"This book tells a part of the back-story to major religious transformations emerging from the tumult of the late Republic. It considers the dynamic interplay of Cicero's approximations of mortals and immortals with a range of artifacts and activities that were collectively closing the divide between humans and gods. A guiding principle is that a major cultural player like Cicero had a normative function in religious dialogues that could legitimize incipient ideas like deification. Applying contemporary metaphor theory, it analyzes the strategies and priorities configuring Cicero's divinizing encomia of Roman dynasts like Pompey, Caesar and Octavian. It also examines Cicero's explorations of apotheosis and immortality in the De re publica and Tusculan Disputations as well as his attempts to deify his daughter Tullia. In this book, Professor Cole transforms our understanding not only of the backgrounds to ruler worship but also of changing conceptions of death and the afterlife"-- Provided by publisher

Print version record.

Cover; Half-title; Title; Copyright; Contents; Acknowledgments; Introduction; Chapter 1 The cultural work of metaphor; Backgrounds: Greek divinization in Sicily; Divine assimilation in the early speeches; Pro lege Manilia: presenting the divine savior at Rome; Speculations and metaphorical frames: the consular year speeches; Chapter 2 Experiments and invented traditions; Cross-domain mapping in the post-exilic speeches; Pro Sestio: the Herculean statesmen of Rome; Authorizing apotheosis in the De re publica and De legibus; Chapter 3 Charting the posthumous path.

Deferring deification in the Caesarian speechesExcavation and innovation: Tusculan Disputations; Chapter 4 Revisions and Rome's new god; De natura deorum and the question of elite skepticism; De senectute and De amicitia: Cato, Laelius, and the parallel world of Cicero's dialogues; The Philippics: exit Caesar, enter Octavian; Conclusions; References; Index.

Includes bibliographical references and index.

English.