Roman historian. He studied rhetoric at Rome, became a praetor, and established a great reputation as an orator, becoming consul in 97. His major works are two historical studies, the 12-volume Historiae (Histories), of which only the first four books survive whole, and the Annales (Annals), of possibly 18 books, of which only eight have been completely preserved. His concise and vivid prose style was a major influence on later writers, such as Gibbon.
Publius (or Gaius) Cornelius Tacitus (c. The surviving portions of his two major works—the Annals and the Histories—treat the reigns of the Roman Emperors Tiberius, Claudius, Nero and those that reigned in the Year of the Four Emperors. These two works span the history of the Roman Empire from the death of Augustus in 14 to (presumably) the death of emperor Domitian in 96.
Other surviving works by Tacitus treat Oratory (in dialogue format, see Dialogus de oratoribus), Germania (in De origine et situ Germanorum) and biographical notes about his father-in-law Agricola, primarily during his campaign in Britannia (see De vita et moribus Iulii Agricolae).
Tacitus' style in his major works is Annalistic.
Biography
Although Tacitus' works contain a wealth of information about his world, details on his own life are scarce. What little is known comes from scattered hints throughout the corpus of his work, the letters of his friend and admirer Pliny the Younger, an inscription found at Mylasa in Caria, and educated guesswork.
Tacitus was born in 56 or 57 to an equestrian family; His praenomen (first name) is similarly a mystery: in some letters of Sidonius Apollinaris and in some old and unimportant writings his name is Gaius, but in the major surviving manuscript of his work his name is given as Publius.
Descent and place of birth
Tacitus' scorn for the social climber has led to the supposition that his family was from an unknown branch of the patrician gens Cornelia, but no Cornelii had ever borne the name Tacitus. Furthermore, the older aristocratic families had largely been destroyed during the proscriptions at the end of the Republic, and Tacitus himself is clear that he owes his rank to the Flavian emperors (Hist. 1.1).
His father may have been the Cornelius Tacitus who was procurator of Belgica and Germania; however, a son of this Cornelius Tacitus is mentioned by Pliny the Elder as exhibiting abnormally rapid growth and aging (N.H. This means that this son was not Tacitus, but his brother or cousin—the senior Cornelius Tacitus may have been an uncle, rather than his father. From this connection, and from the well-attested friendship between the younger Pliny and the younger Tacitus, scholars draw the conclusion that the two families were of similar class, means, and background: equestrians, of significant wealth, from provincial families.
The exact province of his origin is unknown. The possibly-Spanish origin of the Fabius Iustus to whom Tacitus dedicates the Dialogus suggests a (family?) connection to Hispania. Gnaeus Julius Agricola could have known Tacitus from elsewhere. Martial dedicates a poem to Pliny (10.20), but not to the more distinguished Tacitus—which, had Tacitus been Spanish, might be unusual, were Martial's light and often scurrilous style not antithetical to Tacitus' grave and serious manner. No evidence exists that Pliny's friends from northern Italy knew Tacitus, nor do Pliny's letters ever hint that the two men shared a common home province. The opposite, in fact: the strongest piece of evidence is in Book 9, Letter 23, which reports how Tacitus was asked if he were Italian or provincial, and upon giving an unclear answer, was further asked if he were Tacitus or Pliny. Since Pliny was from Italy, Tacitus must have been from the further provinces, and Gallia Narbonensis is the most likely candidate.
His ancestry, his skill in oratory, and his sympathetic depiction of barbarians who resisted Roman rule (e.g., Ann. 2.9), have led some to suggest that he was of Celtic stock: the Celts had occupied Gaul before the Romans, were famous for their skill in oratory, and had been subjugated by Rome.
Public life, marriage, and literary career
As a young man he studied rhetoric in Rome as preparation for a career in law and politics; nothing is known of their marriage or their home life, save that Tacitus loved hunting and the outdoors.
He served in the provinces from ca. His person and property survived Domitian's reign of terror (93–96), but the experience left him jaded and grim, perhaps ashamed at his own complicity, and gave him the hatred of tyranny so evident throughout his works. 44–45, is illustrative:
[Agricola] was spared those later years during which Domitian, leaving now no interval or breathing space of time, but, as it were, with one continuous blow, drained the life-blood of the Commonwealth...
From his seat in the Senate he became suffect consul in 97 during the reign of Nerva, being the first of his family to do so.
In the following year he wrote and published his Agricola and Germania, announcing the beginnings of the literary endeavors that would occupy him until his death. Pliny wrote a few days later that Tacitus had spoken "with all the majesty which characterizes his usual style of oratory".
A lengthy absence from politics and law followed, during which time he wrote his two major works: first the Histories, then the Annals. It is unknown whether he was survived by any children, though the Augustan History reports that the emperor Marcus Claudius Tacitus claimed him as an ancestor and provided for the preservation of his works—but like so much of the Augustan History, this story is probably fraudulent.
Works
Five works ascribed to Tacitus have survived (or at least: large parts thereof). Dates are approximate, and the last two (his "major" works), took more than a few years to write.
(98) De vita Iulii Agricolae (The Life of Julius Agricola) (98) De origine et situ Germanorum (The Germania) (102) Dialogus de oratoribus (Dialogue on Oratory) (105) Historiae (Histories) (117) Ab excessu divi Augusti (Annals)Major works
The two major works, originally published separately, were meant to form a single edition of thirty books, with the Annals preceding the Histories.
