Political Power and Victory Coins in the Visual Propaganda of the Principatus Period

Abstract

Coins, which were part of daily life in Principate like during the Republic as they were used by common people in transactions or the state to pay the salaries of soldiers, were also one of the most convenient tools used for visual propaganda in Rome. Although they were used as a tool of propaganda towards the end of the Republican Era, coins were never became an effective and systematic propaganda tool as much as during the reign of Octavian. Raised close to a competent leader like Caesar, Octavian was inspired by Caesar’s strategic practices and propaganda on one hand, and learned from his guardian Caesar’s mistakes and determined his own strategic moves more carefully and applied them step by step, when it was his time of rule, on the other. Octavian’s especially manipulative policy regarding coins were continued almost unchanged under his emperor successors; they used the powerful written and visual language on coins in order to maintain the legitimacy and continuity of their rule. In that regard, the coin language gained a more distinct identity with the personification and explanatory inscriptions used on the coins from the very beginning of Principate, while it has also ceased to be an object that only the educated can understand. The emperor portraits on the coins have also been the mirror of symbolic power in the recognition of the emperor, the only power of Rome, both in the lands under the dominion and in the foreign states. In this study, the image of power, i.e. visual propaganda, during the Principate was discussed, and the coin samples of each emperor, which stood out mainly with military victories, were examined and their policies were tried to be evaluated.