The Fasces: A History of Ancient Rome's Most Dangerous Political Symbol

305 Pages·2022·24.327 MB·English

by  T. Corey Brennan

i
The Fasces
ii
iii
The Fasces
A History of Ancient Rome’s Most
Dangerous Political Symbol
z

T. COREY BRENNAN
iv
Oxford University Press is a department of the University of Oxford. It furthers
the University’s objective of excellence in research, scholarship, and education
by publishing worldwide. Oxford is a registered trade mark of Oxford University
Press in the UK and certain other countries.
Published in the United States of America by Oxford University Press
198 Madison Avenue, New York, NY 10016, United States of America.
© Oxford University Press 2023
All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in
a retrieval system, or transmitted, in any form or by any means, without the
prior permission in writing of Oxford University Press, or as expressly permitted
by law, by license, or under terms agreed with the appropriate reproduction
rights organization. Inquiries concerning reproduction outside the scope of the
above should be sent to the Rights Department, Oxford University Press, at the
address above.
You must not circulate this work in any other form
and you must impose this same condition on any acquirer.
Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
Names: Brennan, T. Corey, author.
Title: The fasces : a history of Ancient Rome’s most
dangerous political symbol / T. Corey Brennan.
Other titles: History of Ancient Rome’s most dangerous political symbol
Description: New York, NY : Oxford University Press, [2023]
Identifiers: LCCN 2022008598 (print) | LCCN 2022008599 (ebook) |
ISBN 9780197644881 (hardback) | ISBN 9780197644904 (epub)
Subjects: LCSH: Signs and symbols—Italy—History, | Fasces—History.
Classification: LCC CR572 .B74 2023 (print) | LCC CR572 (ebook) |
DDC 929.60945—dc23/eng/20220222
LC record available at https://lccn.loc.gov/2022008598
LC ebook record available at https://lccn.loc.gov/2022008599
DOI: 10.1093/ oso/ 9780197644881.001.0001
1 3 5 7 9 8 6 4 2
Printed by Sheridan Books, Inc., United States of America
v
Contents
Acknowledgments vii
List of Illustrations ix
1. Introduction to the Roman Fasces 1
2. Origins of the Fasces 8
3. Images of the Roman Fasces 26
4. Roman Fasces in Action 50
5. The Roman Fasces: Limits and Discontinuities 73
6. Carrying the Fasces 93
7. Roman Fasces in the Medieval and Renaissance Eras 109
8. Early Modern and Neoclassical Fasces 121
9. Popular and Revolutionary Fasces 136
10. American Fasces 156
11. Constructing Fasces in Mussolini’s Italy 178
12. Eradication of Fasces and Epilogue 198
Abbreviations and Note on Translations 219
Notes 221
Bibliography 255
Index 269
vi
vii
Acknowledgments
About thirty- five years ago, sometime in the 1985– 1986 academic
year, my dissertation director Ernst Badian (1925– 2011) suggested two pos-
sible topics for a Ph.D. thesis. One was the role of the magistrate called the
praetor in the Roman Republic. The other was the staff of the praetor in that
same era, including the lictors, the attendants who carried his most impor-
tant insignia of office, the fasces. At the time, the difference in significance
between the two projects seemed to me practically laughable, and on the spot
(for better or worse) I chose the first. I did not give much thought to the
second until August 2017, while trying to process the shocking “Unite the
Right” rally of extremists held in Charlottesville, Virginia. I was stunned to
see from news reports that some of the participating hate groups had chosen
a Roman- style fasces as their symbol. The thought then occurred to me that
Professor Badian, as so often, had identified a genuinely compelling subject
for study, one with real contemporary relevance. Hence the present book.
For six weeks in the fall of 2019 I had the excellent fortune to hold the
Lucy Shoe Meritt Residency in Classical Studies and Archaeology at the
American Academy in Rome (AAR). It certainly seems providential that
I spent a good portion of my time at the AAR in its superb Library gath-
ering materials for this book, since starting in March 2020 (and indeed, right
through the completion of this manuscript) the global public health crisis has
made this type of in- person research almost impossible. I thank the organizers
of the Glasgow University conference “Women, Wealth and Power in the
Roman Republic,” the Center for the Humanities at Temple University, the
Classical Association of Scotland (Edinburgh and South- East Centre), an
AAR- sponsored panel at the Society for Classical Studies / Archaeological
