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This paper reconstructs the history and meaning of a hitherto unexplained astronomical allusion recurring several times in Roman epithalamic poetry: the association of the evening star with Mount Oeta. By examining the iterations of this motif in surviving Latin literature (especially Catullus 62, Vergil's Eclogue 8 and the pseudo-Vergilian Ciris), I propose to explain the original meaning of this association as a mythological reference to the wedding of Peleus and Thetis, offering a reconstruction of the Hellenistic epithalamic context where it was probably invented, and an interpretation of its function in each of the poems under consideration. The results of this analysis shed new light on some of the most well-known texts of Latin literature, allowing us to understand how this allusion was used to explore the relations between the genres of epithalamic poetry, bucolic and epyllion.

This paper presents a new manuscript of part of theHistoria Augustafrom Erlangen, which vindicates a more than century-old hypothesis by E. Patzig: that the 1489 Venice edition of the work is textually valuable. On this basis, and building on the recent work of R. Modonutti, I present five new passages that are not printed in modern editions of theHA, six lacunose passages restored, and propose that the lost Murbach manuscript is the source. Armed with this new evidence, I re-examine the question of the great lacuna between theLives of Maximus and Balbinusand theLives of the Two Valerians, showing that it is a codicological — and not authorial — feature.

Since Mommsen, it has been a tenet of Roman history that Augustus transformed the ‘senatorial order’ into a hereditary class, which encompassed senators, their children, grandchildren and great-grandchildren in the male line. This paper shows that the idea of a hereditaryordo senatoriusis a myth without foundation in the evidence. Augustus and his successors conferred new rights and duties upon relatives of senators, but did not change their formal rank. Moreover, the new regulations applied not to three generations of descendants, but only to persons who stood under a senator'spatria potestasduring his lifetime. Emperors protected the honour and property of thesefilii familiasof senators, in order to incentivise them to participate in politics and invest their wealth into munificence. The Supplementary Material available online gives all known early imperial holders of the titleclarissimus virin the province of Africa (Supplementary Appendix 1), all known early imperialclarissimi iuuenes(Supplementary Appendix 2) and all known early imperialclarissimi pueri(Supplementary Appendix 3).

This paper explores alternatives to analysing the political impact of Augustus in terms of the establishment of a new constitutional structure, the Augustan Principate. It starts by showing how the wordprincipatuschanged over time and explores the significance of the termstatio. It considers how contemporaries viewed the political changes that occurred during Augustus’ lifetime, analysing the ways in which power at Rome became increasingly embodied in the person of Augustus himself. It suggests that there was an increasing recognition that Augustus was an exceptional individual, whose position in the state was supported by powers granted formally by senatorial decree and popular vote as well as informally by acclamation, but whose authority was ultimately a personal quality, supported by the gods, and predestined by birth. It traces the ways in which Augustus’ rule became increasingly personalised, with the result that one of the main challenges faced by Tiberius ina.d. 14 was how to take over Augustus’ personal role asprinceps.

Fresh water came from a variety of sources, streams and springs as well as aqueducts. Much of the Roman law on fresh water concerns its supply, regulating rights to use it with a variety of legal institutions from public and private law (e.g. ownership, servitudes, interdicts). The study of fresh water has usually followed the legal categories, segregating the public water supply from water that was private property, and consequently segregating different types of evidence. In this paper varied evidence is analysed using the ‘bundle’ approach, an analytical framework from legal scholarship on rights in the environment, in which water rights are not monolithic but are represented by component rights, including rights of access, withdrawal, management, exclusion and alienation. Analysing component rights in fresh water reveals significant continuities in the Romans' regulation of it and the impact of this regulation. Although there was no centralized water administration in the early Empire, Romans took a systematic approach to regulating fresh water based on consistent working principles and policy priorities.

Since its rediscovery in the late nineteenth century, the ‘Araof Domitius Ahenobarbus’ has become a keystone in the history of Roman republican art. Following the seminal interpretation of Alfred von Domaszewski, the monument is usually understood as commemorating the key stages of the Roman census. This paper offers a fundamental reappraisal of theAra's imagery, based on an iconographic analysis which takes into account all relevant signs of rank and status such as shoes, clothing and other attributes. From this it becomes clear that none of the three protagonists on theAracan be identified as a censor. Consequently, the monument neither commemorated a census nor was it a censorial location. Instead, I suggest that theAraactually shows another important political event, namely thedeductioof a Roman colony which I tentatively identify as thecolonia Neptuniafounded by Gaius Gracchus in 123b.c.