The Neighborhoods of Augustan Rome

Name: The Neighborhoods of Augustan Rome
Author: J. Bert Lott
ISBN: 0521828279

by J. Bert Lott

If Wallace-Hadrill shows us what the Augustan age was like for people who could afford posh furniture and read books in Greek, Lott’s book does the same for the common people of the city of Rome. Although the book is very technical, and on a very specific, quite limited subject area, it’s important because it gets you into the streets of Rome. It gets you into the world of the people of Rome, whom Augustus knew very well he had to have on his side as a popular champion. In 8 BC Augustus organised Rome into 14 regions subdivided into ‘neighbourhoods’ ( uici ), with each uicus centred on a ‘cross-roads shrine.’ He funded these mini-temples and provided statues, and created a kind of humble priesthood for them. He gave people, a lot of them ex-slaves, the dignity of the responsibility for looking after these neighbourhood cult centres. The neighbourhood chapels had lots of different gods and goddesses whose statues were put up there, but the main cult was that of the Lares , young twin gods who were thought of as protectors. Lares were the ‘guardian gods’ who protected households. So a Roman house would have a lararium , a little shrine in which the household’s Lares were honoured and worshipped. There was also a big public temple of the Lares for the city of Rome itself, because they were thought of also as protectors of the city. In between were the little chapels for the Lares of individual neighbourhoods, as set up by Augustus. There must have been hundreds of them. So at the grand politics level, he was saying, ‘I’m standing up for you, the Roman people, against a dominant and oppressive oligarchy.’ But he’s also saying at the street level, ‘I’m looking after you, I’m giving you a way to belong.’ I think that’s terrific. It’s something you don’t normally think about , and the literary sources don’t mention it. But it’s there in the archaeology, the inscribed altars and architectural fragments that Bert Lott has collected up and discussed. I like the book because although it’s very specialist, it shines a light on an area of the ancient world that otherwise you just don’t see.

Recommended by

Peter Wiseman

"If Wallace-Hadrill shows us what the Augustan age was like for people who could afford posh furniture and read books in Greek, Lott’s book does the same for the common people of the city of Rome. Although the book is very technical, and on a very specific, quite limited subject area, it’s important because it gets you into the streets of Rome. It gets you into the world of the people of Rome, whom Augustus knew very well he had to have on his side as a popular champion. In 8 BC Augustus organised Rome into 14 regions subdivided into ‘neighbourhoods’ ( uici ), with each uicus centred on a ‘cross-roads shrine.’ He funded these mini-temples and provided statues, and created a kind of humble priesthood for them. He gave people, a lot of them ex-slaves, the dignity of the responsibility for looking after these neighbourhood cult centres. The neighbourhood chapels had lots of different gods and goddesses whose statues were put up there, but the main cult was that of the Lares , young twin gods who were thought of as protectors. Lares were the ‘guardian gods’ who protected households. So a Roman house would have a lararium , a little shrine in which the household’s Lares were honoured and worshipped. There was also a big public temple of the Lares for the city of Rome itself, because they were thought of also as protectors of the city. In between were the little chapels for the Lares of individual neighbourhoods, as set up by Augustus. There must have been hundreds of them. So at the grand politics level, he was saying, ‘I’m standing up for you, the Roman people, against a dominant and oppressive oligarchy.’ But he’s also saying at the street level, ‘I’m looking after you, I’m giving you a way to belong.’ I think that’s terrific. It’s something you don’t normally think about , and the literary sources don’t mention it. But it’s there in the archaeology, the inscribed altars and architectural fragments that Bert Lott has collected up and discussed. I like the book because although it’s very specialist, it shines a light on an area of the ancient world that otherwise you just don’t see."

Augustus · fivebooks.com