Institute of America joint annual meeting, and the University of Gothenburg
for the opportunity to share some of the findings of this book in 2021 via
remote presentations. I am also grateful for invitations to lecture on this sub-
ject in 2020 at Roehampton University, the Institute of Classical Studies
viii
viii Acknowledgments
(London), and the Charterhouse School (Godalming, Surrey); each of these
events was canceled due to COVID-1 9. I also express my thanks to Rutgers
University, its School of Arts and Sciences, and the Department of Classics
for its warm support in general, and in particular for waiving my teaching in
fall 2019 so that I could take up the AAR Residency. In other visits to Rome
over the past years, HSH Prince Nicolò (1941– 2018) and HSH Princess Rita
Boncompagni Ludovisi most generously allowed me to make their historic
Villa Aurora my scholarly base, for which I feel greatly honored and indebted.
I thank especially the following individuals for specific help and guid-
ance in connection with this project over the years, without wishing to im-
plicate them in any of the errors in fact and interpretation this book may
contain: T. Aidonis (Westminster School); E. Badian† (Harvard); M. Beard
(Cambridge); H. Becker and J. A. Becker (Binghamton); M. T. Boatwright
(Duke); W. W. Briggs (South Carolina); D. Chiekova (The College of New
Jersey); M. G. D’Amelio (Rome Tor Vergata); E. Dench (Harvard); J. Dugan
(Buffalo); H. I. Flower (Princeton); V. Follo (AAR); C. Fried (Harvard);
G. Fried (Boston College); A. Giardina (Scuola Normale Superiore,
Pisa); J. P. Hallett (Maryland); K. K. Hersch (Temple); S. Hierl (AAR);
S. L. James (UNC Chapel Hill); M. Koortbojian (Princeton); L. Lancaster
(Ohio); J. Linderski (UNC Chapel Hill); M. Lotts (Rutgers); B. Lundquist
(Tidskriften Medusa); J. Ma (Columbia); C. Maciver (Edinburgh);
A. Majanlahti (Rome); P. Montserrat (Temple); D. Nousek (Western);
B. Nygren (Loyola Maryland); J. Ochsendorf (MIT); I. Östenberg
(Gothenburg); D. Padilla Peralta (Princeton); P. Pedinelli (Rome); G. Ponti
(IES Rome); C. Raddato (Frankfurt); M. V. Ronnick (Wayne State); P. Rudy
(Missouri- Kansas City); E. J. Shepherd (Aerofototeca Nazionale, ICCD);
C. Steel (Glasgow); A. Summerscale (Cambridge, MA); K. Tempest
(Roehampton); and L. Webb (Oxford). I am more generally indebted to each
of my colleagues in the Rutgers Department of Classics: J. McGlew (chair),
and S. Al Kuntar, E. Allen- Hornblower, K. Chew, S. Connolly, T. J. Figueira,
J. Fisher, B. Perruzzi, T. Power, J. Ulrich, and A. Yadin- Israel.
Dorothy Bauhoff expertly copy- edited this book, and Brent Matheny
(Oxford University Press) and Dharuman Bheeman (Newgen Knowledge
Works) patiently guided it through production. I must also register my
warmest thanks to Stefan Vranka, Executive Editor at Oxford University
Press, for his many years of interest, support, and wise counsel, spanning now
three books.
But I offer my deepest appreciation to my beloved wife, Dr. Antonia
Fried, and our children Samuel, Nicholas, and Allegra, to whom I dedicate
this work.
ix
List of Illustrations
Figure 2.1. Postcard (1937) showing fasces- like decorative element
(60 cm in length, with double- headed axe joined to rods,
all in iron) found in 1898 in “Tomb of the Lictor” at the
Etruscan site of Vetulonia. Credit: Collection of T. C.
Brennan. 9
Figure 2.2. Denarius (silver) of M. Iunius Brutus, 54 bce. The reverse
shows his claimed ancestor, the consul (509 bce) L. Iunius
Brutus, between two lictors, preceded by an accensus
(magistrate’s attendant), all walking left; BRVTVS in
exergue = RRC 433/1 . Credit: Classical Numismatic
Group, Inc. Triton XXV, Lot 739 (January 11, 2022). 17
Figure 3.1. Giovanni Battista Piranesi (1720– 1778), Opere Vol.
11: Antichita d’Albano e di Castel Gandolfo; Descrizione
e disegno dell’Emissario del lago Albano (1762) Tav. III,
showing the tomb of Gnaeus Cornelius Scipio Hispallus,
who died as consul in 176 bce. Credit: University of
South Carolina, Irvin Department of Rare Books and
Special Collections. 27
Figure 3.2. Watercolor of fresco scene (now partially lost) in the
“Tomba Arieti” (Rome, Esquiline), showing a Roman
triumph, with six lictors bearing fasces, preceding a
commander in a four- horse chariot (Latin quadriga).
From Giatti (2007), 80 fig. 2. 29
Figure 3.3. Bronze sestertius of Hadrian (RIC II 590b), struck 119–
121 ce, showing (on obverse) a laureate portrait bust
of the emperor facing right, and (on reverse) a lictor
standing left, holding fasces, setting fire to heap of bonds
with torch. The lictor is deliberately shown with lack of