Editing Augustus (section)

=== Growing tensions ===
[[File:Octave (13668015683).jpg|thumb|upright=0.8|A bust of Augustus as a younger Octavian, dated {{circa|30&nbsp;BC}}. [[Capitoline Museums]], Rome]]
Arriving in Rome on 6 May 44&nbsp;BC,{{Sfn|Eck|Takács|2003|page=10}} Octavian found consul Mark Antony, Caesar's former colleague, in an uneasy truce with the dictator's assassins. They had been granted a general amnesty on 17 March in an agreement that they would respect the magistracies installed and laws passed by Caesar to avoid the political turmoil of invalidating them.{{sfn|Bringmann|2007|pages=281–282}} Soon afterwards, Antony succeeded in driving most of them out of Rome with an inflammatory eulogy at Caesar's funeral, mounting public opinion against the assassins.{{Sfn|Eck|Takács|2003|page=10}}{{sfn|Bringmann|2007|page=281–283, 285}}

Mark Antony was amassing political support, but Octavian still had the opportunity to rival him as the leading member of the faction supporting Caesar. Antony had lost the support of many Romans and supporters of Caesar when he initially opposed the motion to elevate Caesar to divine status.{{Sfn|Eck|Takács|2003|page=11}} Antony refused to hand over the money due Octavian as Caesar's adopted heir, possibly on grounds that it would take time to disentangle it from state funds,{{sfn|Rawson|1994|p=472|ps=, citing App. ''BCiv.'', 3.94.}} but also as a measure to delay Octavian from carrying out the popular provision in Caesar's will that promised the dispersal of 300 sesterces ''[[per capita]]'' to the urban plebs of Rome.{{sfn|Bringmann|2007|pages=283, 285}} During the summer, Octavian won the support of Caesarian veterans and also made common cause with those senators—many of whom were themselves former Caesarians—who perceived Antony as a threat to the state. After an abortive attempt by the veterans to reconcile Octavian and Antony, Antony's bellicose edicts against Brutus and Cassius alienated him from the moderate Caesarians in the Senate, who feared a renewed civil war.{{sfn|Rawson|1994|pp=474–476}} In September, [[Marcus Tullius Cicero]] began to attack Antony in a [[Philippicae|series of speeches]] portraying him as a threat to the republican order.{{Sfn|Chisholm|Ferguson|1981|page=26}}{{Sfn|Rowell|1962|page=30}}