Writing Imperial History

Tacitus from Agricola to Annales
Erscheinungsjahr 2023
ISBN: 978-0-472-13343-7
Verlag: University of Michigan Press

Buch, Englisch, 408 Seiten, Hardback, Format (B × H): 152 mm x 229 mm

The late first- and early second-century Roman senator and historian Cornelius Tacitus, whom Edward Gibbon described as “the first of the historians who applied the science of philosophy to the study of facts,” shaped the development of the modern understanding of history as a crucial vehicle for social analysis. The breadth of his thinking is fully revealed only through analysis of how the political, geographical, and rhetorical theories expounded in his early works influenced his later narrative of the evolution of the Roman monarchy. Tacitus, who was one of the oratorical luminaries of his time, produced a collection of works widely recognized as offering the most authoritative account of Rome’s early imperial history. His oeuvre traditionally is divided into the so-called “minor” and “major” works. Writing Imperial History offers the first comprehensive analysis of Tacitus’ five texts and their interconnections and serves to confront longstanding assumptions that have led to a fundamental misunderstanding of the nature and development of his oeuvre and historical thinking. Tracing many of the enduring themes and concerns that Tacitus explores across his oeuvre, the book shows how the vision articulated in his earlier texts persists in his later ones and how he used the former as sources for the latter.

Autoren/Hrsg.

Fachgebiete

• Geisteswissenschaften Literaturwissenschaft Literaturgeschichte und Literaturkritik
• Geisteswissenschaften Geschichtswissenschaft Alte Geschichte & Archäologie

Inhaltsverzeichnis

Acknowledgements
Introduction
Preliminary Remarks: Background
Tacitus and Verginius Rufus: Funeral and Ideology
CHAPTER 1: Agricola: Enunciating Tacitean Concerns and Techniques
CHAPTER 2: Germania: Reading Ethnography alongside Biography
CHAPTER 3: Dialogus de Oratoribus: Rehabilitating the ‘Anomaly’
CHAPTER 4: Historiae: Biography, Ethnography, and Dialogue as Sources for Historiographical Narrative
CHAPTER 5: Annales: Finalizing an Integrated Project
Epilogue
Bibliography
Index Locorum