Discours impérial et figures du prince vertueux : des mots et des images de circonstance

From Cicero’s De Re publica (54–51 BC) to Licinius’ coins (313 AD), this paper aims to reconsider some aspects of Imperial virtues, mainly from the so-called clupeus uirtutis (27–26 BC). Iustitia and Sapientia deliver the first entry to some aspects of an Imperial Discourse, made of words, images and rituals, from Augustus to Constantine. About one hundred coins and four hundred inscriptions have been collected, three coins and twelve inscriptions are considered in order to give some fresh perspectives about the main goals the emperors, members of the Urban and Imperial elites, and peoples of the Imperial cities, have tried to achieve! Even if a major evolution can be observed from the 1st to the end of the 3rd and the beginnings of the 4th centuries AD, especially with an increase of emphasis (the use of superlatives), the fundamental characteristics have been preserved: how to celebrate the princeps through his virtues in order to commemorate the legitimacy of the Imperial Res publica.