Edwards Catharine - Suetonius: lives of the Caesars

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LIVES OF THE CAESARS

GAIUS SUETONIUS TRANQUILLUS is best known for his Lives of the Caesars, starting with the dictator Julius Caesar and ending with the emperor Domitian, which was published in the reign of the emperor Hadrian (11738 CE). Suetonius was probably born around 70 CE either in north Africa or in Italy. His father, a Roman knight, fought in the civil war of 69 CE. Suetonius himself was educated at least partly in Rome and was a friend of the younger Pliny who obtained a number of favours on his behalf. A fragmentary inscription from north Africa makes clear that Suetonius held a succession of posts at court, working perhaps for Trajan and certainly for Hadrian. He thus had privileged access to the imperial archives as well as the emperor himself. A passage from the anonymous Life of Hadrian records that Suetonius was dismissed for lack of respect to Hadrians wife Sabina.

Besides the Lives of the Caesars, his writings also include On Illustrious Men which survives in fragments (among them short biographies of Virgil, Horace, and Lucan) and numerous other scholarly works now almost entirely lost. Suetonius probably died some time after 130.

CATHARINE EDWARDS is Senior Lecturer in Classics and Ancient History, Birkbeck College, London. Her writings include The Politics of Immorality in Ancient Rome (Cambridge, 1993) and Writing Rome: Textual Approaches to the City (Cambridge, 1996).

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SUETONIUS

Translated with an Introduction and Notes by
CATHARINE EDWARDS

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Catharine Edwards 2000

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First published as an Oxford Worlds Classics paperback 2000
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SUETONIUS Lives of the Caesars, starting with Julius Caesar and ending with the Emperor Domitian, has always had its place as a source of extraordinary tales of imperial viceand at times of imperial virtue. Suetonius presents us with shocking accounts of Caligulas plan to make his horse consul (Cal. 55) and of Nero singing while Rome burns (Nero 38), as well as with edifying descriptions of Augustus splendid redevelopment of the city of Rome (Aug. 2830) and Titus decision to put the state before his love for Berenice (a phrase from of Suetonius Life is said to have inspired Racines Brnice). Centuries later rulers might aspire to being hailed as another Augustus or Titusand dread being labelled another Caligula or Nero.

More recently, while some readers have continued to enjoy Suetonius as a fund of fascinating, indeed, sometimes outrageous anecdotes, many have chosen to treat him as a rather frustrating and untrustworthy source of facts about Roman emperors, which the modern scholar needs to correct (as far as possible), supplement, and rearrange, if a coherent biographical narrative is to be produced. However, to read Suetonius in this way is perhaps to miss his significance. Suetonius himself certainly offers little in the way of chronological narrative and it would be rash to rely on the factual accuracy of the stories he tells about the Caesars. But what he has to say about the eccentricities and achievements of emperors, their virtues and vices, gives us valuable insights into ancient Roman debates about imperial power and how it should be exercised.

The kings of Rome had been driven out by the first Brutus, according to Roman myth, and, under the republic, Romans saw themselves as fiercely opposed to monarchy. Yet, while Julius Caesar met a bloody end for his autocratic pretensions, his heir Augustus was able to establish one-man rule and pass his position on to his heir. How was it possible for one man to control public affairs yet not be king? Even that master of public relations Augustus seems sometimes to have misjudged his subjects expectations, as Suetonius account reveals (see e.g. ch. 70). A century after Augustus death (when Suetonius was writing), the question of how an emperor should behave was still a vexed one. This issue is a central concern in Suetonius Lives.

Gaius Suetonius Tranquillus, born around 70 CE, was of an equestrian family (see Roman knight in Glossary), perhaps from Hippo Regius in North Africa, possibly from Italy itself. His father served as a military tribune in the Thirteenth Legion during the civil wars of 69 CE (Otho 10). Suetonius was educated partly in Rome, spending some time in the rhetorical schools, before embarking on a public career. He secured a posting to Britain as military tribune, around the year 110 or 111, through the patronage of the younger Pliny, but did not take it up (Pliny,