In Rome, an exhibition on cursus honorum, at the Capitoline Museums

An exhibition on the cursus honorum, the series of public offices held by Roman citizens who wanted to make a political career in the Republican age: this is the one being held from March 24 to October 2, 2022 in Rome at the Capitoline Museums in the Palazzo dei Conservatori building. The exhibition, entitled Cursus honorum. The Government of Rome Before Caesar, part of the project The Rome of the Republic. The Tale of Archaeology, focuses on the public offices of the magistrates of the Republican age, the cursus honorum, a fundamental aspect of political life in ancient Rome. The exhibition project is promoted by Roma Culture, Sovrintendenza Capitolina ai Beni Culturali and is curated by Claudio Parisi Presicce and Isabella Damiani. Organization by Zètema Progetto Cultura.

The protagonists of this tale are five anonymous characters portrayed by as many statues who act as exceptional narrators: four are male figures to which is added a different voice, a female figure, representing a reality otherwise absent in a society inevitably dominated by men. Their task is to bring the public closer to monuments of historical and symbolic value that celebrate memorable feats of war, along with others that illustrate to us roles related to the administration of the city and the building of the social prestige of individuals and their families. With the help of these special guides, visitors will be reminded of episodes of warfare and conquests that marked milestones in the history of Rome’s expansion: a prominent example is the first naval victory over the Carthaginians in the waters of Milazzo, commemorated by the Rostrata Column erected in honor of Consul Gaius Duilius. This and other events are narrated by three travertine portrait statuae from the mid-first century B.C., formerly at Villa Celimontana, who wear the pallium, i.e., the cloak that was worn over the tunic.

The ius imaginum, i.e., the right to keep portraits of ancestors in the home to be displayed at funerals and on special public occasions, initially exclusive to the patriciate and extended in the 4th century B.C. to plebeians as well when they gained access to public office, is instead narrated by the famous “Togato Barberini” (named after the collection it came from). The majestic marble statue, which can be dated to the first quarter of the first century AD, constitutes a unique testimony to the system of self- legitimization that the families that held power put in place, using the fame and prestige of their ancestors. Finally, the voice animating the female figure, part of a funerary Group with a maiden, made of Luna marble and datable to about the middle of the first century B.C., introduces the funerary monuments, particularly the sarcophagi from the tomb of the gens Cornelia, a rare archaeological evidence of a noble tomb from the Republican age. The display, along the roads leading out of Rome, of the architecture and paintings of the aristocratic tombs constituted another element of ostentation of acquired power.

The exhibition also gives an account of the characteristics of Roman magistracies: collegial, and of limited duration, mostly annual. The higher magistrates (consuls, praetors, censors) were elected by citizens apportioned according to census, assembled in centuriate committees and distinguished by special attributes such as the curule chair, fasces (symbols of coercive power) and a special edged toga. They were the only ones who could celebrate the triumph. Lesser magistrates (quaestors, aediles) were elected by the citizens divided by tribe, meeting in tribute committees. The order of succession of offices was established in the 2nd century BC by a law that also specified the minimum age of candidates and the time that had to elapse between one magistracy and the next. The stages, in ascending order, were: questura, tribunate, edicty, praetorship, consulship, and censorship, to which must be added the temporary and exceptional investiture of the dictatorship. With the advent of the Republic, the powers, previously concentrated in the figure of the king, were distributed between the pontifex maximus, who was vested with the main religious prerogatives, and the consuls, a pair of magistrates with civil powers and military command.

Access to the cursus honorum required, in addition to a minimum census, fame and prestige from ancestors: anyone who did not belong to a few illustrious families was a “new man.” The rules of entry to the magistracies and the articulation of offices underwent changes over time: access to the main magistracies (consulship), initially limited to members of patrician families, was extended to plebeians in the fourth century BC. As Rome’s power increased, other elective magistracies with circumscribed powers were established.

The exhibition makes exclusive use of works pertinent to the Capitoline collections, some from the permanent exhibition of the Centrale Montemartini, some not usually on display. This was (according to an intention that the Capitoline Museums and Archaeological Museums Directorate pursues by organizing exhibitions based on materials from its own collections) a new opportunity to proceed with activities of conservation, restoration and enhancement of the very rich heritage that needs to be made increasingly accessible to the public.

It is within this framework that we proceeded with a multimedia set-up aimed at bringing visitors closer to complex subjects and particular monuments; think of epigraphic documents, very important direct historical sources of not immediate reading. Finally, the exhibition stands as an ideal trait-d’union between the video installation The Legacy of Caesar and the Conquest of Time, visible in the Hall of the She-Wolf and Ancient Fasti in the Palazzo dei Conservatori, and the exhibition Rome of the Republic. The Tale of Archaeology, forthcoming at the Capitoline Museums, Palazzo Caffarelli.

For all information you can visit the Capitoline Museums website.

In Rome, an exhibition on cursus honorum, at the Capitoline Museums

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