The Augustan Empire 43 BC

Octavian anyway knew better than to bludgeon the cultured too crudely. 'Propaganda' is too crass a word to apply to the literary production of his followers. Horace, for instance, was hardly disloyal. When he was writing an Epode, the tone would be appropriately Archilochean and abusive. But he was also writing his Satires, where Lucilius had set the generic pattern of personal attack and derision; yet, very self-consciously, Horace turned away from the tradition, dwelling instead on the delicate portrayal of his life and his values, especially the value of friendship. Remarkably, Antony and Cleopatra escape attack; Horace's personalia are different, warmer and more intimate. If Octavian is in the background, the suggestions are gentle ones: these are his friends, and this is how they live. A few years earlier Virgil too had complimented Octavian in the first Eclogue — 'deus nobis haec otia fecit' (1.6), and there can be little doubt that the god is Octavian. Coming so early in the first poem, that is almost an informal dedication of the whole collection. But the tone is anything but bluntly propagandist. The final emphasis of the first Eclogue rests more on the emptiness faced by the dispossessed Meliboeus; and the whole book explores the different registers of tragedy one found in the Italian countryside, an idyllic land now wracked by a devastation for which, if one thought about it, Octavian himself took much of the blame. In the late thirties Virgil was at work on the Georgics, and there too he wrote warmly of Octavian. But once again the tone is often sombre, dwelling on the vast work that was needed to restore the beauty that had been marred and lost.²³⁴ As in the first Eclogue, Octavian can certainly offer hope: 'hunc saltern everso iuvenem succurrere saeclo|ne prohibete' (G. 1. 500—1). But still not all of these are the emphases Octavian would have favoured himself. Guided doubtless by Maecenas, he was already seeing the value of a patronage which was notably loose and free, and the poets responded with writing

²³¹ See below, ch. 18 pp. 883-93. ²³² See below, pp. 49-50. ²³³ See below, p. 5 3.

²³⁴ That is a suggestion even of the proem to the third Gcorgic, where Virgil promises Octavian a poetic temple in the manner of Pindar. The 'temple' will be in Mantua. After G. 11.198-9, and indeed Eel. ix.27-9 (see above, p. 14), Mantua's suggestions are tragic; its idyllic description at G. 11.12-15 must now seem bland, with the tragedy artificially muted.

which meshed with his propagandist themes without always crudely echoing them. He already knew better than to confuse independence with subversion: knowledge which he was to retain for many years to come.

And, all this while, what was Octavian doing himself? He was in Illyricum, winning some glory for himself with cheap foreign blood. There had been campaigns there a few years earlier: in 39 Pollio had been involved with the Parthini in the south, and possibly with the Delmatae as well,²³⁵ at the same time an army of Octavian had apparently been active somewhere in the country.²³⁶ But little had been achieved, .and there was still plenty for Octavian to do. And, of course, Illyricum bordered Antony's dominion. It was not very likely that it would be strategically valuable if it came to war; at least, not unless Illyricum could be fully conquered, and that would hardly be practicable in the time. A civil war would probably be fought in Greece, and Greece would still be reached most readily by the sea-crossing from Italy. But, when war came, at least Octavian's troops would not have far to go. He could reasonably hope to make inroads into Antony's territory before Antony himself could return.

The campaigns themselves are described elsewhere in this volume.²³⁷ By summer 3 3 Octavian was back in Rome, sporting the eagles which Gabinius had lost in 48 and the defeated Delmatae had now returned.²³⁸ The achievements were modest but real, and Illyricum had certainly served its purpose: Octavian had secured his excuse for keeping his soldiers in arms, the men had been battle-hardened, and Octavian himself looked far more soldierly at the end than at the beginning. Why, he had even contrived to be wounded, though not always very satisfactorily: at Setovia, for instance, he was struck by a stone on the knee. And he might seem something of a disciplinarian as well. On one occasion he had gone so far as to order a decimation of his own troops.²³⁹ During his brief winter stays at Rome Octavian could inveigh against Antony, and contrast his own energy with Antony's sloth.²⁴⁰ Now

This is disputed, and is connected with the difficult question of Pollio's own political position during those years. For different views cf. Syme 1937 (d 67); Bosworth 1972 (c 34); and Woodman 1983 (в 203) on Veil. Pat. 11.78.2.