Cambridge Ancient Hi.. - Index of

158 6. emperor and court
to the country could be inflated into a full-scale procession through the city,
and these ceremonies outside the palace precincts projected different facets
of imperial rule to a broader public. The emperor might ride through the
streets in a gilded carriage pulled by snow-white mules, escorted by the
imperial standards and heavily-armed, brawny men with long hair. He was
preceded by the senate through cleaned and repaired streets where, at
various locations, choruses saluted him. 115
Some secular urban processions dramatized the emperor’s role as civic
benefactor – for instance, when he inspected the city’s granaries – and
onlookers could divine the political stature of leading figures by their proximity
to the imperial carriage. 116 The visual symbolism of these elaborate
displays was verbalized – and actively incorporated onlookers – by the
acclamations chanted by the crowd or, increasingly, by semi-professional
performers. Their simple, rhythmical formulae trumpeted the emperor’s
felicity, victory and piety and might also salute important figures in the
power structure. Though street processions persisted, imperial ceremonies
geared to broader audiences shifted increasingly to the circus. Emperors
still braved the streets when necessary, but their security might be jeopardized,
as Theodosius II discovered when a famished crowd stoned his procession
to inspect the granaries. 117
The army’s role as audience and participant in these public ceremonies
seems to diminish in this era. Thus, the great accession ceremony had
remained closely linked with the Roman army so long as coronations followed
the precedent established by Valens in 364. Down to the time of Leo
I, emperors were proclaimed by the troops outside the city, on the parade
ground at the Hebdomon, a place clearly identified with the army by the
city’s inhabitants. 118 But the pattern changed thereafter, perhaps in connection
with Leo I’s murder of his former patrons, the generals Aspar and
Ardabur, which ended that military family’s dominance at court. Leo I had
his grandson proclaimed emperor in the Hippodrome, and Zeno’s investiture
followed suit shortly thereafter. 119 This new civilian setting for imperial
accession kept the soldiers who symbolized the army’s participation
safely down in the arena. It geared the emperor’s assumption of power to
the urban crowd, as he appeared in the kathisma surrounded by leading
figures of his court to receive the troops’ Latin acclamations and his
people’s Greek ones. The first accession celebrated inside the city set a
pattern which prevailed until the seventh century and affected other ceremonies
– for example, triumphs. 120
115 Proclus of Constantinople, Hom. ix.1–2.
116 Const. Porph. De Cer. ii.51; cf. Mango, Développement 40.
117 Marc. Com. s.a. 431; cf. McCormick, Eternal Victory 94 n. 61. 118 Dagron, Naissance 100–1.
119 Const. Porph. De Cer. i.94; Theoph. AM 5966.
120 Beck (1966) 10–22; McCormick, Eternal Victory 60–9 and 93–100.
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