Origins of the \'Hollywood\' Roman salute?

[tlclark]

Just got back from the library, and for the heckuvit, I checked out Richard Brilliant's Gesture and Rank in Roman Art.

Not much of use on the salute I'm afraid. Every raised hand on the column of Trajan he identifies as a gesture of acclaim and not a specific military salute. The scene mentioned earlier in this thread is one he cites. He points out that the barbarians/dacians are shown in similar attitudes when Trajan offers them clemency, so that would tend to argue against those raised hands being specfic military salutes, but rather raised arms in general acclaim, as in the 'rock concert' theory. (No word on whether Romans made use of bic lighters. :wink: )

Otherwise Brilliant's treatment is entirely unsatisfying.

Every gesture by an emperor that resembles the open-handed salute, or raised hand with two or three fingers he describes as a gesture of oration or adlocutio, which seems rather ad hoc. It's rather circular after a while.

Oh well.