Audiobooks by Tacitus

The Roman historian Tacitus was a successful politician who eventually became Governor of the province of Asia. He is thought to have died around AD 120 and benefitted from the patronage of the Flavian Emperors. The Histories, of which only just over four out of 14 books survive, covers the years following the assassination of the Emperor Nero: Rome was plunged into further civil war with the Year of the Four Emperors (AD 69) and culminated in the accession of Vespasian, the first of the Flavians. Notwithstanding his proximity to the ruling family, Tacitus regretted Rome's development from republic to empire - which is especially evident in his Annals. The Histories is a fascinating close-up account of a critical period in Roman history.

Tacitus (Author), David Timson (Narrator)

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Annals

Beginning at the end of Augustus's reign, Tacitus's Annals examines the rules of the Roman emperors from Tiberius to Nero (though Caligula's books are lost to us). Their dramas and scandals are brought fully under the spotlight, as Tacitus presents a catalogue of their murders, atrocities, sexual improprieties and other vices in no unsparing terms. Debauched, cruel and paranoid, they are portrayed as being on the verge of madness. Their wars and battles, such as the war with the Parthians, are also described with the same scrutinising intensity. Tacitus's last major historical work, the Annals is an extraordinary glimpse into the pleasures and perils of a Roman leader, and is considered by many to be a masterpiece.

Tacitus (Author), David Timson (Narrator)

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The Annals: The Reigns of Tiberius, Claudius, and Nero

Here is a lively new translation of Cornelius Tacitus's timeless history of three of Rome's most memorable emperors. Tacitus, who condemns the depravity of these rulers, which he saw as proof of the corrupting force of absolute power, writes caustically of the brutal and lecherous Tiberius, the weak and cuckolded Claudius, and 'the artist' Nero. In particular, his gripping account of the bloody reigns of Tiberius and Nero brims with plots, murder, poisoning, suicide, uprisings, death, and destruction. The Annals also provides a vivid account of the violent suppression of the revolt led by Boudicca in Britain, the great fire of Rome under Nero, and the subsequent bloody persecution of the Christians.

Tacitus (Author), Nigel Patterson (Narrator)

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The Annals

The Annals, written by Gaius Cornelius Tacitus (56c-120 CE), is regarded as one of the great literary works of history in the Roman world. Tacitus is considered by many to be the greatest of Roman historians, and The Annals is his' outstanding achievement. Originally comprising 18 volumes, books 7 to 10 and parts of books 5, 6, 11 and 16 have been lost, but those that remain, read here by Martyn Swain, tell the fascinating tale of the Julio Claudian emperors and their times. Writing many years after their deaths, in the reign of the emperor Trajan, but still within living memory of his subjects, Tacitus describes the corrupting nature of Roman society with an analytical eye and a critical mind, seeking to present an accurate and considered view of the key events and characters of the preceding century. Beyond the scope of any Hollywood epic, his canvas is vast, and he paints the picture of the incipient decline of Roman values and society following the death of the Divine Augustus. His descriptions of the lives and deaths of the Julio Claudian emperors (14-68 CE) paint portraits of some of the most monstrous and notorious individuals the world has ever seen: he describes the gradual moral decay and corruption of the hypocritical Tiberius; the weakness of the unfortunate Claudius and his infamous wives Messallina and Agrippina; and the unmitigated malignant evil of the despicable Nero. Tacitus, who was also known as Publius Cornelius Tacitus, chronicles the intrigues and excesses of the rulers of empire as well as their overpowering pride and vanity within the setting of fabulous wealth, absolute power and a range of pernicious wickedness of unparalleled variety. The Annals are remarkable as a work of literary accomplishment written by a master of rhetoric and have a poetic, tragic quality often focusing on the seemingly implacable nature of fate and the widespread bloodshed, disaster and doom so often unleashed by intransigent human greed and malevolence. John Jackson's translation of The Annals chronicles a series of events filled with multiple examples of the limitless appetite for power, wealth and glory and the interplay between the rulers of the state, its populace, its institutions and its military. As well as detailing the conflicts, battles and conquests of the empire stretching from North Africa to Persia and from Palestine to Britain, Tacitus recounts fascinating details of insurrection, mutiny and rebellion in the armies of Rome; battles won and lost; storms at sea; shipwrecks; suicides; assassinations; torture; executions; murder by poison, rope and blade; incest and worse; and the commonplace of family members scheming, plotting, and killing each other to satisfy their lusts and achieve their ambitions.

Tacitus (Author), Martyn Swain (Narrator)

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Agricola, Germania, A Dialogue Concerning Oratory

These three vibrant texts show different sides of the Roman historian Tacitus (c56–c102 CE), best known for his principal (and much longer) legacies of The Annals and The Histories. Agricola was a successful general and governor of Britain (77-83CE), a task which he carried out with firmness and probity - in contrast to much of the corruption and repression in place during the reign of Emperor Domitian. Included in his account are the prebattle speeches of both Agricola and the Briton Calgacus. Tacitus' account of Germania shows a very different land with its many tribes, their habits and qualities in a strongly rural and resistant environment. A Dialogue Concerning Oratory, by contrast, is placed decidedly at the heart of Roman culture, a survey of rhetoric and the art of eloquence. The ability to speak clearly and well was admired throughout the Greek and Roman eras; educated men were expected to have received training in form and delivery: exordium, narration, period. Tacitus presents individuals who display the art of oratory in various forms, referring to the giants of the past - the speeches of Cicero, Brutus, Caesar and many others were kept in volumes and studied. And they question whether eloquence and the skills of oratory had declined in the age.

Tacitus (Author), Leighton Pugh (Narrator)

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The Histories

Tacitus, a Roman orator and public official, is considered one of the greatest historians as well as one of the greatest prose stylists of the Latin language. In The Histories, he describes and interprets the period in which he lived, beginning with the political situation that followed Nero's death in 69 and ending with the death of Domitian in 96 and the close of the Flavian dynasty. The five books of the history still extant are part of an original work of twelve to fourteen books. The narrative as it now exists, with its magnificent introduction, is a powerfully sustained piece of writing. Because Tacitus was a conscious literary stylist, both his thought and his manner of expression gave life to his work. He wrote in the grand style, helped by the solemn and poetic usage of the Roman tradition, and he exploited the Latin qualities of strength, rhythm, and color.

Caius Cornelius Tacitus, Tacitus (Author), James Adams (Narrator)

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