Tacitus

3 units

Tacitus, the great historian and orator of the late first and early second centuries CE, is one of our best sources for the early history of the Roman Empire. With his concise style and scathing political insight, Tacitus' writings influenced later authors from Ammianus Marcellinus to Macchiavelli. We will read selections from Tacitus' historical works, paying particular attention to: prose style; genre, rhetoric, and historiography; and Tacitus' critique of the Principate.