RELIGION 189the sensitivities of the Roman upper classes, and discreetly asserting the
inseparability of emperor and state. Certain of his subjects saw no merit in
moderation in this context. The exceptional honours paid to Augustus by
Greeks, their enthusiastic appreciation of the benefi ts of his rule, the overt
and detailed comparisons made between the emperor and the gods, and the
organization of the cult at both provincial and local level together make it
possible to identify the reign of Augustus as a crucial turning- point in the
history of ruler cult. The cult continued to diffuse and prosper over the next
two centuries. There was a change in tone and in superfi cial characteristics.
Augustus’ successors, at least until the Severan age, received fl atter and
shorter honorifi c decrees and fewer cults, generic cults tending to replace
cults in the name of an individual. But these are indications of routinization,
not lack of vigour.^3
The imperial cult appealed to Augustus, as it did to later emperors, as a
way of focusing the loyalty of provincials on the imperial persona. In the
East, the initial impetus came from the provincials themselves, as
communities, anxious to eradicate the memory of their support for Antony
in the civil war, transformed existing cults and institutions to accommodate
it. But the work done by Roman governors in encouraging and even
orchestrating these moves, or by the authorities in Rome, including the
emperor, in approving proposals forwarded to them and occasionally taking
the initiative, should not be neglected. In the West, the part played by the
Roman authorities and their representatives in the provinces in propagating
the cult was much more central. Proconsular prompting can be shown or
suspected to lie behind the public expression of devotion to Augustus at
provincial or regional capitals like Carthage and Lepcis Magna in north
Africa.^4 Provincial as opposed to local city cults of the emperor in the West
likewise originated in imperial initiatives. It is noticeable that the cult was
established at the provincial level in newly conquered, un-Romanized
provinces before its introduction into peaceful, relatively Romanized
provinces. This signifi es that the provincial cult of the emperor was fi rst
employed as an instrument for the promotion of the military and political
might of Rome. It was used by the fi rst emperor in no other way.
The foundation of the provincial cults near Lyon and in Cologne defi nes
the character and limits of Augustan policy in this area. The imperial cult for
the provinces of the Three Gauls at Condate, at the confl uence of the Rhône
and the Saône, was instituted on Augustus’ birthday in the year of his
assumption of the offi ce of high priest, 12 BC. Drusus, the emperor’s stepson,
was at hand just before his German war to convoke and direct the inaugural
meeting of the provincial council (Livy, Epit. 139), of which the local leader
and fi rst high priest was Gaius Iulius Vercondaridubnus, a notable from the
Aeduan tribe based on Autun. The cooperation of the tribal leadership was
not always assured. In AD 9 the Aeduan’s counterpart at the city of the Ubii
(Cologne), Segimundus of the Cherusci, absconded to join the German
rebels (Tacitus, Ann. 1.39.1, 57.2). The Aeduan and Treveran chiefs who led