Tacite (in Latin Publius Cornelius Tacitus ) is a historian and a Roman philosopher born in 55 and died towards 120 a. J. - C.

Biography

One knows very few things on the life of Tacit… Was the Roman historian probably born between 54 and 56 as a Gaulle Narbonnese (in Vaison it Romaine?), under Néron, and probably resulting from a family of the equestrian order from Gaulle transalpine, dynamic social class and thrives which was used as support for the Empire since the decline of Roman the patricians families.

Extremely of its severe and disciplined education, he attends the grammaticus , the rhetor and even becomes, undoubtedly, the pupil of Quintilien. Its brilliant studies open the doors of the forum to him and thus begins, towards 75, its lawyer career: he then attends Gallic lawyers of the bar of Rome.

In 77, he marries the girl of the consul Agricola. It is for him the beginning of a great political career of senior official. Vespasien grants the laticlave to him, the tribunat military and Tacit becomes member of the Viginti Sex Viri , “the Council of the 26”.

In 81, under Titus, he becomes questeur, then, into 84, under Domitien, praetor and powerful orator of the plebs.

In 87, he is member of the Quindecimuir Sacris Fatiundis , “the College of the 15”. Its political office doubles sacerdotal career then.

From 89 to 93, he becomes legate of province as a Gaulle Belgium.

In 93, it goes back to Rome and, not to draw to him the attention of the emperor Domitien (81-96), always ready to exile or make assassinate the famous characters of the Empire, Tacite remainder with the variation of the capacity.

It accepts the consulate only into 97, becoming Consul suffect, under the emperor Nerva. The same year, it was in charge of the funeral oration of the consul Verginius Rufus.

In 98, when Trajan reaches the capacity, Tacite becomes one of familiar of the emperor and is withdrawn from the policy under Trajan to devote itself to the history and its writing.

In 100, it is made lawyer of the province of Asia against the former governor Marius Priscus; Pline the Young person underlined the eloquence and the dignity of this plea.

From 112 to 113, he is governor of the province of Asia and reaches, consequently, with the political high position. One knows nothing about the remainder of his life. He would have died in years 120.

Work

• January 98: Of uita Iulii Agricolae ( life of Agricola )
• At the end of 98: Of situ ac populis Germaniae or Of origin and situ Germanorum ( Germanic the )
• 107: Dialogus of oratoribus ( Dialogs of the speakers )
• 109: Historiae ( Stories )
• 110: Ab excessu diui Augusti (unfinished work corresponding so that the tradition named Annals )

Life of Agricola ( Of uita Iulii Agricolae )

This biography appears into 98, five years after the death of Agricola, the father-in-law of Tacit. This work has two motivations:

• Tacite was not in Rome at the time of died of his/her father-in-law and thus could not pronounce its funeral praise.
• Tacite wanted, by contrast with the mode in exercise, to make the apologue of a form of virtus and human qualities of which Domitien was deprived. It thus made a point of showing a discrete opposition, a kind of passive resistance.

While writing the Life of Agricola , Tacite wants to pay homage to a man that he liked and estimated. It rents in him a good servant of the Empire, which it contributed to extend, by completing the conquest of the Brittany ( Britannia , current Great Britain) and by pacifying it. Thus work is presented at the same time in the form of a funeral praise and a historical test on Brittany, its inhabitants and his conquest. It is also a proclamation against the tyranny of Domitien, assassinated into 96. What is striking in this work, it is the original approach which made Tacite of the phenomenon of the conquest imperialist. It is interested as a geographer and an ethnologist - as in the Germanie - in these Barbarians attacked by the Roman expansion, by taking account of the point of view of conquered and not only of that of the conquerors. Which reasons would they have to accept the constraint passively? Can the conquest ensures the force and the glory of the Roman people, but claim to ensure the happiness of overcome? Tacit shows much clearness by stressing that Agricola practices a policy of cultural assimilation.

