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RESEARCH PRODUCT

Immagini ed echi di Augusto in Sicilia: realia e contesti, res incertae vel alienae

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The paper gathers and analyzes the data useful for reconstructing the reception and the legacy of Augustus’ image in Sicilian civic contexts. Beside the four portrait heads from Syracuse, Centuripe, Tyndaris, Taormina, several sculptural, epigraphic and numismatic testimonia are considered from the above-quoted cities and other Sicilian sites. Except for few more ancient inscriptions/statues(?) (Syracuse) and coins (Segesta), a key moment in the response by the local civic communities to the imperial model is around Augustus’ visit of 21 B.C. and in the immediate period after his death. Moreover, a series of testimonia, mainly inscriptions and coins, belong to mid(-late) Augustan age, particularly from 12 B.C. I have to remark a certain resurgence of Augustus’ image during/following Caligula’s visit in Eastern Sicily and most probably under Claudius’ reign. A larger and more articulated phenomenon is the renewal of Augustan models in the statues of other members of the gens Augusta and in symbolic-religious or “historical-religious” reliefs.