Capitoline as its head, the gates as its senses, the treasury as its intestines, and the Cloaca Maxima as its bowels, they were primed to interpret its destruction in corporeal terms.Footnote ¹⁰³ Livy invites this reading by comparing those who witnessed the invasion from the Capitoline Hill to mourners at a funeral: quocumque clamor hostium, mulierum puerorumque ploratus, sonitus flammae et fragor ruentium tectorum avertisset, paventes ad omnia animos oraque et oculos flectebant, velut ad spectaculum a fortuna positi occidentis patriae (“Wherever the shouts of the enemies, the wails of women and children, the thundering of the flames, and the crashing of falling buildings had captured their attention, they fearfully turned their minds and faces and eyes to all these things, as if placed by Fortune at the spectacle of their dying homeland,” Liv. 5.42.4). Evoking the sounds of funereal lamentations and the crackling flames of a pyre, Livy suggests that the corpse on display is that of Rome itself. Its death plays an integral role in the cycle of history governing the text. Only a political community that has died, after all, can experience the rebirth that scholars have long identified at the beginning of Book 6 (secunda origo, Liv. 6.1.1).Footnote ¹⁰⁴ With this revival comes a new model of the body politic to replace that of the Fable of the Belly.

In the concluding chapters of Book 5, Livy looks ahead to the shape that this new body politic will take. While the Gauls are occupied with pillage and plunder, residents from the countryside begin to gather with allied Latins in Veii and hatch a plan to recapture Rome. Describing the gradual growth of their strength (viresque crescebant, Liv. 5.46.4), Livy compares the group to a maturing body: maturum iam videbatur repeti patriam eripique ex hostium manibus; sed corpori valido caput deerat (“It seemed that the time was now ripe for the country to be taken back and snatched from enemy hands; but a head was lacking to the strong body,” Liv. 5.46.5). His phrasing recalls the opening of Book 2, where the new Republic is described in similar terms (maturis iam viribus, Liv. 2.1.6). Whereas the Republican body politic is shaped without reference to a head of state, however, those assembled in Veii realize they need one to survive. Their openness to this model of authority suggests that the res publica is entering a new stage in its evolution. The ramifications of their decision are nevertheless limited by the military context in which it is made. Because the sphere of war admitted stronger forms of individual authority than that of peace, it was less jarring to refer to a caput in this context.Footnote ¹⁰⁵ Whether capital symbolism will make its way into the domestic sphere is a question that Livy initially leaves unanswered.

Seeking a statesman to take on the head of state role, those gathered in Veii think of the banished Camillus: locus ipse admonebat Camilli (“The place itself reminded them of Camillus,” Liv. 5.46.6). Now in need of the sort of strong leader they once feared, they decide to recall him from his exile in Ardea and appoint him to the dictatorship. The application of capital symbolism to this office, a possibility raised but not realized in Book 3, suggests the adaptation of a once regal metaphor to the parameters of Republican magistracy. Livy emphasizes that this adaptation takes place in response to public consensus and in accordance with constitutional norms: consensu omnium placuit ab Ardea Camillum acciri, sed antea consulto senatu qui Romae esset: adeo regebat omnia pudor discriminaque rerum prope perditis rebus servabant (“By the consensus of all it was decided to recall Camillus from Ardea, but only after the senate was consulted in Rome: to such an extent was propriety ruling everything, and were they protecting the distinctions of matters, even though things were nearly ruined,” Liv. 5.46.7). The insistence of those in Veii upon following legal procedures confirms that they see themselves as legal representatives of the res publica.Footnote ¹⁰⁶ That the senate accepts their status as such is suggested by its response: it agrees to recall Camillus from exile through the comitia curiata and appoint him dictator in absentia. Acknowledging that it is unclear whether Camillus departed from Ardea before or after the appointment was completed, Livy writes that it is preferable to believe (quod magis credere libet) that he waited for the law to be passed so that he did not violate the will of the people (iniussu populi, Liv. 5.46.11). Livy thereby betrays his own investment in a narrative in which the authority of Camillus is constitutionally sanctioned. Republican customs set the boundaries within which Camillus becomes the head of state, allowing the metaphor to shed its regal heritage.