Here is the composition:

• Chap. I to III: the beginning of work is placed under the patronage of Nerva and Trajan, which returned freedom to the Roman people.
• Chap. IV to IX: life of Agricola itself.
• Chap. X to XXXVIII: ethnographic and geographical essay on Brittany and the Breton ones. Tacit the conquest of the island details. Agricultural is shown there like the representative of all the virtues.
• Chap. XXXIV - XLVI: portrait of Agricola. Tacit invites to follow this example.

Germanic the ( Of situ ac populis Germaniae )

In 98 also appears Germanic the (or On the origin and the country of German the ), small work of topicality - Trajan strengthened the border of the the Rhine -, but whose character is more definitely historical and ethnographic. It is a description of the various tribes living in the north of the the Rhine and the the Danube. Tacit was inspired clearly by former authors like Tite-Live or Pline Old the. The love of the freedom of German, their strength, their bravery are opposed to corruption prevailing in Rome.

There remain to us 46 chapters whose distribution is very clear:

• Chap. I to XXVII: each chapter is devoted to a question. It is a note on a given subject: habitat, food, hospitality, plays, marriage, clothing.
• Chap. XXVIII with XLVI: passage in review of the various German people of west in is, since the edges of the Rhine to the borders of the known Russian world, while passing by the Baltic and Scandinavia.

One can retain two lessons:

• moral lesson: the poverty and the simplicity of the institutions maintain at German purity of manners from which the Romans moved away. It is a stoical topic constantly present.
• political lesson: these virtues, which is the same ones as those which made frightening old Rome, are worrying for the future of the Roman Empire.

the Dialog of the speakers ( Dialogus of oratoribus )

Sometimes one hesitated to allot the Dialog of the speakers to Tacite, but all the manuscripts put it under its name. The work was undoubtedly composed into 80 or 81, at the moment when Tacite was turned towards the eloquence and was still entirely published probably into 107.

Tacit address the Dialog in Justus Fabius, which required of him the causes of the decline of the eloquence. It pays, with the manner cicéronienne, a maintenance to which it assisted into 75 between the Maternus poet and the speakers Marcus Aper, Julius Secundus (its two Masters) and Vipstanus Messala. The Dialog does not answer the put question immediately. In a first part, Aper and Maternus discuss with heat the respective merits the eloquence and poetry. In one second part, while seeking if the eloquence is in decline, the interlocutors oppose the modern ones to old. One arrives finally at the causes of the decline of the eloquence: moral relaxation in education, mediocrity of the teaching of the rhéteurs, loss of political freedom and new social conditions.

the Stories ( Historiae )

the Stories , published into 106, describe the Roman Empire of January 1st, 69 at year 96, i.e. of the advent of Bent with dead of Domitien. The unit was to cover 12 pounds, but one preserved only 5 of them: the entirety of the first 4 books and the first 23 chapters of the book V. the contents of original work cover the following reigns: Bent, Othon, Vitellius, Vespasien, Titus and Domitien. The work which reached us completes with the reign of Titus:

- Book I: Bent and Othon or the triumph of Othon

• Galba adopts a patrician, Pison.
• Revolt of Vitellius.
• Mutiny of Praetorian in Rome.

- Book II: Othon and Vitellius, or triumph of Vitellius

• Engagement in the East of the legions of Vitellius.
• battles Othon - Vitellius.
• Died of Othon with Bédriac.
• Description of the reign of Vitellius, famous for its goinfrery and its mollesse.

- Book III: Vitellius and Vespasien, or the triumph of Vespasien

• Vespasien arrives to Italy.
• Victoire on Vitellius with Bédriac.
• Seat and catch of Casement bolt.
• Agitation in the provinces.
• Seat and fire of Capitole.
• Died of Vitellius.

- Book IV: Julius Civilis

• the Batavians are raised under the control of Julius Civilis: they besiege the camp of Vétéra.
• Civilis wants to involve all Gaulle in the revolt, but, after being itself at this meeting in Rheims, the Gallic cities decide to remain faithful to the Empire.

- Book V: Titus in front of Jerusalem

• Événements of the Seventy.
• Titus is yet only one crown prince, but it begins the head office of Jerusalem and Judaea.

