Literary Texts and the Roman HistorianLiterary Texts and the Roman Historian focuses on the problems and methods involved in reconstructing the history of the ancient world. David Potter examines the different kinds of text from which Roman history is reconstructed by modern students, and he explores how ancient participants in the literary culture of the Roman empire constructed their own history. In contrast, he also discusses alternative forms of historical narrative, suggesting that those texts were produced to provide alternative paradigms to those offered in the traditional historical narratives. Literary Texts and the Roman Historian provides an accessible and concise introduction to the complexities of Roman historiography which will be invaluable to students of all periods of history. |
Contents
Definitions | 11 |
Texts | 20 |
Illustrative evidence | 41 |
Narrative | 59 |
Scholarship | 79 |
Near Eastern records of the past and the Roman imagination | 95 |
Conclusion | 117 |
Presentation | 120 |
Cicero | 135 |
Verisimilitude | 144 |
Conclusion | 150 |
classical authors discussed in the text | 156 |
Notes | 168 |
| 203 | |
| 212 | |
Objectivism and relativism | 126 |
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Common terms and phrases
Ammianus ancient Annales antiquity appears Atticus Augustus Berossus Caesar Cambridge Cassius Dio century BC Christian chronicle Cicero concerned contemporary context critical cultural D.S. Potter Dionysius Dionysius of Halicarnassus discourse discussion documents draft Editions Eunapius Eusebius evidence eyewitness fact FGrH fiction fourth century fragments Galen Greek Hecataeus Herodotus Historia Augusta historical writing historiography important interesting issue Jacoby Latin Leopold Leopold von Ranke letters Libanius linguistic literary literature Livy Loeb Manetho manuscript Marius Maximus methods modern practitioner narrative notes offered orator Oxford papyri person Pliny Polybius Postmodern present problem Prophets and Emperors question Ranke Ranke's record repr representation rhetoric Roman Empire Roman history Roman world second century Senate simply social sort sources speech story style Suetonius suggests surviving Tacitus Teubner textual theory things Thuc Thucydides tion tradition truth written wrote Zenodotus