Roman History and Cultural Context: every key term you need (+ practice quiz)
40 flashcard terms for AP Latin Unit 6, written to match the course framework. Study them here, then drill them as interactive flashcards, or test yourself with the 20-question quiz — free, no account needed.
Julius Caesar's adopted heir who defeated Antony and Cleopatra at Actium (31 BCE) and became princeps in 27 BCE; Vergil wrote the Aeneid (c. 29-19 BCE) under his patronage.
Maecenas
Augustus' wealthy adviser and literary patron who supported Vergil and Horace; patronage linked poets to the new regime without making them mere propagandists.
Publius Vergilius Maro
Born 70 BCE near Mantua, died 19 BCE at Brundisium; author of the Eclogues, Georgics, and the unfinished Aeneid, which he reportedly asked to have burned.
Gaius Julius Caesar
100-44 BCE; consul 59 BCE, proconsul of Gaul 58-50 BCE, victor of the civil war, dictator; assassinated on the Ides of March. His Commentarii report the Gallic campaigns in the third person.
Commentarii
Caesar's genre: ostensibly plain field notes rather than polished history, a form that lends his self-presentation an air of objectivity.
First Triumvirate
The informal 60 BCE alliance of Caesar, Pompey, and Crassus that secured Caesar's consulship and his Gallic command; it collapsed after Crassus' death at Carrhae (53 BCE).
Lex Vatinia
The 59 BCE law granting Caesar Cisalpine Gaul and Illyricum for five years; the Senate added Transalpine Gaul, giving him the base for the Gallic War.
Roman Civil War (49-45 BCE)
Caesar crossed the Rubicon in January 49 BCE; his victories over Pompey (Pharsalus, 48) and the Pompeians ended the Republic in all but name.
Second Triumvirate
Octavian, Antony, and Lepidus (43 BCE), formalized by law; proscriptions killed Cicero, and Philippi (42 BCE) destroyed Brutus and Cassius.
Battle of Actium
31 BCE naval victory of Octavian (Agrippa commanding) over Antony and Cleopatra; depicted at the center of Aeneas' shield in Book 8 as the culmination of Roman history.
Pax Augusta
The peace and restoration program Augustus advertised after decades of civil war; the Aeneid's promise of 'imperium sine fine' and Anchises' 'parcere subiectis et debellare superbos' echo it.
Ara Pacis
The Altar of Augustan Peace (dedicated 9 BCE) whose reliefs of Aeneas sacrificing and of the Julian family reflect the same ideology as the Aeneid.
Gens Iulia
Caesar's and Augustus' family claimed descent from Iulus (Ascanius), son of Aeneas, and so from Venus; the Aeneid gives this claim epic authority.
Pietas
Devotion to gods, family, and country; Aeneas' epithet 'pius' marks him as the model of the Roman virtue Augustus promoted through religious revival.
Furor
Irrational passion or frenzy, opposed to pietas and ratio; embodied by Juno, Dido's love, Turnus, and finally Aeneas himself when he kills Turnus.
Fatum
Fate, the divinely fixed course of events, especially Rome's destiny; Jupiter guarantees it, Juno delays it, mortals suffer under it.
Mos Maiorum
The 'custom of the ancestors,' the unwritten code of Roman conduct that Augustus claimed to restore through moral legislation.
Clementia
Mercy toward the defeated, advertised by Caesar in the civil war; the Aeneid tests it when Aeneas hesitates over the suppliant Turnus.
Manly courage and excellence, the quality Caesar praises in his centurions and that Vergil examines in Aeneas, Turnus, and Nisus and Euryalus.
Fides
Good faith and reliability in obligations; Roman self-image contrasted their fides with the perceived treachery of enemies like the Gauls or Carthaginians.
Punic Wars
Three wars between Rome and Carthage (264-146 BCE); Dido's curse calling for an avenger ('exoriare aliquis ... ultor') foreshadows Hannibal.
Hannibal
Carthaginian general who invaded Italy in 218 BCE and won Cannae; a Roman audience heard him in Dido's curse and in the eternal enmity she demands.
Cursus Honorum
The ladder of magistracies (quaestor, aedile, praetor, consul); Caesar climbed it and used the proconsulship as a springboard for military glory.
Legion
Caesar's main unit, nominally about 5,000 men in ten cohorts; he raised legions on his own initiative in Gaul, a sign of his growing independence.
Centurion
Career officers commanding centuries; Caesar names men like Titus Pullo and Lucius Vorenus (Book 5) to praise virtus and rivalry within the ranks.
Legatus
A senior officer commanding legions under Caesar; Labienus is his most trusted, while Sabinus and Cotta die at Aduatuca.
Gallia
Caesar divides Gaul into three parts: Belgae, Aquitani, and Celtae/Galli, distinguished by language, customs, and laws (Book 1.1).
Druids
The priestly class of Gaul described in Book 6: they judge disputes, teach orally, believe in transmigration of souls, and are exempt from war and taxes.
Equites (Gallic)
The Gallic warrior aristocracy; Caesar's ethnography contrasts them with the druids and the oppressed common people (plebs).
Germani
Peoples east of the Rhine whom Caesar portrays as harder and less civilized than the Gauls, having no druids and worshiping only Sun, Fire, and Moon.
Ariovistus
German king invited into Gaul by the Sequani; Caesar's defeat of him in 58 BCE established Roman dominance in eastern Gaul.
Vercingetorix
Arvernian leader of the great revolt of 52 BCE, defeated at Alesia; Caesar led him in triumph in 46 BCE and had him executed.
Britannia
Caesar's two expeditions (55 and 54 BCE, Books 4-5) were more prestige than conquest; his account of British customs is among the earliest.
Rhine Bridge
In 55 BCE Caesar's engineers bridged the Rhine in ten days (Book 4), a demonstration of Roman technical mastery over Germany.
Homeric Model
Aeneid 1-6 recasts the Odyssey (wanderings) and 7-12 the Iliad (war); Vergil's aemulatio both imitates and transforms Homer.
Ennius
Author of the Annales, the first Latin hexameter epic; Vergil borrows archaic diction and phrasing from him.
Hellenistic poet of the Argonautica whose Medea supplies a model for Vergil's Dido.
Catullus and Neoterics
Late-Republican poets whose learned, emotional style, especially poem 64 on Ariadne, influenced Vergil's treatment of abandoned Dido.
Roman Religion
Auspices, sacrifice, and prodigies shape both texts: Aeneas constantly consults omens, and Caesar's Gauls and Germans are judged by their religious practices.
Suicide of Dido
Read against Cleopatra's suicide in 30 BCE: an eastern queen who threatened Rome ends her own life, a resonance Vergil's audience could not miss.