As Book 5 comes to an end, Livy confirms the vitality of the new body politic over which Camillus presides. Its health is thrown into sharp relief by the descent of a plague on the Gauls (Gallos pestilentia, Liv. 5.48.1). Their illness mirrors that suffered earlier by the Romans and renders them equally vulnerable to attack. They are subsequently expelled from the city by the Veiian collective, a victory that prompts Camillus to be heralded as the savior of Rome: Romulus ac parens patriae conditorque alter urbis haud vanis laudibus appellabatur (“He was praised in not at all empty terms as Romulus and father of the country and another founder of the city,” Liv. 5.49.7). Through these titles, Livy introduces the intertwined themes of rebirth and refoundation, which will extend into and peak in the opening of Book 6.Footnote ¹⁰⁷ He reinforces the parallel between the two founding fathers at the conclusion of Book 5, when Camillus delivers a speech to discourage another proposed move to Veii. Reminding his fellow citizens of the prophesy that Romulus delivered in Book 1, he asserts, hic Capitolium est, ubi quondam capite humano invento responsum est eo loco caput rerum summamque imperii fore (“Here is the Capitoline, where it was once said upon the discovery of a human head that this spot would be the head of the world and peak of empire,” Liv. 5.54.7).Footnote ¹⁰⁸ In assigning the same speech to both founders, Livy ties Rome’s imperial ambitions to its exemplary statesmen. The success of expansion abroad, he suggests, depends upon having a viable head of state at home.

Because Camillus becomes the head of state through the office of the dictatorship and in the context of a military crisis, it is initially uncertain whether this model of authority will remain operative in peacetime. The opening chapter of Book 6, however, suggests that his extraordinary position in the body politic extends beyond the Gallic crisis. It begins with an extended organic metaphor that makes the rebirth of Rome explicit in the narrative: clariora deinceps certioraque ab secunda origine velut ab stirpibus laetius feraciusque renatae urbis gesta domi militiaeque exponentur (“Hereafter the civil and martial deeds of the reborn city will be set forth more clearly and certainly from its second origin, as if springing again from its roots more abundantly and fruitfully,” Liv. 6.1.3). Having experimented with metaphors of fields and fruits upon the foundation of the Republic and Second Decemvirate, respectively, Livy now turns to the vine. The shift allows him to incorporate the exemplary statesman into an organic model of constitutional development: ceterum primo quo adminiculo erecta erat eodem innixa M. Furio principe stetit (“But it [the city] stood by leaning on the same support by which it had been first raised, on Camillus, the first citizen,” Liv. 6.1.4).Footnote ¹⁰⁹ Livy’s portrayal of the res publica leaning on a stake accentuates rather than avoids the idea of collective reliance upon one man. Viticulture, after all, was frequently used as a model of dependence in Roman thought. Cicero’s De Finibus suggests that vines can only thrive under the care of a vinedresser equipped with the knowledge to trim (circumcidat), prune (amputet), straighten (erigat), lift (extollat), and prop (adminiculet) them. Summing up the reliance of the vine on external aids, he writes, in ipsa enim parum magna vis inest, ut quam optime se habere possit, si nulla cultura adhibeatur (“For it has insufficient strength in itself to reach its highest form unless it is aided by cultivation,” Cic. Fin. 5.39). In applying the same metaphor to Rome, Livy suggests that its citizens have sacrificed a degree of autonomy in the pursuit of political stability. The language of rebirth and regeneration implicitly validates their decision.

