The Propagation of the Imperial Theology
One of the great problems for those dealing with the imperial cult is the question
of how the “theology” of the cult and the information were disseminated. In this
context a papyrus from Egypt offers valuable information. The text has preserved
part of a play that was staged at the local theater. The god Phoebus Apollo himself
appeared on stage to announce to the audience that he had just accompanied the
emperor Trajan, with his carriage drawn by white horses, to heaven. But then he
announces the good news that the new emperor Hadrian has just entered office,
who is characterized with the words “whom all things obey because of his virtue
and the Geniusof his divine father (=Trajan).”
The superhuman appearance of the emperor and his core family could quite effect-
ively be transmitted by the minting of coins (see chapter 11). Of course coins could
not replace the written message of an honorary inscription and an official oration
praising the divine achievements of the emperor, but certainly coins were much more
widely disseminated within the empire. Coins used a pictorial language with a con-
centrated and simplified message that could be immediately understood, at least by
the population of the cities. A coin with a picture showing the supreme god, Jupiter,
handing a small statue of the goddess of victory to the emperor transmitted a definite
message: the emperor has received his power and his ability to be victorious from
the supreme god himself.
Only a very small minority of the Roman population had the chance to meet the
emperor at least once during their own lifetime. The emperors only rarely left Rome
or Italy – the traveling emperor Hadrian (ad117–38) is clearly an exception – but
the desire to enjoy the personal presence of the emperor was very great. Under these
circumstances the fabricated image of the emperor was of enormous importance, because
it could be used as a substitute for his person. You could address the image of the
emperor when you offered sacrifice to him; the picture of the emperor was present
if you took an oath and invoked his name to confirm the validity of your statement.
A slave who felt tortured by his master could flee to the statue of the emperor and
find a kind of asylum, because the shelter offered by the image of the emperor was
as valid as the emperor himself.
The conviction that the statue of an emperor was as powerful as the living
emperor himself was much more than an expression of a primitive popular belief. It
represented a kind of belief that was also shared by the higher ranks of the political
hierarchy. Therefore the picture of the emperor could be used even during diplo-
matic encounters to represent the authority and power of the emperor if he could
not attend the meeting. When the Armenian king Tiridates met Domitius Corbulo,
the Roman supreme commander who had conducted the war against him, the reign-
ing emperor Nero (ad54 – 68) was far away in Rome. Tacitus (Annales15.28) has
described the ceremony that took place inad 63.
The Roman and Armenian armies, arranged in battle order, were watching. In
the center of the Roman army a tribunalhad been built, on which the seat of a
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