The Emperor's Qualities According to the Custom of the Latin Panegyrics

The boastful speeches included in the Panegyrici Latini Collection have long been underestimated as a source because they are filled with flattery and self-serving rhetorical figures. At the end of the 19th and the beginning of the 20th century, the main issues that the researchers dealt with were the way, the time and the place of the corpse, and the clarification of the authorship of speeches. In recent decades, interest in the collection has been revived. New editions and new translations (first full German and English translations) are just some of the results. Several articles and monographs have clarified the literary qualities of the speeches and the value of the collection as a historical source. In many of these studies, the problem of the ideological purpose of panegyrics was addressed. Obviously, despite their limitations in the rhetorical canon, their authors manage to organize them in a complex and creative way of composing and including important ideological messages in the description and praise of the works and qualities.

The purpose of this study is to show that panegyrists combine the ceremonial function of praise with ideological justification of the emperor's power, and linking this justification to the requirements of verus princeps. To the omnipresent question, Which one of the contenders is a legitimate emperor, and which one the usurper?", the panegyrics answer ambiguous: "Тhe origin is important, but the mode of government is also important - the real Emperor rules for the benefit of the people, refrains from arbitrariness and guarantees the security and prosperity of the state and the people."