Gaius Octavius was of a prosperous family that had long been settled at Velitrae (Velletri), southeast of Rome . His father, who died in 59 bce, had been the first of the family to become a Roman senator and was elected to the high annual office of the praetorship, which ranked second in the political hierarchy to the consulship. Gaius Octavius’s mother, Atia, was the daughter of Julia , the sister of Julius Caesar , and it was Caesar who launched the young Octavius in Roman public life. At age 12 he made his debut by delivering the funeral speech for his grandmother Julia. Three or four years later he received the coveted membership of the board of priests ( pontifices ). In 46 bce he accompanied Caesar, now dictator, in his triumphal procession after his victory in Africa over his opponents in the Civil War; and in the following year, in spite of ill health, he joined the dictator in Spain . He was at Apollonia (now in Albania ) completing his academic and military studies when, in 44 bce, he learned that Julius Caesar had been murdered.

Augustus was no stranger to assassination plots. Fortunately, Augustus did not suffer the same fate as his adoptive father, Julius Caesar . Augustus died of natural causes on August 19, 14 CE, at age 75. He was immediately succeeded by his adopted son, Tiberius .

Augustus brought peace (“ Pax Romana ”) to the Greco-Roman world. In 27 BCE he nominally restored the republic of Rome and instituted a series of constitutional and financial reforms that culminated in the birth of the principate. As princeps of Rome, Augustus enjoyed enormous popularity. He reformed the monetary system and significantly expanded Roman territory.

After the assassination of Julius Caesar in 44 BCE, Augustus joined forces with Caesar’s former chief lieutenant, Mark Antony , and his magister equitium (“master of the cavalry”), Marcus Lepidus , to form the Second Triumvirate of Rome. The Second Triumvirate did not last long. About 40 BCE Antony began a consequential love affair with Cleopatra , queen of Egypt. Shortly thereafter Lepidus fell from power, and Augustus waged war against Antony and Cleopatra. Augustus emerged victorious in 30 BCE.

Yes! Julius Caesar was Augustus’s great-uncle—that is, Augustus’s mother’s mother’s brother. Caesar played a big role in Augustus’s early life. He introduced Augustus to Roman political life and took him on military campaigns and victory tours too. In his will Caesar formally adopted Augustus as his son and identified him as his chief personal heir.

Augustus (also known as Octavian) was the first emperor of ancient Rome . Augustus came to power after the assassination of Julius Caesar in 44 BCE. In 27 BCE Augustus “restored” the republic of Rome, though he himself retained all real power as the princeps , or “first citizen,” of Rome. Augustus held that title until his death in 14 CE. Today he is remembered as one of the great administrative geniuses of Western history.

Augustus , also called Augustus Caesar or (until 27 bce) Octavian , original name Gaius Octavius , adopted name Gaius Julius Caesar Octavianus , (born September 23, 63 bce—died August 19, 14 ce, Nola , near Naples [Italy]), first Roman emperor , following the republic, which had been finally destroyed by the dictatorship of Julius Caesar , his great-uncle and adoptive father. His autocratic regime is known as the principate because he was the princeps , the first citizen , at the head of that array of outwardly revived republican institutions that alone made his autocracy palatable . With unlimited patience, skill, and efficiency , he overhauled every aspect of Roman life and brought durable peace and prosperity to the Greco-Roman world.

Rise to power

Returning to Italy, he was told that Caesar in his will had adopted him as his son and had made him his chief personal heir. He was only 18 when, against the advice of his stepfather and others, he decided to take up this perilous inheritance and proceeded to Rome. Mark Antony (Marcus Antonius), Caesar’s chief lieutenant, who had taken possession of his papers and assets and had expected that he himself would be the principal heir, refused to hand over any of Caesar’s funds, forcing Octavius to pay the late dictator’s bequests to the Roman populace from such resources as he could raise. Caesar’s assassins, Marcus Junius Brutus and Gaius Cassius Longinus, ignored him and withdrew to the east. Cicero, the famous orator who was one of Rome’s principal elder statesmen, hoped to make use of him but underestimated his abilities.

Augustus Augustus, bronze sculpture from Meroe, Sudan, 1st century ce ; in the British Museum. Courtesy of the trustees of the British Museum

Celebrating public games, instituted by Caesar, to ingratiate himself with the city populace, Octavius succeeded in winning considerable numbers of the dictator’s troops to his own allegiance. The Senate, encouraged by Cicero, broke with Antony, called upon Octavius for aid (granting him the rank of senator in spite of his youth), and joined the campaign of Mutina (Modena) against Antony, who was compelled to withdraw to Gaul. When the consuls who commanded the Senate’s forces lost their lives, Octavius’s soldiers compelled the Senate to confer a vacant consulship on him. Under the name of Gaius Julius Caesar he next secured official recognition as Caesar’s adoptive son. Although it would have been normal to add “Octavianus” (with reference to his original family name), he preferred not to do so. Today, however, he is habitually described as Octavian (until the date when he assumed the designation Augustus).

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Octavian soon reached an agreement with Antony and with another of Caesar’s principal supporters, Marcus Aemilius Lepidus, who had succeeded him as chief priest. On November 27, 43 bce, the three men were formally given a five-year dictatorial appointment as triumvirs for the reconstitution of the state (the Second Triumvirate—the first having been the informal compact between Pompey, Crassus, and Julius Caesar). The east was occupied by Brutus and Cassius, but the triumvirs divided the west among themselves. They drew up a list of “proscribed” political enemies, and the consequent executions included 300 senators (one of whom was Antony’s enemy Cicero) and 2,000 members of the class below the senators, the equites or knights. Julius Caesar’s recognition as a god of the Roman state in January 42 bce enhanced Octavian’s prestige as son of a god.

He and Antony crossed the Adriatic and, under Antony’s leadership (Octavian being ill), won the two battles of Philippi against Brutus and Cassius, both of whom committed suicide. Antony, the senior partner, was allotted the east (and Gaul); and Octavian returned to Italy, where difficulties caused by the settlement of his veterans involved him in the Perusine War (decided in his favour at Perusia, the modern Perugia) against Antony’s brother and wife. In order to appease another potential enemy, Sextus Pompeius (Pompey the Great’s son), who had seized Sicily and the sea routes, Octavian married Sextus’s relative Scribonia (though before long he divorced her for personal incompatibility). These ties of kinship did not deter Sextus, after the Perusine War, from making overtures to Antony; but Antony rejected them and reached a fresh understanding with Octavian at the treaty of Brundisium, under the terms of which Octavian was to have the whole west (except for Africa, which Lepidus was allowed to keep) and Italy, which, though supposedly neutral ground, was in fact controlled by Octavian. The east was again to go to Antony, and it was arranged that Antony, who had spent the previous winter with Queen Cleopatra in Egypt, should marry Octavian’s sister Octavia. The peoples of the empire were overjoyed by the treaty, which seemed to promise an end to so many years of civil war. In 38 bce Octavian formed a significant new link with the aristocracy by his marriage to Livia Drusilla.

But a reconciliation with Sextus Pompeius proved abortive, and Octavian was soon plunged into serious warfare against him. When his first operations against Sextus’s Sicilian bases proved disastrous, he felt obliged to make a new compact with Antony at Tarentum (Taranto) in 37 bce. Antony was to provide Octavian with ships, in return for troops Antony needed for his forthcoming war against the empire’s eastern neighbour Parthia and its Median allies. Antony handed over the ships, but Octavian never sent the troops. The treaty also provided for renewal of the Second Triumvirate for five years, until the end of 33 bce.