The celebration of the
Ludi Saeculares (Secular Games) was made possible by the completion of a widespread architectural program of construction, renovation and expansion commenced by Caesarion over a decade prior and comprising all of Rome. A new, highly efficient water system provided for the needs of the growing populace; marble bathed the city in the form of temples (old and new), porticoes, theaters, basilicas, baths, granaries, aqueducts, bridges, monuments and civic buildings. Caesarion was credited not only with the physical reconstruction of the city, but with the restoration of the Republic and the protection of the “universal” dominion of the Roman people. Under his auspices Roman rule had been pushed farther than before - Germania and Parthia quelled - the kings of the Earth made supplicants of the Roman Senate and people, represented as they were in Caesarion’s sovereignty and international patronage. The Games, delayed due to civil war and the vicissitudes which followed in the wake of the Ides of March, could finally be held in comfort and peace.
The Emperor had taken up residence in Mediolanum, an agreeable site in the north of Italy from where he could keep a watchful eye on his step-son’s successes in Germania while keeping himself abreast of eastern developments. He was soon subsumed into a life of drunken sloth, every bit as ostentatious and extravagant as the
tryphé (magnificent voluptuousness) of the Ptolemaic court. Surrounded by philosophers, musicians and foreign dignitaries, he allowed his consort
Livia Drusilla a taste of Imperial power for the first time. She intervened in the succession to Cyrene and manoeuvred favourites into the government of the eastern half of the Empire, to the detriment of his son
Isidorus. She then set about engineering a new round of honours for her husband, to coincide with Secular Games and the public presentation of her grandson
Tiberillus in adult garb: a dynastic statement intended to pave the way for the boy’s future succession.
Around this time a series of portents and signs were observed in Rome. In the Forum Romanum a wolf killed a number of people and bit a Vestal; the temple of Iuventas ('youth') burned down and ants swarmed in the very forum. At night torches were observed wandering south to north, illuminating the sky. To spectators it was clear that Rome's security and fecundity were endangered: the wolf and ants represented alien invaders, the torches were signs of war. The citizens hurriedly sought expiation, praying for the safety of the Emperor, and beseeching the Senate to bring him back at once.
Accordingly the Senate summoned the Emperor to return to Rome with his court and preside over the Ludi. The Ludi would not only usher in a new cycle of Secular Games (the original cycle having lapsed) and celebrate the future prosperity of Rome, but also inaugurate a new "
saeculum"[1], one in which Caesarion was to appear prominently as the savior and restorer of the Republic and second founder of the city (or founder of the 'new' city). It was also hoped that, while providing a tangible link to the mythical past of Rome (whose memory and morals he had defended and restored), the Games would act much like the previous Games at Antioch, displaying the vitality of the Imperial lineage as a harbinger of the continued vitality of the State. Finally some revisionist history on all sides led the Senate to consider the year the twentieth of Caesarion's rule: though it had taken Caesarion some three years to reign in Rome undisputed, it had been twenty years since Vipsanian had been captured at Nisibis. Part of the Senate (now considered the right or just) had sided with Caesarion and recognized him as sole consul when his colleague
Corvinus (then in Rome) resigned in favour of
Publicola, who ruled as dictator until his death at Livia's hands had made Caesarion's triumphant return possible (even then Caesarion was forced to pursue Corvinus to Sicily).
As fortune - or a casual tweaking of facts - would have it, the Ludi would coincide with the
vincennalia, celebrations voted by the Senate to celebrate Caesarion's twentieth year of rule.
No consuls were elected for the year: instead the Senate and People decided to honor Caesarion as
Dominus Mundi, "master of the world", naming the year for him alone[2]. Though the official line was to credit the suggestion to Livia's dead son
Drusus, it was no doubt the fruit of her own behind-the-scenes machinations. Drusus' treasured memory nevertheless proved crucial in carrying the suggestion in the Senate. Even in his placid state Caesarion was somewhat startled by the brazen nature of the title and initially rejected it, going so far as to consider issuing an edict against it. Care was taken to elaborate on the exact meaning of this honorific - Caesarion was not
dominus in the sense of owner or sovereign, but as the one appointed by the
populus Romanos uictor dominusque omnium gentium ("the Roman people, conqueror and master of all peoples") to administer justice on its behalf. As the commander of the Roman people, to whom they had entrusted the well-being of the city, and as the august commander of the army, to whom they had entrusted the legions and well-being of the provinces[3], he could not deny that he had received jurisdiction over all - the world, in hyperbolic terms. This selfsame universal jurisdiction was the fruit of his continuous efforts on behalf of the Roman people and the means by which the
Pax Augusta had been assured to that and future generations.
The sudden death of his son
Iulion on the journey from Mediolanum to Rome dampened the Emperor's mood somewhat and made him more susceptible to the influence of his wife. The honour paid to the boy by Livia and her circle endeared them to Caesarion, perhaps oblivious to the worthlessness of lip service to a dead bastard who had never posed too great a dynastic threat to her and her's. Caesarion was now aged 47; his wife was 58 and her son
Tiberius 42. The adoptive father and son were too close in age to be certain who would outlive the other; and while Livia could be more certain of departing first, she did not wish to do so without assuring her progeny the succession. If Tiberius died first, there was every chance of power passing to one of Caesarion's biological sons, all of whom were fast approaching manhood. Her eldest grandsons -
Tiberillus and
Germanicus - were barely entering adolescence and decidedly secondary, in everyone's calculations, to the Emperor's own sons. Livia was therefore eager to shore up her own position, in the hope of accruing greater legitimacy to her blood heirs in their future bids for supreme power.
Upon their arrival in Rome obliging Senators sought to have Livia named
Genetrix Orbis, a suitably grandiose honour on level with Caesarion's latest, pointing to her as progenitor of the "world" - the Roman Empire - or more literally, the progenitor of its future rulers. Tiberius himself blocked the Senatorial resolution to offer her that title, urging restraint in the granting of such honours to women. Most likely he spoke on Caesarion's behalf (or at least with his consent), though the Emperor probably preferred to avoid denying his wife honours publicly. It was instead decided to name her
Mater Patriae - "mother of the fatherland" - both for her own manifold good works (not least the assassination of the tyrannical dictator Publicola, her own ex-husband) and the array of virtues she was popularly considered to possess in abundance, as for the two illustrious sons she had given the Republic: Tiberius and Drusus, the two of them consuls multiple times and conquerors of Germania.
She was first acclaimed as such at the re-dedication of the Temple of Concordia, one of her and Tiberius' own personal building projects. She got her wish when at the year's Liberalia her grandson
Tiberillus changed into the
toga virilis, the garb of manhood. He received the same honours as had previously been granted the Emperor's sons Ptolemy, Isidorus, Caius and Aurelius Maecenas (this last one in 4BC): a pontificate and introduction to the Senate, who gave him the right to attend its meetings, to attend games and banquets in the company of senators, and to hold the consulship at the age of 20. The knights acclaimed him as a
princeps iuventutis and
sevir turmae. With Isidorus' consulate delayed for the second year running and her other grandson Germanicus (son of Drusus) almost assured similar treatment the coming year, the Mater Patriae's year got off to a rather brilliant start.
[1] A lifetime of 100 or 110 years traditionally separated one game from th other. Saeculum can also mean "generation", "century", “epoch”, "age", "time".
[2] Years were generally named after the two consuls serving that year.
, regularizing his blend of powers and prerogatives in the form of two extraordinary magistracies - one urban and one provincial.