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SUETONIUS TRANQUILLUS, GAIUS

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Originally appearing in Volume V26, Page 22 of the 1911 Encyclopedia Britannica.
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SUETONIUS TRANQUILLUS, See also:

GAIUS , See also:Roman historian, lived during the end of the 1st and the first See also:half of the 2nd See also:century A.D. He was the contemporary of See also:Tacitus and the younger See also:Pliny, and his See also:literary See also:work seems to have been chiefly done in the reigns of See also:Trajan and See also:Hadrian (A.D. 98– 38). His See also:father was military See also:tribune in the XIIIth See also:legion, add he himself began See also:life as a teacher of See also:rhetoric and an See also:advocate. To us he is known as the biographer of the twelve Caesars (including See also:Julius) down to See also:Domitian. The lives are valuable as covering a See also:good See also:deal of ground where we are without the guidance of Tacitus. As Suetonius was the See also:emperor Hadrian's private secretary (magister epistolarum), he must have had See also:access to many important documents in the Imperial archives, e.g. the decrees and transactions of the See also:senate. In addition to written and See also:official documents, he picked up in society a See also:mass of See also:information and anecdotes, which, though of doubtful authenticity, need not be regarded as See also:mere inventions of his own. They give a very good See also:idea of the See also:kind of See also:court See also:gossip prevalent in See also:Rome at the See also:time. He was a friend and correspondent of the younger Pliny, who when appointed See also:governor of See also:Bithynia took Suetonius with him. - Pliny also recommended him to the favourable See also:notice of the emperor Trajan, " as a most upright, See also:honourable, and learned See also:man, whom persons often remember in their See also:wills because of his merits," and he begs that he may be made legally capable of inheriting these bequests, for which under a See also:special enactment Suetonius was, as a childless married man, disqualified. Hadrian's biographer, Aelius Spartianus, tells us that Suetonius was deprived of his private secretaryship because he had not been sufficiently observant of court See also:etiquette towards the emperor's wife during Hadrian's See also:absence in See also:Britain.

The Lives of the Caesars has always been a popular work. It is rather a See also:

chronicle than a See also:history. It gives no picture of the society of the time, no hints as to the See also:general See also:character and tendencies of the See also:period. It is the emperor who is always before us, and yet the portrait is See also:drawn without any real See also:historical See also:judgment or insight. It is the See also:personal anecdotes, several of which are very amusing, that give the lives their See also:chief See also:interest; but the author panders rather too much to a See also:taste for See also:scandal and gossip. None the less he throws considerable See also:light on an important period, and next to Tacitus and Dio See also:Cassius is the chief (sometimes the only) authority. The See also:language is clear and See also:simple. The work was continued by See also:Marius See also:Maximus (3rd century), who wrote a history of the emperors from See also:Nerva to Elagabalus (now lost). Suetonius was a voluminous writer. Of his De viris illustribus, the lives of See also:Terence and See also:Horace, fragments of those of See also:Lucan and the See also:elder Pliny and the greater See also:part of the See also:chapter on grammarians and rhetoricians, are extant. Other See also:works by him (now lost) were: Prata (' Ael u s s=patchwork), in ten books, a kind of See also:encyclopaedia ; the Roman See also:Year, Roman Institutions and Customs, See also:Children's See also:Games among the Greeks, Roman Public See also:Spectacles, On the See also:Kings, On See also:Cicero's See also:Republic. Editio princeps, 147o; See also:editions by See also:great scholars: See also:Erasmus, See also:Isaac See also:Casaubon, J.

G. See also:

Graevius, P. See also:Burmann; the best See also:complete annotated edition is still that of C. G. See also:Baumgarten-See also:Crusius (1816); See also:recent editions by H. T. See also:Peck (New See also:York, 1889); See also:Leo Preud'homme (1906); M. Ihm (1907). Editions of See also:separate lives: See also:Augustus, by E. S. Shuckburgh (with useful introduction, 1896) ; See also:Claudius, by H. Smilda (1896), with notes and parallel passages from other authorities.

The best editions of the See also:

text are by C. L. See also:Roth (1886), and A. Reifferscheid (not including the Lives, 186o). On the De viris illustribus, see G. Kortge in Dissert. Qhilolog. halenses (190o), vol. xiv. ; and, above all, A. See also:Mace, Essai sur Suetone (1900), with an exhaustive bibliography. There are See also:English See also:translations by See also:Philemon See also:Holland (reprinted in the Tudor Translations, 1900), and by See also:Thomson and Forester (in See also:Bohn's Classical Library).

End of Article: SUETONIUS TRANQUILLUS, GAIUS

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