A Divine Right to Rule? The Gods as Legitimators of Power

What is it about?

In Ancient Rome, an individual could claim that they had the support of a god, and, if their claim was believed, could attempt to leverage that divine support to justify their political power, military commands, and social capital. In this paper I analyse how claiming divine support could be a powerful political strategy and how this developed across the Roman Republic and into the Early Empire.

Featured Image

Photo by Leonhard Niederwimmer on Unsplash

Photo by Leonhard Niederwimmer on Unsplash