OCR Classical Civilisation The Imperial Image: a complete overview of the option
A complete overview of the OCR Classical Civilisation The Imperial Image option (H408/22). Explains how the paper is examined, the transformation of Octavian into Augustus, and how statues, monuments, coins and poetry projected an image of peace, piety, victory, dynasty and divine connection, with the source skills the option rewards.
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OCR Classical Civilisation The Imperial Image (H408/22) is a Culture and the Arts option that studies how the first Roman emperor, Augustus, crafted and spread his public image through literature and material culture. This overview ties together the transformation of Octavian, the messages of the image, and the sources that carried it. Each section has a matching dot-point page.
How the paper works
The Imperial Image is examined in 1 hour 45 minutes for 75 marks (30% of the A-level). It uses the standard five question types: a short-answer question, a 10-mark stimulus question on a printed source or image, a 10-mark idea question, a 20-mark essay and a 30-mark essay. You must handle both literary sources (the Res Gestae, Augustan poetry) and visual sources (statues, monuments, coins).
From Octavian to Augustus
The image rests on a transformation. The violent young Octavian rose through civil war, proscriptions and the defeat of Antony and Cleopatra at Actium. In the settlement of 27 BC he "restored the Republic," took the name Augustus, and presented himself as the modest princeps, ruling (he claimed in the Res Gestae) by auctoritas not potestas. The image masked the reality of his control of the provinces, armies and succession.
The messages and the media
Augustus' image projected a consistent set of messages, peace, piety, military victory, dynasty and divine connection, through several media:
- Sculpture: the Prima Porta statue (the victorious general, the Parthian standards, the Cupid linking him to Venus) and the Via Labicana statue (the pious Pontifex Maximus), all in an idealised, ageless portrait type.
- Architecture: the Ara Pacis Augustae (the imperial procession, Tellus/Pax, Aeneas, projecting peace, piety and dynasty) and the Forum of Augustus with the Temple of Mars Ultor.
- Coinage: coins carrying his portrait, titles and changing messages (the Parthian standards, the doors of Janus, his heirs) across the empire.
- Poetry: Virgil and Horace celebrating the golden age and Roman destiny, with the more ambivalent voices of Propertius and Ovid.
The central debate
A recurring theme is the gap between image and reality, and how far the sources are propaganda. Every Augustan source is a constructed image first and evidence of fact second, and the strongest answers always note this gap and evaluate sources critically.
How to revise
Learn the prescribed sources in detail, ready to describe and decode each one. Build a grid of Augustan themes against the sources that convey them. Practise the source-based stimulus questions and the thematic essays.
Sources & how we know this
- OCR A Level Classical Civilisation (H408) specification — OCR (2017)