American Nostalgia for Rome
Hayden Sestak
Dr. Beronja
UGS 302
15 April 2018
American Nostalgia for Rome
Washington D.C., the capital of the United States of America, is a city glorifying the nation’s founding and the ideals it holds to be important. From the monuments to great presidents to Capitol Hill, the ideals of democracy and the importance of a united Republic radiate out to those viewing them. However, another central aspect that all the important structures in Washington D.C. seem to have in common is very much evident, as well. These structures look clearly Roman. The multitude of buildings containing Roman columns and the numerous structures modeled off of Roman temple design are not situated in the capitol due to a mere love for the Roman aesthetic, because the enshrining of Roman ideas filters down into the layers of American society, too. Ever since America’s founding there has been a clear attempt to connect the new nation to the ideals of the Roman Republic in order to show America as continuing the republican ideals set forth centuries earlier and to establish an ancient legitimacy to this fledgling, new and experimental nation.
The use of nostalgia relating to the Roman Republic existed from the very beginning, largely in the form of restorative nostalgia. When Svetlana Boym wrote her analysis of the types of nostalgia she characterized restorative nostalgia by its use of symbolism and rhetoric relating to the origin point – in this case that would be the Roman Republic (Boym, 2001). The founders during the early days of America used restorative nostalgia by putting themselves in the place of the ancient Romans that created the famous Republic. This use of nostalgia was quite widespread and influential as it solidified the connection between the new nation and the Roman Republic in common discourse and popular culture such as newspapers. Many of the themes that were enveloped in this nostalgia are still used today. The prevention of tyranny, for example, was a rhetorical theme that America was born under, and one that remains relevant in American political discourse today. The Romans had rejected the monarchy that had existed, and instead set up a republican framework for government. So, in the founders’ situation, they had the chance to replicate this ancient dispelling of monarchial rule and in essence create the “Roman Republic 2.0”. The notion of the founders portraying themselves as Romans of the Republic and the British as the dictatorial Caesar was common. The founders and revolutionary soldiers likened themselves to the patriotic hero Cato in the play that was fittingly popular amongst them, and they saw Britain as Caesar with “unchecked ambition and tyrannical oppression” (Malamud 2008, p. 32). These Roman comparisons remained common throughout American history and serve their purpose of strengthening the connection to Rome well.
The choice of depicting the situations and people of the time in their Roman likenesses served a clear and deliberate purpose of signaling that America as a new country should be thought of in terms of the ideals that surrounded the Roman Republic. It is no mystery that Thomas Jefferson and many other founders thought very fondly of the ideals expressed in the Roman Republic, after all they fit perfectly with the anti-tyrannical rebellion they had just succeeded in winning. In the timeframe that the founders existed, nostalgia for the founding of the Roman Republic came and was used naturally, as has already been stated. As the nation was set up, the deliberateness of the reinforcement of these ideals became clear. A great case study for this is the Capitol Building in Washington D.C. This is one of the central structures for the United States – it houses one of the three branches of government and serves as the basis for United States republicanism. With all the importance endowed on it, the political elites ensured that it would also express to all that the ideals that form the United States government are very much a continuation of classical Roman ones. The Capitol Building has white Corinthian columns with a Roman temple design directly on the front of the building which loudly states the Roman influences. Inside the building, at the top of the rotunda is a painting called “The Apotheosis of Washington” that depicts Washington surrounded by angels going to heaven. In Rome, an apotheosis scene was a common scene that would deify a deceased ruler. To see one in America, especially in the Capitol Building shows that the very soul of the U.S. government is connected to the classic Roman ideals, and that Washington was an embodiment of those same ideals.
