Latin 520 (Tiberius): Assignment for Week 1 (Jan. 3-6)

NB: our discussion of this author/text may well spill over into next week….in fact, I’m pretty much planning on it.

• Read:

Velleius Paterculus Roman History 2.94-131

You should have read all of this in English translation (in Yardley/Barrett)…please use this translation (a copy on our reserve shelf)

Please read in Latin all or as much of this as you are able (I understand this may be a challenge to complete in 48 hrs….but as I say, we’ll doubtless spill over into the next meeting): 2.123-24, 127-28, 129-31. Of course, if you are feeling ambitious and full of vim and vigor, you may read all of 2.94-131 in Latin! We’ll translate some or all of this in class.

The Latin version of this is available online at:

http://www.thelatinlibrary.com/vell2.html

I have also put the old Teubner (we do not own the newer Teubner by Watt) on our reserve shelf in Denny 210.

• Ponderanda:

We begin with Velleius’ (short) Roman History not only because he is the one surviving, contemporary historical account of the career of Tiberius (though he concludes in AD 29, thus covering the first 15 years of Tiberius’ 23 year reign) but also because his account has generally been discounted given the much later, weightier and distinctly more negative narrative of Tacitus, the biography of Suetonius, and Cassius Dio’s still later but fairly substantial Tiberian books (57-58).

Our readings in Velleius cover Tiberius’ successful military career under Augustus, his succession, and highlights of his reign down to AD 29. The key question I’d like you to consider is this: what does Velleius wish us to believe are Tiberius’ chief contributions to Rome – and to its ‘culture’? What are the elements of Tiberian culture, insofar as one can glean them from Velleius’ narrative (come prepared with some passages to point to in support of your observations)? What does Velleius not tell you about in this respect (about ‘culture’, that is) that you might expect him to have done?

That question aside, what do you conclude are the general characteristics of this history? How does it differ from – or how is it similar to – other Roman/Greek historians you might have read?

• Secondary reading:

Read the very good introduction in Yardley/Barrett, pp. xiii-xl.

As purely optional entertainment and amusement – and if you want to know what I think VP was up to – read ‘The Imperial Republic of Velleius Paterculus’ in The Blackwell Companion to Greek and Roman Historiography, John Marincola, ed., pp. 411-18 (Blackwell 2007). On reserve shelf.

Hard core Velleians will want to use Woodman’s magisterial commentary (on our reserve shelf). Even if you don’t read Velleius with Woodman at your side every minute, I strongly recommend you read his commentary on the passages I specified to be read in Latin above.