The Histories
In one of the first chapters of the Agricola, Tacitus said that he wished to speak about the years of Domitian, of Nerva, and of Trajan. In the Historiae the project has been modified: in the introduction, Tacitus says that he will deal with the age of Nerva and Trajan at a later time.
The Annals
The Annals was Tacitus' final work, covering the period from the death of Augustus Caesar in the year 14. We do not know whether Tacitus completed the work or whether he finished the other works that he had planned to write; he died before he could complete his planned histories of Nerva and Trajan, and no record survives of the work on Augustus Caesar and the beginnings of the Empire with which he had planned to finish his work as a historian.
Minor works
Tacitus also wrote three minor works on various subjects: the Agricola, a biography of his father-in-law Gnaeus Julius Agricola;
Germania
The Germania (Latin title: De Origine et situ Germanorum) is an ethnographic work on the diverse set of Germanic tribes outside the Roman Empire. Tacitus himself had already written a similar, albeit shorter, piece in his Agricola (chapters 10–13).
Agricola (De vita et moribus Iulii Agricolae)
The Agricola (written ca. As in the Germania, Tacitus favorably contrasted the liberty of the native Britons to the corruption and tyranny of the Empire;
Dialogus
When the Dialogus de oratoribus was written remains uncertain, but it was probably written after the Agricola and the Germania. Many characteristics set it apart from the other works of Tacitus, so much so that its authenticity may be questioned, even if it is always grouped with the Agricola and the Germania in the manuscript tradition. it lacks the incongruities that are typical of Tacitus' major historical works. It may have been written when Tacitus was young; More probably, the unusually classical style may be explained by the fact that the Dialogus is a work dealing with rhetoric.
The sources of Tacitus
Tacitus used the official sources of the Roman state: the acta senatus (the minutes of the session of the Senate) and the acta diurna populi Romani (a collection of the acts of the government and news of the court and capital). Generally, Tacitus was a scrupulous historian who paid careful attention to his historical works. The minor inacurracies in the Annals may be due to Tacitus dying before finishing (and therefore final proofreading) of this work.
Tacitus cites some of his sources directly, among them Pliny the Elder, who had written Bella Germaniae and an historical work which was the continuation of that of Aufidius Bassus. Tacitus used some collections of letters (epistolarium) and various notes. While he placed no value on the Stoic theory of suicide, Tacitus used accounts of famous suicides to give a dramatic tone to his stories.
Literary style
Tacitus' writings are known for their deep-cutting and dense prose, seldom glossy, in contrast to the more placable style of some of his contemporaries, like Plutarch.
Describing a near defeat of the Roman army in Ann. I, 63 Tacitus does apply gloss, but does so by the brevity with which he describes the end of the hostilities, than by embellishing phrases.
In most of his writings he keeps to a chronological ordering of his narration, with only seldom an outline of the "bigger picture", and leaves the reader to construct that picture for himself.
Nonetheless, when he does sketch the bigger picture, for example, in the opening paragraphs of the Annals - summarizing the situation at the end of the reign of Augustus - he uses a few condensed phrases to take the reader to the heart of the story.
Approach to history
Tacitus' historical style combines various approaches to history into a method of his own (owing some debt to Sallust): seamlessly blending straightforward descriptions of events, pointed moral lessons, and tightly-focused dramatic accounts, his historiography contains deep, and often pessimistic, insights into the workings of the human mind and the nature of power.
Tacitus' own declaration regarding his approach to history is famous (Ann. I,1):
| inde consilium mihi . |
Although this is probably as close as one can get to a neutral point of view intention in antiquity, there has been much scholarly discussion about Tacitus' alleged "neutrality" (or "partiality" to others, which would make the quote above no more than a figure of speech).
Throughout his writings, Tacitus appears primarily concerned with the balance of power between the Roman Senate and the Roman Emperors.
Another important recurring theme is the role of having the sympathy of the army in the coming to power (and staying there) of an Emperor: throughout the period Tacitus is describing, the leading role in that respect sways between (some of) the legions defending the outer borders of the Empire, and the troops residing in the city of Rome, most prominently the Praetorian Guard.
Tacitus' political career was largely spent under the emperor Domitian;
Nonetheless the image he builds of Tiberius throughout the first six books of the Annals is neither exclusively bleak nor approving: most scholars analyse the image of Tiberius as predominantly positive in the first books, becoming predominantly negative in the following books relating the intrigues of Sejanus.
In general Tacitus does not fear to give words of praise and words of rejection to the same person, often explaining openly which he thinks the commendable and which the despicable properties. Not conclusively taking sides for or against the persons he describes is his hallmark, and led thinkers in later times to interpret his works as well as a defense of an imperial system, as a rejection of the same (see Tacitean studies, Black vs.
Prose style
Tacitus' skill with written Latin is unsurpassed;
His historical works focus on the psyches and inner motivations of the characters, often with penetrating insight—though it is questionable how much of his insight is correct, and how much is convincing only because of his rhetorical skill.
Tacitus owes the most, both in language and in method, to Sallust; Ammianus Marcellinus is the later historian whose work most closely approaches him in style.
Studies and reception history
From Pliny the Younger's 7th Letter (to Tacitus), §33:
| Auguror nec me fallit augurium, historias tuas immortales futuras. |
Tacitus is remembered first and foremost as Rome's greatest historian, the equal—if not the superior—of Thucydides, the ancient Greeks' foremost historian;
Though his work is the most reliable source for the history of his era, its factual accuracy is occasionally questioned: the Annals are based in part on secondary sources of unknown reliability, and there are some obvious minor mistakes (for instance confusing the two daughters of Mark Antony and Octavia Minor, both named Antonia).
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