Initium principis: the Procedure of Handing Over the Authority to the First Successors of Augustus
Velikanova Е. N.
The author examines the procedure of investing first successors of Augustus with princeps' authority by the examples of Tiberius and Gaius Caligula. Scholars do not seem to have come to a universally accepted view of the mechanism; variance of their opinions of the process and its stages corresponds to the lack of univocacy in ancient sources. Synthesising the data of the sources, a scholar has to explain away the contradictions between them. The questions to be answered are as follows. What were specific features of both principes' «initium» and common elements of the power they received, the elements which laid the foundation of the political and legal mechanism of handing down personal authority under the new regime? What was the procedure of handing it down? Analysing Tacitus' and Dio Cassius' accounts and other relevant documents, the author makes the following conclusions. Initium Tiberii (Tac. Ann. I. 16) was the first case of the practice. The troubles of the «transition period» (in 14 AD) were caused by the preceding events. In Caligula's case the circumstances were quite different, since Gaius was a private person. The procedure of handing over the princeps' authority was based upon republican public law constructions. Successor's fate was determined by three political forces: the army (as part of the civil community), the senate and the comitia, but the degree of their participation in the process was different. Comitia voted only formally for the decision proposed by the senate. The army's role was decisive. The senate acquired greater importance during the initium, because the senators took official decision about the transition of authority to the new princeps. In the earlier period of the Julio-Claudian dynasty during the election of princeps the candidate was discussed, as was the case with Tiberius, and this made the procedure very much like election of a magistrate. The candidate had to get approval of three «instances» in the form of military oath (in the legions and praetorian cohorts), recommendation (in the senate) and adopting of lex de imperio (at the comitia). Formally, the lex had the greatest importance, but in fact it was the army (who took the oath) that had decisive force. But iusiurandum did not have the same importance in public law system as lex. Of some importance were also family relations between the successor and the predecessor (for the latter could be deified after his death) and the princeps' testament indicating the successor. Within the framework of the old mechanism of handing over authority, functions of various institutions changed or were redistributed. These changes formed the specific features of principate from the point of view of public law system.