Clarifying the implications of his agricultural imagery for the metaphor of the body politic, Livy finally calls Camillus a head of state. He opens the third chapter of Book 6 by declaring, caput rei Romanae Camillus erat (Liv. 6.3.1). As Christina Kraus points out, the “striking epithet” combines Rome’s hegemonic role as the caput rerum and Ennius’ famous line, moribus antiquis res stat Romana virisque (Enn. Ann. Fr. 156 Skutsch).Footnote ¹¹⁰ Stamping the head of state metaphor with Ennius’ imprimatur, Livy grants it the ancestral legitimacy it lacked in the political discourse of the Late Republic. This section has illustrated how the imagistic arc of the first pentad makes such a rehabilitation possible. In Book 1, Livy describes a regal res publica that enjoys stability but eventually succumbs to tyranny and loses its liberty. The Republican res publica operative in Books 2–5 faces the opposite problem. It enjoys independence but cannot regulate civil strife, leading to prolonged periods of instability that culminate in the Gallic Sack. The solution is not a return to monarchy, but a new governing model that makes space for the exemplary statesman to guide the res publica towards concord. Camillus’ transformation into the caput rei Romanae represents the fulfillment of this vision. As a Republican head of state, he embodies the reconciliation of two conflicting models of the body politic.

The figurative framework that I have traced is specific to Livy’s Archaic history; though organic imagery continues to appear in the rest of the text, it does not demarcate distinct phases in the life cycle of the res publica. Two other instances of capital symbolism, however, merit brief mention. The first comes in Book 6, when the rise and fall of M. Manlius Capitolinus is used to illustrate the danger posed by statesmen who exploit the head of state metaphor for personal gain. Manlius, who earns the cognomen Capitolinus due to his protection of the Capitoline Hill during the Gallic invasion, initially acts as a complement to Camillus, defending the city from the inside while Camillus rescues it from the outside.Footnote ¹¹¹ In Book 6, however, he becomes a plebeian rabble rouser who reopens the recently healed wounds of civil strife: recrudescente Manliana seditione (Liv. 6.18.1).Footnote ¹¹² The rare verb recrudesco confirms that the body politic is once again in peril, so much so that the senate tries to avoid foreign wars lest it be distracted from healing domestic ills: ab sanandis domesticis malis (Liv. 6.18.2).Footnote ¹¹³ Appropriating capital symbolism to gain popular favor, Manlius declares, solo aequandae sunt dictaturae consulatusque, ut caput attollere Romana plebes possit (“Dictatorships and consulships must be leveled to the ground so that the Roman plebs are able to lift their head,” Liv. 6.18.14). His proposal constitutes a rejection of the belly–members and head–body dualities; while the former validates the authority of the senate and the latter that of the statesman, both presume popular obedience as the natural order of things. Manlius instead steps into the mold of Catiline, who sought to grant the people their own head and gain personal power along the way.Footnote ¹¹⁴ The senate consequently responds to Manlius as it later would to Catiline, implementing the senatus consultum ultimum to prevent an intestinum bellum (Liv. 6.19.2) against a plague-bearing citizen (pestiferum civem, Liv. 6.19.6). Thrown off the Tarpeian Rock, the man named Capitolinus plunges to his death from the caput mundi. The overdetermined capital symbolism hints at the risk posed by this figuration of statesmanship.Footnote ¹¹⁵ Falling into the hands of a populist demagogue rather than exemplary founder, it could be used to subvert rather than support the ancestral constitution.

The same set of concerns reemerges later in relation to Scipio Africanus. Although Livy denies that Scipio ever represented a threat to the Republic, his outsized influence earns him the ire of radical tribunes who make false charges to secure his exile. Among their accusations is that Scipio acted more like a dictator than a legate during his recent trip to Greece, showing those in the East what those in the West had long known: unum hominem caput columenque imperii Romani esse, sub umbra Scipionis civitatem dominam orbis terrarum latere (“That one man was the head and column of the Roman empire, and that a political community that was mistress of the world lay under the shadow of Scipio,” Liv. 38.51.4).Footnote ¹¹⁶ The tribunes revive the head of state metaphor, dormant in Livy’s history since Book 6, to accuse Scipio of exercising authority that exceeds the bounds of Republican statesmanship.Footnote ¹¹⁷ At the same time, they also acknowledge Rome’s dependence on him by comparing him – like Camillus – to a prop upon which the empire relies for support.Footnote ¹¹⁸ They articulate a tension at the heart of Roman politics, namely that the same statesmen upon whom the Republic depended for its acquisition of empire threatened its longevity through their accumulation of outsized influence. As Rome recedes under his shadow, Scipio subsumes the body politic into himself.Footnote ¹¹⁹ The speech of the tribunes confirms that the head of state metaphor could still be used to police the boundaries of Republican statesmanship, sounding a note of caution for those interested in laying claim to this role.Footnote ¹²⁰

