Augustus' Wit

Perhaps because he was self-sufficient he [Augusto] could take a joke at his own expense, as several anecdotes suggest. He possessed a sense of humor that was cynical on his own account as it was on anyone else's. In his youth he had written, among other things, a tragedy about Ajax. Looking back on it later he cringed and obliterated it; in the Roman world writings were wiped away with a sponge, much as pencil marks can be removed with an eraser nowadays, so when a friend asked him what had become of his tragedy he said that Ajax had committed suicide falling on his sponge [Ájax, no mito, suicida-se atirando-se sobre a sua espada: ver imagem].

Augustus, de Pat Southern.

Routledge, London & NY: 1998.

imagem: métopa do santuário de Hera em Foce Sele (570-560 a.C.)

@ Museu Arqueológico Nacional de Paestum