The symbol engraved on Augustus’ signet ring was a sphinx. Julian the Apostate described him as ‘a chameleon’. He seized power declaring himself the saviour of the Roman Republic, but in the process abolished it. He ruled as an autocrat but maintained the fiction that he was no more than the Republic’s First Citizen — and left as his legacy a new system of imperial government that was to continue for another 400 years in the West and until 1453 in Constantinople in the East.
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Moi, Auguste, Empereur de Rome, an exhibition that brings together more than 170 busts, sculptures and other artifacts, from over 40 museums, will be at the Grand Palais in Paris from 19 March until 13 July.
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