The Pharaoh Octavian

[Onasander]

https://books.google.com/books?id=4wPAmml1G9sC&pg=PA13&lpg=PA13&ots=YtWmvZXXA6&focus=viewport&dq=arius+octavian&output=html_text

 

I don't know how the Greeks were "crowned", this makes it sound almost like a Medieval Pope crowning a Holy Roman Emperor.

 

I find it odd that a independent, colonial monarchy would let the priesthood do the crowning in the first place. But it also makes sense why Octavian would immediately search it out, and also why Egypt was never properly integrated into the empire.

[caldrail]

Egpyt never properly integrated? Egypt was a personal preserve of Augustus and a major supplier of 'corn' to the city of Rome. Since there were never any serious problems with natives in Egypt, one wonders why it was considerred not properly intergrated. As for the priesthood, since egyptian religions were still current (and one or two quite popular in Rome, Isis for a long time, it makes sense that casting Augustus in the light of Pharoah was going to happen. To assume that Egypt became an identikit part of Roman culture is sheer nonsense - no province of the ROman empire ever did that. Gaul was considered the closest emulatior, but all provinces retained their own flavour and native populatiions even to the very end.

[Onasander]

So the Dacians didn't come close? They still call themselves ROMania. They tried really, really hard.

 

Egypt, from everything I've read, simply was isolated from the rest of the empire (how this worked beyond passport and customs is beyond me, it obviously got peoplepeople, at least lower class swelling Alexandria).

 

I can be corrected here of course, my knowledge of learning of these restrictions come from just two primary sources separated by a few centuries, and random mentions of Egypt never being properly integrated (Senate had no say, almost like a private estate of the emperors).

 

I just don't know the primary source for that idea, wasn't my idea.

 

I do have to disagree with the questioning of the link if Octavian actually was crowned, under the superstition that the Senate wouldn't approve him as Emperor if he did.... this is idiotic, his legions years before fought off legions in Italy during the Perusine War, he had just offed his last real contended (Mark Anthony) and the Senate already had plenty of experience in what to expect if it resisted since Julius Caesar.... but this counter-argument isn't proof for me Augustus was crowned. I'm still stumped as to how the Egyptian priesthood got to crown anyone in the first place under the old system of Ptolomy. But it seems reasonable if such king making priests did exist, you make a beeline straight to them and get them under your control. Getting them to crown you and flooding them with money seems smart.

Edited March 28, 2015 by Onasander

[caldrail]

Romania is a name that certainly shows Roman influence, as does the ltin based native language spoken today. However, the Romans are adamant - it's Gaul that was the closest emulator of latin culture. Most places only had Roman amentieis, public buildings, and a section of the populace that went latin in order to further their interests.

 

Crowning Octavian as king of Rome would have been a death sentence, however much of a king he actually was. In the provinces, there was less concern. Running provincial Egypt was not the same as running the city that ran the empire.