Livy - Rome’s Italian Wars: Books 6-10

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Translation J. C. Yardley 2013
Introduction, Notes, and other editorial matter Dexter Hoyos 2013

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LIVY

Romes Italian Wars
Books Six to Ten

Translated by
J. C. YARDLEY
With an Introduction and Notes by
DEXTER HOYOS

ROMES ITALIAN WARS
BOOKS SIX TO TEN

TITUS LIVIUS (LIVY), the historian, was born in Patavium (modern Padua) in 64 or 59 BC and died in AD 12 or 17 in Patavium, surviving therefore into his late seventies or early eighties. He came to Rome in the 30s BC and began writing his history of Rome not long after. There is no evidence that he was a senator or held other governmental posts, although he was acquainted with the emperor Augustus and his family, at least by his later years. He appears to have had the means to spend his life largely in writing his huge history of Rome, Ab Urbe Condita or From the Foundation of the City, which filled 142 books and covered the period from Romes founding to the death of the elder Drusus (7359 BC). Thirty-five books survive: 110 (753293 BC) and 2145 (218167 BC).

J. C. YARDLEY has translated Livys The Dawn of the Roman Empire (Books 3140) and Hannibals War (Books 2130) for Oxford Worlds Classics, as well as Tacitus Annals. He has translated Justin for the American Philological Associations Classical Resources series, Velleius Paterculus for Hackett, and Curtius Rufus for Penguin Classics. He is also the author of Justin and Pompeius Trogus (2003) and (with Waldemar Heckel) Alexander the Great (2004).

DEXTER HOYOS was born in Barbados, studied at Oxford, and taught Roman history and historians, and Latin, at Sydney University until his retirement in 2007; he is now an Honorary Affiliate of the University. He has published widely on Latin teaching and aspects of Roman and Carthaginian history, including The Carthaginians (2010) and, as editor, A Companion to the Punic Wars (2011). He introduced J. C. Yardleys translation of Hannibals War for Oxford Worlds Classics.

For
Jann, Barbara, Camilla, Andrea, Elaine, and Jane

LIVY, or in full Titus Livius, was born at Patavium in northern Italy (Padua today) in 59 BC, and so lived through the turbulent years of the fall of the Roman Republic into the calm and politically controlled era of one-man rule under Augustus and his successor Tiberius. or done any military service. Apart from some essays, now lost, on philosophy and rhetoric, he undertook in his late twenties to compose an up-to-date history of Rome drawing on mostly Roman but also some Greek predecessors. He entitled it From the Foundation of the City (Ab Urbe Condita): to all Romans their City was unique.

The history eventually amounted to 142 books, taking Romes history

Livys youth was a time of growing political instability, even though Rome had subdued and was still expanding an empire from the Atlantic to the river Euphrates, and Julius Caesar was about to launch his conquest of Gaul. Roman political life was degenerating fast into power-contests between dominant leaders even to the point of civil war in 49 BC. When Caesar triumphed, he was quickly eliminated, in 44 BC, by an alliance between disenchanted supporters and resentful ex-enemies. Fresh upheavals broke out, climaxing in prolonged and violent rivalry between the two remaining leadersCaesars former deputy Mark Antony and his great-nephew and adopted son Caesar Octavian. The outcome was victory for Octavian in 3130, which made him master of Rome and the empire.

Taking the ceremonious name Augustus in 27, the new ruler set himself to restore peace, order, and confidence at home, to continue expanding the empire, and also to make it plain that he

At the start, Livy had no idea that his work would fill 142 books. The first five, on Rome of the kings (Book 1) and then the fifth-century Republic, dealt with about 360 years; then Books 610 narrate the ninety-seven years from 389 to 293 BC. In the middle of Book 10 he pauses, almost in wonderment, to comment

He was right. The epitomes that survive of the history show that the second half of his work, starting at Book 72, began with the year 91 BC, and the work from there to Book 133 gave an immensely detailed account of events down to 29 BC. Augustus virtual monarchy brought about a change: if their epitomes are a guide, Livys final books (134142) narrated mainly foreign wars down to 9 BCa sign, perhaps, of political discretion by an author now famous and enjoying the rulers favour.

The complete history was too massive for most readers. Eighty years later the poet Martial joked that his library could not fit Livy in whole, and he welcomed an abridgement. Of this vast narrative only one-third survives. Book 10 ends with the year 293 BC; then 2145 take us from 219 down to 167. Even these thirty-five Books fill six or seven volumes of Latin