Leiden conventions rendered as EpiDoc: restorations as supplied(reason=lost), gaps as gap, abbreviations as expan(abbr+ex), omitted letters as supplied(reason=omitted), surplus as surplus, corrections as corr. Critical apparatus as listApp. The facing translation is div type=translation; the historical commentary is div type=commentary.
On the 13th day before the Kalends of October, at Pisa, in the forum, in the Augusteum, the scribes present were Q. Petillius Q. f., P. Rasinius L. f. Bassus, M. Puppius M. f., Q. Sertorius Q. f. Pica, Cn. Octavius Cn. f. Rufus, and A. Albius A. f. Gutta. Whereas C. Canius C. f. Saturninus, duumvir with judicial power, brought before the council a measure on augmenting the honours of Lucius Caesar — son of Augustus Caesar, father of the fatherland, pontifex maximus, holder of tribunician power for the twenty-fifth time, augur, consul designate, leader of the youth, and patron of our colony — and asked their opinion on the matter, on that matter they decreed as follows:
Since the Senate of the Roman people, among many and the greatest honours for Lucius Caesar — son of Augustus Caesar, father of the fatherland, pontifex maximus, holder of tribunician power for the twenty-fifth time, augur, consul designate — by the unanimous consent and zeal of all the orders [had decreed honours], the task was entrusted to C. Canius Saturninus, duumvir, and to the ten leading men, of choosing and inspecting which site seemed the more suitable, and of buying, with public money, from the private owners of that place, the site they should most approve; and that each year at that altar, on the 13th day before the Kalends of September, public offerings be made to his shade by the magistrates, or by those who there preside over jurisdiction, clad in dark togas — those for whom it shall be lawful and right to wear such dress on that day — and that an ox and a black sheep, decked with dark-blue fillets, be sacrificed to his shade, and those victims be burned in that place, and over them single urns of milk, honey and oil be poured; and then at last that leave be granted to others, if any should wish privately to make offerings to his shade, provided that no one offer more than one wax taper, or one torch, or one garland, and that those who sacrifice, girt in the Gabine manner, kindle a pile of wood and so keep it; and that the space before that altar, where those piles are to be heaped and arranged, lie open forty feet in every direction and be fenced with stout stakes, and that stacks of wood for that purpose be set up there each year; and that, on a large cippus fixed beside the altar, this decree, together with the earlier decrees pertaining to his honours, be cut or engraved. For as to the other solemnities which, on that same day, it was thought fitting to avoid or forbid, that is to be followed which the Senate of the Roman people shall have decreed concerning them. And that, at the first opportunity, envoys from our order go to the Emperor Caesar Augustus — father of the fatherland, pontifex maximus, holder of tribunician power for the twenty-fifth time — and ask of him that he permit the Julian colonists of the loyal colony Iulia Pisana to do and carry out all these things by virtue of this decree.
[At Pisa, in the forum, in the Augusteum (?)], the scribes present were Q. Sertorius Q. f. Atilius Tacitus, P. Rasinius L. f. Bassus, L. Lappius L. f. Gallus, Q. Sertorius Q. f. Alpius Pica, C. Vettius L. f. Virgula, M. Herius M. f. Priscus, A. Albius A. f. Gutta, Ti. Petronius Ti. f. Pollio, L. Fabius L. f. Bassus, Sex. Aponius Sex. f. Creticus, C. Canius C. f. Saturninus, and L. Otacilius Q. f. Panthera. Whereas they made a formal statement that, since in our colony, because of disputes among the candidates, there were no magistrates, the following things had been done and transacted: when, on the fourth day before the Nones of April, the news arrived that Gaius Caesar — son of Augustus, father of the fatherland, pontifex maximus, guardian of the Roman empire and protector of the whole world, grandson of the Deified — after the consulship which, waging war beyond the farthest borders of the Roman people, he had carried through with success, the republic well managed and the most warlike and greatest nations conquered or received into protection, himself having taken wounds for the republic, had by that mischance been snatched by cruel fate from the Roman people: he, already designated a princeps most just and most like his father in his virtues, and the sole protection of our colony; and since this news, when the grief was not yet stilled which the whole colony had taken up at the death of his brother Lucius Caesar — consul designate, augur, our patron, leader of the youth — had renewed and multiplied the mourning of all, of each man and of all together: for these reasons all the decurions and colonists, since in that crisis the colony had neither duumvirs nor prefects nor anyone in charge of jurisdiction, agreed among themselves that, in keeping with the magnitude of so great and so sudden a calamity, it was fitting that, from the day on which his death was announced until the day on which his bones should be brought back and laid to rest and the rites due to his shade completed, all should change their dress, and that — the temples of the immortal gods, the public baths and all the shops being closed — they should abstain from banquets, and that the matrons of our colony should go into mourning.