Over the course of Ab Urbe Condita, Livy himself applies capital symbolism to only two men: Numa and Camillus. It is well known that both played key roles in the self-fashioning of Augustus, who framed his role in the res publica in relation to those played by exemplary ancestors.Footnote ¹²¹ Livy contributes to this project by comparing the religious and civic refoundations over which Numa and Camillus presided to acts later performed by Augustus.Footnote ¹²² When Numa closes the Temple of Janus, for example, Livy looks ahead to Augustus’ completion of the same act: iterum … post bellum Actiacum ab imperatore Caesare Augusto pace terra marique parta (“Again … after the Actian war, when peace over land and sea was secured by Caesar Augustus as imperator,” Liv. 1.19.3).Footnote ¹²³ The parallel invites readers to link capital symbolism to both men. The same idea found iconographical expression in a series of asses likely minted in 23 bce that depict Augustus’ head on one side and Numa’s on the other, establishing the latter as an exemplum for the former.Footnote ¹²⁴ Andrew Wallace-Hadrill suggests that the ideological power of double-headed coins stems from the sense of confusion that they produce in their users as to which side is the obverse and which the reverse.Footnote ¹²⁵ There is no easy way to distinguish between them, so that the two heads become interchangeable symbols of authority. In this way, the coin type visually expressed a message that could also be extrapolated from Livy’s text: as a second Numa, Augustus was another head of state.

Livy draws even more pronounced parallels between Augustus and Camillus, who share the task of refoundation in the aftermath of civic destruction. By calling Camillus Romulus ac parens patriae conditorque alter urbis (Liv. 5.49.7) and referring to him as the first citizen (princeps, Liv. 6.1.3), he evokes the language with which Augustus was praised.Footnote ¹²⁶ He himself characterizes Augustus as a conditor at 4.20.7, suggesting the purposefulness of the resonance. And though the title pater patriae was not officially bestowed on Augustus until 2 bce, he was already being addressed as pater atque princeps in Horace’s roughly contemporary Odes.Footnote ¹²⁷ These allusions point towards deeper thematic parallels that operate throughout Book 5 and have been the subject of much scholarly discussion.Footnote ¹²⁸ For our purposes, it is sufficient to note that the statesman whom Livy calls the caput rei Romanae is the same one to whom he most directly compares Augustus. He thereby primes his readers to interpret his metaphors of the body politic in relation to contemporary affairs. The lessons that they take away from his narrative, however, are not necessarily straightforward. While Camillus rescues the res publica from the brink of death, his ambitions also earn him the distrust and displeasure of his peers.Footnote ¹²⁹ The tale of Scipio Africanus, to whom Horace compares Augustus in his ninth Epode, reflects similar ambiguity.Footnote ¹³⁰ Although it is a tribune, not Livy, who accuses Scipio of acting like a head of state, his words confirm that this symbolism could still be used to criticize excessively powerful statesmen. Rather than offer unqualified support for any one model of the body politic, Livy crafts a more complicated picture of their various risks and rewards. His willingness to broach such questions, however, marks him as a thinker of a new age.

