The Cambridge Companion to the Roman Historians

An introduction to how the history of Rome was written in the ancient world, and its impact on later periods.

Andrew Feldherr (Edited by)

9780521670937, Cambridge University Press

Paperback, published 24 September 2009

488 pages, 4 b/w illus.
22.7 x 15.2 x 2.2 cm, 0.77 kg

No field of Latin literature has been more transformed over the last couple of decades than that of the Roman historians. Narratology, a new receptiveness to intertextuality, and a re-thinking of the relationship between literature and its political contexts have ensured that the works of historians such as Livy, Sallust, and Tacitus will be read as texts with the same interest and sophistication as they are used as sources. In this book, topics central to the entire tradition, such as conceptions of time, characterization, and depictions of politics and the gods, are treated synoptically, while other essays highlight the works of less familiar historians, such as Curtius Rufus and Ammianus Marcellinus. A final section focuses on the rich reception history of Roman historiography, from the ancient Greek historians of Rome to the twentieth century. An appendix offers a chronological list of the ancient historians of Rome.

Introduction Andrew Feldherr
Part I. Approaches: 1. Ancient audiences and expectations John Marincola
2. Postmodern historiographical theory and the Roman historians William W. Batstone
3. Historians without history: against Roman historiography J. E. Lendon
Part II. Contexts and Traditions: 4. Alternatives to written history in Republican Rome Harriet I. Flower
5. Roman historians and the Greeks: audiences and models John Dillery
6. Cato's Origines: the historian and his enemies Ulrich Gotter
7. Polybius James Davidson
Part III. Subjects: 8. Time Denis Feeney
9. Space Andrew Riggsby
10. Religion in historiography Jason Davies
11. Virtue and violence: the historians on politics Joy Connolly
Part IV. Modes: 12. The rhetoric of Roman historiography Andrew Laird
13. The exemplary past in Roman historiography and culture Matthew Roller
14. Intertextuality and historiography Ellen O'Gorman
Part V. Characters: 15. Characterization and complexity: Caesar, Sallust, and Livy Ann Vasaly
16. Representing the emperor Caroline Vout
17. Women in Roman historiography Kristina Milnor
18. Barbarians I: Quintus Curtius and other Roman historians' reception of Alexander Elizabeth Baynham
19. Barbarians II: Tacitus' Jews Andrew Feldherr
Part VI. Transformations: 20. Josephus Honora Chapman
21. The Roman exempla tradition in Imperial Greek historiography: the case of Camillus Alain M. Gowing
22. Ammianus Marcellinus: Tacitus' heir and Gibbon's guide Gavin Kelly
23. Ancient Roman historians and early modern political theory Benedetto Fontana
24. Rewriting history for the early modern stage: Racine's Roman tragedies Volker Schröder
25. 'Tacitus' Syme': the Roman historians and twentieth-century approaches to Roman history Emma Dench.

Subject Areas: Classical history / classical civilisation [HBLA1], Ancient history: to c 500 CE [HBLA], Literary studies: classical, early & medieval [DSBB]