And that the day on which Gaius Caesar died — the ninth day before the Kalends of March — be handed down to memory as a day of grief, like the day of the Allia; and that it be recorded, and provided by the command and will of all present, that no public sacrifice, no supplications, no betrothals, no public banquets be afterwards held, undertaken or proclaimed on that day, the ninth before the Kalends of March, nor any theatrical or circus games take place or be watched on that day; and that each year, on that day, public offerings be made to his shade by the magistrates, or by those who preside over jurisdiction at Pisa, in the same place and in the same manner as has been established for the offering of rites to Lucius Caesar; and that an arch be set up in the most frequented place of our colony, adorned with the spoils of the nations conquered by him or received into protection, and that upon it be placed a statue of him on foot in triumphal dress, and around it two gilded equestrian statues of Gaius and Lucius Caesar; and that, as soon as we are able, by the law of the colony, to elect and have duumvirs, the first two men so elected refer to the decurions this which has pleased the decurions and all the colonists, so that, their public authority being brought to bear, it may be lawfully so provided, and, on their motion, entered in the public records; and that meanwhile T. Statulenus Iuncus, Augustal flamen, junior pontifex of the public rites of the Roman people, be asked — the present necessity of the colony being excused before the envoys — to make known this public duty and the will of all, by a memorandum delivered to the Emperor Caesar Augustus, father of the fatherland, pontifex maximus, holder of tribunician power for the twenty-sixth time; and that T. Statulenus Iuncus, first citizen of our colony, Augustal flamen, junior pontifex of the public rites of the Roman people, shall have done so, the memorandum — just as is written above — having been delivered to the Emperor Caesar Augustus, pontifex maximus, holder of tribunician power for the twenty-sixth time, father of the fatherland.
It is the pleasure of the enrolled councillors that those things which, on the fourth day before the Nones of April — when Sex. Aelius Catus and C. Sentius Saturninus were consuls — were done, transacted and established by the consent of all the orders, all of them be so done, conducted, held and observed by L. Titius A. f. and T. Allius T. f. Rufus, duumvirs, and by whoever shall thereafter be duumvirs, prefects or any other magistrates in our colony — all things to be so done, conducted, held and observed in perpetuity; and that L. Titius A. f. and T. Allius T. f. Rufus, duumvirs, see to it that all those things which are written above be entered, by our decree, in the presence of the proquaestors, at the first opportunity, by the public scribe into the public records. They so decreed.
The first Pisan decree opens with the form of a Roman municipal act: the date, the place — the forum of the colony, in its Augusteum — and the scribes present. It then states the motion: the duumvir C. Canius Saturninus uerba fecit, ‘made a statement’, on augmenting the honours of Lucius Caesar, dead earlier in AD 2 at Massilia, and asked the council its opinion (Ehrenberg & Jones, Documents, no. 68).
The abbreviations are those of a working municipal record: v. f. (uerba fecit), and the formulae q. d. e. r. f. p. (quid de ea re fieri placeret) and d. e. r. i. c. (de ea re ita censuerunt) — ‘what they wished done about that matter’ and ‘on that matter they decreed thus’. The honorand's titles — pontifex maximus's son, augur, consul designate, leader of the youth, patron of the colony — are the cursus of an Augustan prince.
The body of the decree votes a cult of the dead prince. An altar is to be bought with public money; at it, each year on the anniversary, the magistrates are to offer public inferiae to his manes — an ox and a black sheep with dark-blue fillets, milk, honey and oil — and private citizens may then make their own small offerings. The decree even sets the size of the precinct: forty feet square, fenced with stakes (Ehrenberg & Jones, Documents, no. 68).
Two clauses give the decree its place in the dossier. It orders itself engraved on a cippus ‘together with the earlier decrees pertaining to his honours’ — the Pisan council had decreed for Lucius more than once. And it twice defers to Rome: the other solemnities are to follow ‘what the Senate of the Roman people shall have decreed’, and an embassy is to ask Augustus himself for leave to act. The municipal cult is built in the shadow of the lost Roman decrees for the prince.
The second decree, for Gaius Caesar two years later, is one of the most vivid documents of the early Principate. Its preamble explains an emergency: the colony of Pisa, caught between elections, had no magistrates at all when the news of Gaius's death arrived, and so the decurions and colonists acted ‘by agreement among themselves’. The decree is, in form, the record they later ratified (Ehrenberg & Jones, Documents, no. 69).
The narrative of the death is studied rhetoric. Gaius — wounded in the East, iam designatum principem, ‘already a designated princeps’ — is snatched ‘by cruel fate’; and his death falls on a colony still in mourning for his brother Lucius, so that the grief is ‘renewed and multiplied’. The colony's response is total: a change of dress, the temples and baths and shops shut, banquets abandoned, the matrons in mourning — the language of a community in iustitium, public suspension.
The honours themselves follow the precedent of Lucius's decree and reach further. The anniversary of Gaius's death — the ninth day before the Kalends of March — is to be a day of grief ‘like the day of the Allia’, the dies Alliensis, the blackest day in the Roman calendar; no sacrifice, betrothal, banquet or games may fall on it. Annual inferiae are set, exactly ‘as established for Lucius Caesar’ (Ehrenberg & Jones, Documents, no. 69).
Then a triumphal arch, hung with the spoils of Gaius's eastern war, carrying his statue on foot in triumphal dress flanked by gilded equestrian statues of Gaius and Lucius together — the two dead princes paired, as their names would be paired in the destinatio centuries. The decree closes with its constitutional knot: because there were no magistrates, the resolution must later be put to the decurions by the first duumvirs elected, and meanwhile carried to Augustus by the colony's princeps, T. Statulenus Iuncus.
The final paragraph is the ratification proper — the decree the duumvirs at last passed once the colony again had magistrates. It is dated by its consuls (Sex. Aelius Catus and C. Sentius Saturninus, the consuls of AD 4) and confirms ‘all those things’ done in the emergency, binding them on the present duumvirs L. Titius and T. Allius Rufus and on all future magistrates of the colony in perpetuom (Ehrenberg & Jones, Documents, no. 69).
The closing word — censuere, ‘they decreed’ — is the same verb that ends a senatus consultum. A municipal council of a Tuscan colony closes its act with the formula of the Roman Senate itself: the decree's whole grammar is borrowed upward, the colony mirroring the state. The instruction to enter the act ‘in the public records’ by the public scribe, before the proquaestors, is what turned the resolution into the bronze that survives.