Augustus as the caput orbis

While Livy’s rehabilitation of the head of state metaphor took place in the 20s bce, the identification of the princeps as the caput rei publicae did not occur until the reign of Tiberius. The late Augustan era, however, illustrates two significant steps in this direction. The first came in the eulogy that Cornelius Severus composed for Cicero in his Res Romanae. As we saw in the Introduction, the eulogy advertises Severus’ fluency in the paradigm of Roman Republicanism. Glorifying Cicero as the champion of the senate, forum, courts, ritual practice, and civilian life (ille senatus | vindex, ille fori, legum ritusque togaeque, Sen. Suas. 6.26), the poet enumerates the key pillars of public life and political legitimacy in the Late Republic. Yet he also calls Cicero an eternally outstanding head of state: egregium semper patriae caput. Cicero himself would never have described his statesmanship in these terms. Like his contemporaries, he used the head to denote non-Republican governance. Severus reverses the signifying force of the symbol, so that it becomes emblematic of traditional political ideals. In this way, his historical epic participates in the same revisionary project as Livy’s first pentad. Rather than search for heads of state in the Archaic past, however, he finds at least one in the last generation of the Republic. That the current body politic might also have a head was an idea quickly losing its transgressive force.

The second step towards the portrayal of the princeps as the caput rei publicae appears in Ovid’s Metamorphoses and Tristia, both of which identify Augustus as the caput orbis.Footnote ¹³¹ Ovid had begun exploring this figure as early as the Amores, where he promises that Vergil will be read Roma triumphati dum caput orbis erit (“As long as Rome will be the head of the world over which she has triumphed,” Ov. Am. 1.15.26).Footnote ¹³² Linking the longevity of Latin poetry to the success of the Roman empire, he joins other thinkers in using the head–body comparison to validate imperial hegemony.Footnote ¹³³ He stresses the absolute nature of this authority in the Fasti, which links world domination to the importation of the goddess Cybele to Rome in 204 bce: post, ut Roma potens opibus iam saecula quinque | vidit et edomito sustulit orbe caput (“Later, after Rome – powerful in wealth – had already seen five centuries and lifted her head over a thoroughly subjugated world,” Ov. Fast. 4.255–6). Like Livy, he portrays this dominion as preordained in the Archaic past. As Evander tours the future site of Rome in Book 5, Ovid writes, hic, ubi nunc Roma est, orbis caput, arbor et herbae | et paucae pecudes et casa rara fuit (“Here, where Rome is now, the head of the world, were once trees and fields and scanty flocks and scattered homes,” Ov. Fast. 5.93–4). The contemporary stakes of this symbolism emerge in the Tristia, a text that Thomas Habinek has shown to be deeply engaged “in the project of Roman imperialism.”Footnote ¹³⁴ Rome’s status as the head of the world stands in contrast to the submission of the Germans, who lower their own head beneath Tiberius’ feet: teque, rebellatrix, tandem, Germania, magni | triste caput pedibus supposuisse ducis (“And you, rebellious Germany, have finally lowered your sad head under the feet of our great ruler,” Ov. Tr. 3.12.47–8).Footnote ¹³⁵ Ovid evokes the literal body of a prisoner prostrated before a Roman general and the metaphorical body of Germania, who must submit to Rome to survive. Mediating between these two levels of meaning is the princeps, who undertakes the military campaigns necessary for the formation and survival of an imperial body politic.Footnote ¹³⁶

The gradually developing perception that Augustus embodied the authority of Rome allowed him to step into its role as the head of the world. Ovid foregrounds such slippage between the res publica and its princeps in Book 15 of the Metamorphoses. When the caput orbis figure first appears, it operates in the terms we have come to expect. Like Livy’s Romulus, Pythagoras delivers a prophesy predicting and naturalizing Roman rule: nunc quoque Dardaniam fama est consurgere Romam | … haec igitur formam crescendo mutat et olim | immensi caput orbis erit (“And now rumor has it that Dardanian Rome is rising … then by growing it changes form and one day will become the head of the whole world,” Ov. Met. 15.431–5).Footnote ¹³⁷ Ovid foregrounds the shifting shape of the Roman body politic, which is characterized by its mutability rather than constancy. As history moves towards the apotheosis of Caesar and the deification of Augustus, he hints at its acquisition of a head: tarda sit illa dies et nostro serior aevo, | qua caput Augustum, quem temperat, orbe relicto | accedat caelo (“May that day be far off and later than our era, when Augustus’ head, after abandoning the world which it rules, approaches the sky,” Ov. Met. 15.868–70). It is now Augustus’ rather than Rome’s head that presides over the world. The potentially transgressive nature of this admission is nevertheless limited in two ways. First, the verb tempero suggests moderation and restraint rather than the absolute rule conveyed in Ovid’s earlier use of this imagery. Second, Ovid’s gaze is directed outwards towards the empire rather than inwards towards the res publica. The text thereby avoids disrupting the fiction that the power Augustus exercised abroad had little to do with the norms that prevailed at home.Footnote ¹³⁸

