Text, Hand of emperor Augustus wearing a ring

X. 23322. Statue of the emperor Augustus (29 BC-AD 14). Bronze. Found in the Aegean sea between the islands of Euboea and Agios Efstratios. The emperor is depicted in mature age, mounting a horse. He wears a tunica with a vertical purple stripe (clavus purpurea) and a fringed paludamentum decorated with a maeander pattern. Iconographic features of the Prima Porta and Actium types are combined in this statue. The right hand is raised in a gesture of official greeting. The hilt of his sword can be seen below the left hand, in which he held the horse's reigns. On the bezel of his finger-ring a staff of divination (lituus) is engraved, symbolising the supreme religious office of Pontifex Maximus, assumed by Augustus in 12 BC. 12-10 BC.