The accession of Tiberius upon the death of Augustus in 14 A.D. established the precedent of dynastic rule at Rome. Even though Tiberius was not related to Augustus (07.286.115), he underscored his connections to the princeps by commissioning portraits that created an intentional physical and stylistic resemblance (compare this with the portrait of Augustus). Therefore, Tiberius was the first successor in a long line of emperors that used the artistic convention of calculated resemblance to legitimize his position and promote specific ideas about his reign.

Rings bearing ancestral portraits were widely used in the Republic as personal seals, as both a means of identification and a guarantee against forgery. Augustus is known to have commissioned a portrait gem of himself from the notable Greek artisan Dioscurides, and presumably his ring was passed down to his heirs and used for official business much as Augustus had done. In the early imperial period, it became popular to wear rings with a portrait of the current emperor, although this practice continued only up to the second century A.D.

Open full-size image