The symbolism introduced in the Metamorphoses becomes more explicit in Tristia 3, which repeatedly stresses the poet’s displacement from Rome.Footnote ¹³⁹ It is perhaps the unique perspective granted by this distance that allows him to transform the head of the princeps into the head of the world. Returning to the question of his fault, he asserts, non mihi quaerenti pessumdare cuncta petitum | Caesareum caput est, quod caput orbis erat (“Caesar’s head, the head of the world, was not attacked by me in an attempt to destroy everything,” Ov. Tr. 3.5.45–6). The repetition of caput draws attention to the parallel positions occupied by Augustus and Rome, so that the former becomes the embodiment of the latter. In connecting this theme to his exile, however, Ovid gestures towards the risks posed by a man whose fickle favor determines membership in the body politic. Even a citizen who has done nothing wrong might find himself expelled from the organism of which he was once a part. In this way, Ovid’s engagement with capital symbolism echoes his use of healing tropes to destabilize the distinction between benevolent and autocratic rule. His poetry suggests that the metaphor of the body politic could be used to criticize or validate the power of the princeps. In the hands of a thinker highly attuned to the paradoxes of the Principate, it could do both at the same time.Footnote ¹⁴⁰

This chapter has explored how Roman thinkers used the metaphor of the body politic to respond to the constitutional changes of the late first century bce. Participants in a discourse community that favored continuity over change, they used figurative speech to address the arrival of sole rule without naming it as such. The metaphor of the healer, already validated through its prominence in Ciceronian oratory, was quickly if tentatively taken up by Horace, Vergil, and Valgius Rufus to describe the salutary effects of Augustus’ rule. The head of state metaphor faced a more arduous path to acceptance due to its regal heritage. Only after it had been rehabilitated as a positive signifier of statesmanship, a project that began in historical narratives, could it be used in relation to contemporary affairs. This process exemplifies how the paradigm of Roman Republicanism evolved in response to the establishment of the Principate. It was not only that Republican political language changed to meet the needs of autocracy, but that autocracy transformed what Romans perceived to be Republican political language in the first place. Yet even as Romans grew accustomed to the models of the civic healer and head of state, ambivalence remained. The ambiguity of Ovid’s poetry serves as a reminder that subversion lurks where panegyric proliferates. The trajectory of Julio-Claudian political discourse, the subject of the next two chapters, confirms as much.

I would like to conclude by considering the broader conceptual import of the imagistic evolution traced thus far. Scholars have long debated how – or if – those living under Augustus understood the significance of the revolution that they witnessed. In the absence of any direct admission of the arrival of autocracy, this question will surely continue to provoke debate. The transformation of the body politic metaphor, however, indicates collective awareness of a shift in governing form. Roman thinkers might have lacked the historical perspective that allows us to identify the establishment of “the Principate,” but they reworked a foundational model of social organization to account for the command of an extraordinary statesman over the res publica. The decades that separate Livy’s first pentad from Ovid’s Tristia illustrate how gradually this process took place. That it happened at all, however, confirms that no political language can resist addressing the lived reality of power for too long. What cannot be expressed literally finds expression figuratively. The Augustan age represents only one moment in this story, which had its origins in the Late Republic and reached its conclusion in the aftermath of Nero’s downfall. Turning to the period from Tiberius to Claudius in the next chapter, we will see how a new generation of thinkers catalyzed the next phase in the life cycle of the Roman body politic.