Janico Albrecht is going to present a working paper on "Religio imperatoris and religio urbis in the Late Republic: The Case of Lucius Cornelius Sulla"

The following text is a synthesis of several subchapters (bold) that treat the Late Republican politician and general (imperator) Lucius Cornelius Sulla (ca. 138-78 BC). My interest is not so much a biographical one but rather focusses on some aspects of his well-documented self-stylisation. For the sake of brevity, I don’t include the wider perspective on his political environment and on other agents who also brought forward religious claims during this time (chapters 5.1.3.2+3) as well as – building on this – the interpretation of transgressive religious behaviour as potentially desirable for  imperatores especially in a civil war. 

Sulla is commonly known for becoming the first imperator to turn his army against Rome, for waging a bloody civil war on Italian soil, for (after his victory) systematically murdering any perceived opposition and as dictator making drastic changes in the political system. In my thesis, though, his political ambitions and reforms play a less important role than his career as imperator Felix (~the Fortunate) – his literary self- stylisation as divinely inspired general. Special emphasis is put on the imperatorial context. Here, the underlying idea is that Roman religion showed its highest structural density in the public sphere where political ambitions and religious office-holding went hand in hand and were tightly connected to the idea of senatorial authority in religious matters. The situation changed during wartime which for centuries usually meant the warmer seasons of every year. The turn from 2nd to 1st century saw the development that military campaigns didn’t only last for months but could take armies and generals away from Italy for years. When Rome was at war the imperator (usually the acting or a recent consul) was invested with almost unlimited authority not only in military but also religious matters. Far away from the social control of his peers (except those who accompanied him as subordinates) it was expected from him not only to interact with his men but also the gods whose cooperation was both formally necessary and of utmost importance to motivate the soldiers. 

Within historiography the religious behaviour of generals almost became an own genre  of exemplary accounts which stand out because here Roman senators (and thereby often religious office-holders) adapted behavioural patterns which would have been entirely out of place in the civil sphere (e.g. claiming personal divine inspiration). Furthermore, already many ancient historians show a peculiar awareness for the importance and problems of bringing such claims back to Rome. In such cases even when treating obviously transgressive behaviour moral criteria rarely play a role. The focus lies rather on interactional considerations: audiences are not only impacted but can also play an active part so that confirmation, modification and rebuttal by the ‘claimant’ become integral parts of negotiating imperatorial claims.

  It is this double setting of imperatorial religious claims in the military context and their negotiation at Rome in which Sullas literary account of his military and religious deeds comes in as an extraordinary source – especially since his autobiographical work antedates the historiographical material that we have for this epoch by half a century! By taking a closer look at the transport of Sullas religious narratives from the battlefields of the east to the form of literary apology I try to stress not only his ability to circumvent contemporary scrutiny by his peers but also his systematic contextual overlay due to the fact that he never ‘civilised’ and even in Rome never refrained from using imperatorial modes of communication. This assumption is the starting point for the analysis of the later civil war periods which are no less characterised by charismatic approaches to imperatorial authority and claims to religious preordination.