On the Unreality of the Actian Arch: Reassessing the Celebration of Actium in and beyond Rome (20 min)

Presenters

Anne Hrychuk Kontokosta, New York University

Abstract

It is widely accepted that the Battle of Actium (31 B.C.E.) was a pivotal historical event that effectively brought an end to the political norms of the Roman republic and laid the foundations for the Principate. Despite the social and political importance of this victory, it is also commonly held that aside from his triple triumph, Octavian/Augustus refrained from permanently and overtly celebrating his civil war victory in Rome, relying instead on subtle symbolic and metaphorical references in the Capital (dolphins, tripods, rostra, etc.) and reserving grandiose victory monuments for far-flung locals with foreign or veteran audiences, most famously at Nikopolis. Interpretations of a freestanding arch, the so-called Actian Arch, granted to Octavian by the Senate in 31 B.C.E. and possibly depicted on a denarius with a single bay arch minted in 29–27 B.C.E., have been influenced by this traditional narrative. Many have argued that the Actian Arch stood only for a short time at the southeast corner of the Forum Romanum before it was either torn down or integrated into the less politically-contentious Parthian Arch, thereby aligning with what Paul Zanker labeled the end of Octavian's self-aggrandizing “triumviral style.”

This paper reassesses the literary, numismatic, and archaeological evidence for an Actian Arch in Rome, as well as the context in which it would have been constructed. It questions whether this frequently cited monument was ever built in Rome and proposes that the arch depicted on the denarius of 29–27 B.C.E. was instead set up in Brindisium, the port city from which Octavian’s troops embarked for Actium. Finally, it situates the possible Brindisium arch within a growing corpus of prominent and long-standing Actian victory monuments that together demand a reevaluation of Roman attitudes toward Actium and the public reception of Actian victory monuments, both inside and outside the capital.