plans of rebuilding a private house on sacred ground – for Clodius clearly a sacri-
lege – Cicero delivered a speech to prove that the sign referred to Clodius’ crimes.
Finally, Cicero had powerful friends for a time and rebuilt his house. Although he
somehow doubted divination in his work De divinatione, he talks about a dream he
had during his exile: the long-deceased general Gaius Marius approached him in this
dream and asked him why he was so sad. When Cicero lamented his exile, Gaius
Marius told him to cheer up and to go to the temple of Honor (honos) and Virtue
(virtus). Cicero claimed that the senate met in that very temple when it decided to
recall Cicero from his exile (Cic. Div.1.59). By publishing this dream – it is not
unlikely that Cicero talked about it long before his works were published – Cicero
allied himself with the tradition of another famous Roman who had been exiled and
who had returned in triumph.
Generals of the civil wars accepted only positive signs and they had private seers,
thus documenting their ability to communicate with the gods: the boundary
between “private” and “public” divination disappeared. In the war against Jugurtha
(111–105bc), Marius had his personal soothsayer (Plut. Marius8.4); Sulla had a
haruspexwho turned a Roman soldier killed by lightning during the siege of Athens
into a favorable sign (Obsequens 56b). Publius Cornelius Lentulus Sura took part
in the conjuration of Catilina, and Lentulus felt called upon to do so by a prophecy
of the quindecimvirithat the next ruler of Rome would come from the family of
the Cornelii (Cic. In Catilinam3.9). A number of positive omens are reported about
Caesar. Signs foretold his victory at decisive battles; on precisely the day when he
defeated Pompey at Pharsalus (48bc), the statue of Victoria in the temple at Elis
in southern Greece turned toward the door; at Pergamum drums sounded in the
temple; at Tralles in Asia Minor a palm tree, symbol of victory, grew within a few
hours in front of the statue of Caesar (Caesar, Bellum civile3.105). During the last
decades of the Roman republic, signs became personalized. We also know of omens
foretelling Caesar’s death. His wife Calpurnia dreamed that she was holding her dead
husband in her arms (Plut. Caesar63).
In the case of Augustus, positive signs abound. When he first entered Rome after
the death of Caesar, the sun shone on him and produced a rainbow (Obsequens
68), an obvious indication of divine favor. In 42bc, three suns were seen merging
into one during a sacrifice (Obsequens 70), which prophesied that the power of the
triumvirs would be inherited by one person – Octavian/Augustus. Signs were told
about the critical points of his life: at the beginning of his political career at Rome
and at important battles. It seems plausible that the signs were not just inventions
of later historians and biographers, but were communicated during the important
events. During the reign of Augustus, prodigies turn up only in 17 and 16bc. The
prodigies of 17bcdid not just happen anywhere, but took place in the villa of Livia,
Augustus’ wife (Obsequens 71), and seem to have been welcome in the context of
the Secular Games (ludi saeculares) taking place in the same year. The following year,
the day after Augustus had left Rome to travel to Gaul, the temple of Iuventas burned
down, a wolf killed some people in the Forum Romanum, the Forum was swarm-
ing with ants, and at night torches wandering from south to north illuminated the
sky. As expiation the citizens offered prayers for the safety of the emperor (Dio 54.19.7).
302 Veit Rosenberger