The Role of the Dead in the Political Culture of the Roman Republic
This session will explore how death and funerals were used by the political elite during the Roman Republic as a public spectacle for the sake of increasing the bereaved party’s own socio-political capital. It will also explore how death, and the memory of a dead ancestor, could be, and was, used to better one’s chances in the aristocratic competition that was central for the political culture of the Roman Republic.

The session will begin with an overview on how the Romans viewed death and the afterlife and how a typical funeral for the aristocratic elite was performed, with a focus on performative practices and spectacle in both private and public spheres. This will also include a short discussion on how demography and the marriage patterns of the Roman elite created large age gaps between sons and fathers which in turn greatly affected funerary practices. Following this we will explore how the Romans communicated and used the deeds and honors of the deceased to further their own agendas in two major ways:

How tombs and funerary inscriptions were used to increase the socio-political capital of the Roman gentes, as exemplified by L. Cornelius Scipio Barbatus (c. 337 BC – 270 BC) and the Tomb of Caecilia Metella (c. 30 – 10 BC).
How funerary processions, death masks (imagines), and honorary games (ludi funebres) were used by the aristocratic elite as part of electoral campaigns.

Further this will be exemplified through looking at several individuals that were either furthered, or hampered, by the careers and the memory of their fathers and grandfathers, and how important timing was in these situations. The memory of a long dead hero is sometimes easier to use than trying to fill the shoes of a recently deceased political giant. Thus we can look at, and compare, individuals who began their careers at different points related to the death of their fathers.

For example we can find C. Marcius Rutilus Censorinus (a. 310 – 256 BC) who could use the name of his long since dead father C. Marcius Rutilus (a. 357 – 342 BC) to shape himself into the prime representative for an increasingly powerful plebeian aristocracy. M. Fabius Vibullanus (a. 442 – 431 BC) who had to “obliterate from men’s minds the infamous judgement” performed by his father Q. Fabius Vibullanus (a. 467 – 449 BC), and Q. Fulvius Flaccus (a. 187 - 172 BC) whose career, although impressive, was forever diminished by comparison to the greater achievements of his father Q. Fulvius Flaccus (a. 237 – 205 BC).