Along with the establishment of the connection of ideals, another reason for the founders to draw Roman comparisons to themselves was to legitimize the new nation. America stood tired and quite odd after the Revolution. It had defeated the British, the most powerful empire on Earth, but now it had to run a country, and it did not help that many outside of the new independent colonies thought of them as a rather desolate backwater and not a thriving powerhouse that they would eventually be. The founders, however, wanted America to be a force to be reckoned with as well as respected and legitimized in the world. This framed the type of language they used to describe the new country. John Adams wrote talking about America, “Immortal Rome was at first but an insignificant Village … but by beginnings it rose to a stupendous Height” (Malamud 2008, p. 33). When George Washington shockingly stepped down from the office of President after two terms, the world was enthralled. The elite in America saw Washington just as one of the Romans during the Republic that had allowed the peaceful transition of power. “His contemporaries saw him as modeling the Roman values admired in the early Republic so well that they often portrayed him with Roman symbols” (Malamud 2008, p. 35). To portray the first President in such a way showed the rest of the world that the ideals of the Roman Republic were in fact working – there would be no fall back to monarchy – and that the nation very well could follow the course of Rome and become quite powerful. The thought process also involved the fact that America “would remain exceptional as long as its citizens cultivated virtue and acted with the best interests of the republic in mind” (Malamud 2008, p. 40). This line of thinking transfers the two established goals of nostalgia for the Roman Republic – legitimacy and the continuation of ideals – into an ongoing process of establishing symbols so that the hybrid American-Roman ideals continue to have meaning in whatever future America would look like.
In many ways the governmental landmarks around Washington D.C. fulfill the two goals because their architectural design shows veneration for Roman Republican ideals which allows them to continue instilling their ideals onto future generations. The next point of focus is to see how the buildings that have been established since the early founding have used restorative nostalgia in their venerating architecture. A great case study for this is the Supreme Court building. It was built many years after the founding, yet it follows many of the principles that were set up during the founding. The building is quite clearly Roman in inspiration, with beautiful white columns in the Corinthian style and a temple-like design. The marble used in the columns was brought over from Italy as a more subtle homage to Rome. However, a blatant symbol of the connections of ideals is the words “Equal Justice Under Law” which appear on the West side of the building. These words embody the virtues of the American legal system, while at the same time owing their originality to ancient Greek/Roman traditions. With the important task of creating a building dedicated to housing the highest court in the nation, the political elite approved a design that clearly drew off of Roman inspiration in order to show that the legal system in the United States was founded under the Roman ideals of equality and justice. Many of the monuments built to honor former Presidents also share in the tradition of having their architectural design contain obvious Roman influences. The Jefferson Memorial is modeled after one of the greatest Roman architectural achievements The Pantheon as if to symbolize the crafting and design that went in to the Roman masterpiece was similar to the design that Jefferson did for the Declaration of Independence. New generations will continue to look upon these monuments and equate the past Presidents with the Roman ideals of equality, justice, and liberty due to the specific design choices.
With the infusion of Roman inspiration throughout all layers of the United States government a side effect is that political discourse in this country becomes infused with Roman symbols just like the buildings. A key feature in the political discourse is the decline of the Republic. Rome certainly went from a thriving Republic to an Empire ruled by dictators, so if America would be a continuation of the Roman Republic it may be susceptible to such a collapse. Senator Robert Byrd of West Virginia used this theme when decrying a bill “The Senate, he said, “handed to the President just as the Roman Senate handed to Caesar and to Sulla the control over the purse” (Malamud 2008, p. 43). Within political discourse comparisons of the President to the infamous Caesar are certainly not uncommon. “Writing in Die Spiegel on the day the U.S. invaded Iraq, Erich Follath und Gerhard Spörl suggested that like the Rome of the Caesars, the decadent, complacent U.S. kingdom of the Bushites was rotting from the inside” (Burton 2013, p. 2). What is shown by these two examples is that with America carrying the continuation of the Roman Republic so openly, political discourse is invariably going to contain strains of Romanesque terminology.
America has been a nation willingly wearing its Roman inspiration openly. Nostalgia for the Roman Republic has existed from the very beginning. The founders and eventual political elites existing in any era have used restorative nostalgia with architectural symbols and popular culture to instill the connection to classic Rome. Because of the numerous references and the most important buildings in the nation containing clear references to Roman architecture the idea is quite engrained in the public consciousness. America will forever be thought of in the context of the Roman Republic, and it is due to the legacy of restorative nostalgia.
References:
Burton, P.J. (2013) Pax Romana/Pax Americana. International Journal of the Classical Tradition. 20:15
Boym, Svetlana. (2001). The Future of Nostalgia. New York. NY: Basic Books
Malamud, M. (2008) Ancient Rome and Modern America. Osxford, UK: Wiley-Blackwell,
Maiolo, David. N.d. Photograph. Retrieved from url.