M. Vipsanius Agrippa -- comments on Rome
Feb. 20th, 2007 11:27 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
vaznettiOne thing I do like in this season's Rome is the way they're forming Agrippa's politics -- it's a nice use of the tradition found i.e. in Cassius Dio, where there's a set piece debate between Agrippa and Maecenas, with Maecenas advocating monarchy and Agrippa a return to a more Republican government. So here it's Agrippa who has the scene with Cicero, and Agrippa who hates the proscriptions. Perhaps it will be Agrippa who succeeds in moderating Octavian's violence.
Historically, it was Agrippa who married the daughter of Cicero's closest friend, Atticus; make of that what you will. Anyway, she seems to have died young.
The evidence for Agrippa's political beliefs is minimal: it's easier to see why people would think that he opposed monarchic government than to figure out what he actually thought. In any case, his career is entirely devoted to Augustus, and it's hard to imagine that he would have opposed him, especially during the years when he was Augustus' de facto heir. Had Augustus died first, Agrippa might have attempted a return to some kind of senatorial government; he probably would have run into the same problems Tiberius does in his early years in power. And as I say, the evidence is rather sketchy -- we know about Tiberius' politics, of course, but have to fill in Agrippa's, Livia's and Vipsania's from imagination. I find it tempting to imagine that Tiberius was following not just his father but his father-in-law, even though Ti. Claudius Nero and M. Vipsanius Agrippa had such wildly different backgrounds.
I don't quite know what to make of Agrippa and Octavia here: if the show does go ahead with the Antony/Octavia match, there's potential for a great deal of wailing and gnashing of teeth, and it will give Agrippa a bit more drive in the Actium sequences.
It's not a question of opposition to Augustus, or to the Principate, but of different understandings of what the Principate is: Agrippa, had he been left in power, couldn't have used Augustus' more dramatically monarchic ideas to maintain his own authority, so he would have to have shaped a slightly different Principate. One gets the sense that this Agrippa, at least, might have done quite a good job of it.
Historically, it was Agrippa who married the daughter of Cicero's closest friend, Atticus; make of that what you will. Anyway, she seems to have died young.
The evidence for Agrippa's political beliefs is minimal: it's easier to see why people would think that he opposed monarchic government than to figure out what he actually thought. In any case, his career is entirely devoted to Augustus, and it's hard to imagine that he would have opposed him, especially during the years when he was Augustus' de facto heir. Had Augustus died first, Agrippa might have attempted a return to some kind of senatorial government; he probably would have run into the same problems Tiberius does in his early years in power. And as I say, the evidence is rather sketchy -- we know about Tiberius' politics, of course, but have to fill in Agrippa's, Livia's and Vipsania's from imagination. I find it tempting to imagine that Tiberius was following not just his father but his father-in-law, even though Ti. Claudius Nero and M. Vipsanius Agrippa had such wildly different backgrounds.
I don't quite know what to make of Agrippa and Octavia here: if the show does go ahead with the Antony/Octavia match, there's potential for a great deal of wailing and gnashing of teeth, and it will give Agrippa a bit more drive in the Actium sequences.
It's not a question of opposition to Augustus, or to the Principate, but of different understandings of what the Principate is: Agrippa, had he been left in power, couldn't have used Augustus' more dramatically monarchic ideas to maintain his own authority, so he would have to have shaped a slightly different Principate. One gets the sense that this Agrippa, at least, might have done quite a good job of it.
