#shdshs sorry. octavian is not my guy. he's the opposite of my guy. he's partially responsible for killing my guy

[brother-emperors]

I know you’ve mentioned Antony’s association with Dionysus before, but what’re your thoughts on Octavian’s association with Apollo (or Apollonian-Dionysian duality of [aristocratic] culture in the late republic wrt hedonism vs traditional values)..? (Bit off topic now but I’m also crazy about Lucullus’ ranked dining rooms and Will Durant’s comments about his example of excess spreading throughout the upper classes and indirectly inspiring young men to crossdressing/“bisexual impartiality”)

tbh thinking about octavian's association with apollo is getting too much into 'I have to think about octavian as an individual person with no one else around,' territory, and there's only about 2 and a half years of his life when he's interesting enough for me to do that without feeling like I'm slowly being turned into salt. save me, agrippa, you're my only hope.

I DO spend a lot of time thinking about the late republic and the augustan age and how hedonism and the reinvention and enforcement of traditional/conservative values (esp in the relative social flexibility of the late republic being intolerable in the age of augustus, but in a general sense that octavian is spending a fair amount of time and propaganda to reinvent rome to a specific image and to reinvent means that what existed before must be immoral, wrong, deviant, bad, etc) plays into empire making. and also the general hypocrisy of some of octavian's policies, like. look in the goddamn mirror, man.

mostly when I end up thinking about octavian and apollo, it's actually about the thebaid and it's commentary on imperial rome and the role that apollo plays and what he represents in that context. like. hm. yes of course it absolutely makes sense that you have an affinity for apollo.

also GOD yeah I completely forgot about the bisexual impartiality description from durant. I'd show up to one of lucullus' gatherings based on the spectacle of his description specifically ngl, and the only roman whose parties I want to show up for are caligula's, and even then. only once.

#shdshs sorry. octavian is not my guy. he's the opposite of my guy. he's partially responsible for killing my guy #literally i just finished a biography on him and it wasn't even for him it was for something im working on abt herod antipas #ask tag