Political monuments are characterized by visual materiality that allows for and indeed invites engagement; the claim for permanence; and the force of visual presence. Caesar’s monuments, especially on the Capitol, signalled a decidedly new quality of presence irreconcilable with the fine balance of individual achievement and public recognition. The rules behind this balance were flexible, but collective consensus always retained the upper hand. The balance tipped only with Pompey’s enormous theatre complex on the Campus Martius. The complex created a new type of public space, and it set the precedent for Caesar, who took on the challenge of competition with his own Forum project. Such an omnipresent dynamic of increase provoked heavy polemics and fierce conflict, but this violence was not only tolerated but reckoned with as a possibility from the very start. It appeared more appropriate to accept repeated violation of tradition while still affirming it than to develop a fundamentally different, new ‘system’ of norms and behaviours. The mode of permanent transgression was indicative not only of a political culture in crisis but also of a culture of crisis.

The first chapter presents evidence in support of the claim that an interest in ruins was never widespread. It had to begin somewhere and at some time. There had also to be certain factors, which are set out in the chapter, that facilitated the interest. The main evidence for a lack of interest in ruins is seen in the motives for tourism in ancient Greece and Rome – indeed, tourism is one of the leading themes of the whole work. The indifference of the Greeks and Romans to ruins is also found in other cultures, notably China’s. What seems to be needed for the ruins of any culture to arouse interest and to make a favourable impression is a gap in the continuity of that culture, such as occurred in Roman culture from late antiquity to the early Middle Ages in Europe. Someone aiming to bridge that gap – a tourist, say – who surveys past Roman culture with a sympathetic eye and an understanding of its achievements is in a position to find the ruins, the material remains of Roman culture, as interesting as any of its other monuments.

Our study has concentrated on the explicit attempts by the ancient historians to convince the reader of their authority to narrate deeds, and to portray themselves as believable narrators of those deeds. We have seen how the dictates of ancient literary criticism enjoined authors to work within a tradition, and to show their innovation within that tradition. As certain historians became accepted models for imitation, their concerns and approach dictated for those who followed the proper way to write history. As the earlier historians were ’authoritative’, so their followers sought to imitate the manner by which those predecessors had constructed their own authority. It was in this way that authority and tradition were closely related, and so long as the belief in imitation held sway, there could be no authority outside of tradition.

The Roman senatorial elite laid claim to all roles of prominence in society. The very notion of nobilitas made prominence an all-inclusive virtue, in office-holding as much as in other public arenas. Indeed, scrutinizing an inherent tension between annual roles as embodied by the honores and more durable, sometimes life long, roles of prominence, Hans Beck argues that the aristocracy’s integrated claim to leadership wielded significant stabilizing impact upon Roman society. L. Quinctius Flamininus was expelled from the senate in 184 BCE but maintained his other social rules, his public standing, and his overall notability. In the century and a half that followed, Beck detects a gradual erosion of inclusive ideals of prominence. The crisis of the Republic is thus understood as a disintegration of social roles. In the era of the great extraordinary commands, the performance of prestige duties of the collective became less and less important. Augustus’ ostentatious unification of these under his watchful guard as princeps propelled a change in role behaviour that could easily be portrayed as a restitution of the Republican outlook.

The chapter pursues the consequences of the claim that the Greek canon was made based on the performative qualities of its authors, emphasizing its internal friction. As such, it did not embody any timeless values. Its function could be replicated by other traditions influenced by it: first Roman, then European languages and then globally. There is no function today that is uniquely performed by the Greek literary legacy and, in this sense, there is no need to preserve the particular tradition of classical studies. Greek antiquity is worthy of study simply because of its pivotal role, but it essentially expired. And yet, the attitude of admiration toward this type of liberating past experience is a useful one to maintain, as part of an overall hopeful attitude toward the arc of the moral universe.

This book is a study of the explicit attempts by the ancient Greek and Roman historians to claim the authority to narrate the deeds encompassed in their works. The term ’authority’ has many meanings over a range of disciplines, but in this book it is used to refer to literary authority, the rhetorical means by which the ancient historian claims the competence to narrate and explain the past, and simultaneously constructs a persona that the audience will find persuasive and believable. The work is thus a study of certain forms and conventions of persuasion employed by the historians. No attempt is made to evaluate the truth or falsity of historians’ claims; rather, I try to set out the various claims which are part of the construction of the author’s historiographical persona; to see how and why these claims are made; to explain how the tradition of such claims developed; and to show how the tradition moulded the way in which writers claimed historiographical authority.

Most of the ancient historians give some indication to their audience why they embarked upon writing their history. These remarks sometimes concern themselves with the unique nature of the historian’s subject matter; in addition to the greatness of the deeds, historians will frequently explain other circumstances that led them to the composition of their histories. There is, in general, a tendency as time goes on for authors, while not abandoning the magnification of their theme, to present a more ’personal’ call to history, that is, to say something of themselves and the personal experiences that underlay their writing of history.

Martin Jehne looks at the Roman comitia through the lens of their rich symbolism. Set in a demarcated space and sanctioned by the auspices of the gods, the popular assemblies were, in general, integrative: they symbolized the belonging of the citizens to the community as a whole. But the assemblies (comitia centuriata, comitia tributa, and comitia curiata) were far from uniform. Each one, argues Jehne, wielded a different type of integrative force upon its participants. The centuriate assembly emphasized hierarchy and vertical integration; the tribal assemblies had an essentially egalitarian structure. In light of a rapidly expanding body of citizens, the integrating capacities of the popular assemblies ought to have shrunk. Creating a climate of consensus and communality, those capacities were preserved in the assemblies’ roles as referential quantities that embodied ideas of hierarchy and equality vital to the libera res publica.