How to be a Roman emperor

> One of his [Augustus'] most significant and lasting innovations was to flood the Roman world with his portrait: heads stamped on the small change in people's pockets, life-size or larger statues in marble and bronze standing in public squares and temples, miniatures embossed or engraved on rings, gems and dining room silverware. This was on a vastly bigger scale than anything of the sort before.

> about 250 statues, not to mention images on jewels and gems, found right across Roman territories and beyond, from Spain to Turkey and Sudan, show Augustus in many different guises, from heroic conqueror to pious priest.

> These all have such similar facial features that standard models must have been sent out from Rome, in a coordinated attempt to spread the emperor's image to his subjects. They all adopt an idealising, youthful style that echoes the classical art of fifth-century BCE Athens and makes a glaring and loaded contrast with the craggy, elderly, wrinkled, exaggerated 'realism' that is characteristic of the portraits of the Roman elite in the earlier part of the first century BCE. They were all intended to bring a far-flung population, most of whom would never see the man himself, face to face with their ruler. And yet they almost certainly look nothing like the real Augustus at all. Not only do they fail to match up with the one surviving written description of his features, which -- trustworthy or not -- prefers to stress his unkempt hair, his bad teeth and the platform shoes which, like many autocrats since, he used to disguise his short stature; they also look almost exactly the same throughout his life, so that at the age of seventy-plus he was still being portrayed as a perfect young man.

The point of the statue is to make the viewer feel respect and awe, not to accurately depict the man's appearance. Compare Oliver Cromwell's unusual official portrait showing him as he actually appeared, warts and all.