Tacit a pessimistic vision of the history had and held of the disconcerting remarks. The first page of the Stories is edifying: “I even approach the one time rich history of misfortunes, disfigured by the engagements, torn by seditions, cruel in peace: four princes massacred by iron, three civil wars, more still of foreign wars, and most of the time, the ones and the others at the same time…” Follows a review of failures and dramas: “However, this century was not sterile in virtues at the point not to also produce good examples: mothers accompanying their sons in the escape, of the wives according to their husband in the exile, the honesty of the slaves even vis-a-vis tortures, of the demises of famous men worthy of died of old. ” And it is by a formula without call that Tacite car the lesson of these abominable times: “The gods, indifferent to our safeguard, have concern only our punishment. ”
One could see there a gallery of portraits animated by actors who incarnate various aspects of the capacity without managing to dominate the course of the events. The art of the historian consists in registering within the traditional framework of annalistic complex and dramatic vision of the events. It takes pleasure to describe the storm, the fermentation of the events, the sublime spectacle of the extreme situations. Tyrants or victims, the protagonists are after only the reflection of crowd which carries them then condemn them: “The rabble overpowered it insults, after its death, with as much of lowness than, of alive sound, she had adored it”. One of passions of Tacit is the fascination of the spectacles of death. When Rome is invaded by the troops of Vespasien, the people of the City attend the engagements like with spectacle of circus. And the description which Tacite gives this extraordinary scene is itself impregnated of this fascination of the horror which characterizes its painting of the events. The picturesque one of Tacit, it is art to make perceive the monstrosity of the beings, the situations, the spectacles.

Annals ( Ab excessu diui Augusti )

Written between 115 and 117, this work constitutes, undoubtedly, the historical philosopher's stone of Tacit. The title apocryphal book which the tradition ( Annals ) retained is resulting from an abusive interpretation of passage IV, 32. It is not known if the author completed his work before dying. This one was to comprise 18 pounds whose contents extend from the beginning of the reign of Tibère (14 a. J. - C.) at the end of the reign of Néron (68 a. J. - C.). We preserved books I to IV, the beginning of the book V, part of book VI as all that lies between second half of book IX and first half of book XIV. We thus lost the end of the reign of Tibère, any Caligula, the beginning of the reign of Claude and the two last years of the reign of Néron.

Tacit drew its sources in the works of other historians, the public registers and sometimes in its own experience. At the same time historian and moralist, Tacite depicts there with pessimism, as for the Stories , in a style of one seizing concision, mentalities and manners of the men of sound temps.
Thus the portrait which trace the historian of the emperors and their entourage is it pitiless: obsession of the plot at Tibère, weakness makes indignant at a prince at Claude, monstrosity of Néron. The entourage - composed of Agrippine, the mother of Néron, and of freed, executors of simple works - are with the tuning fork. The assassination is the favorite weapon of the capacity. From this work, Racine will draw the subject from one of its tragedies: Britannicus . We find in Annals the literary matter of the Histoires , but the approach of the political events is appreciably different. Tacit turns primarily its glances towards the interior policy and traditional balance between “what occurs to Rome” and “what occurs outside” is not respected.

The historian

Its step

Its value of historian is very disputed: Tacit would not have been objective in what he wrote and the rigor of his information is disputed. It too much is considered impassioned. It could however moderate its laudatory portrait by the appreciation of the errors of its heroes (its hatred for Tibère and Agrippine does not prevent it from giving them an exceptional dimension in its work).
Tacit, when he wrote his works, combined several sources, interpreted them and reconsidered them in an original way. It built its historical reflection on its philosophical thought. It combined the thought of the three large historians who preceded it: Tite-Live, Salluste and Cicéron.

Its thought

Tacit is not only one artist, but also a thinker whose thought is not simple… To interpret its texts is not easy. Moreover, it leaves in its work certain remote regions, which make difficult the interpretation of its thought, and which enable him not to submit to too distinct theses. Was he a friend or an enemy of the empire? He was certainly a friend of the empire, and without any doubt a friend of Rome. He served the emperors, which did not prevent it from criticizing them. Its original intention was not in fact not to serve the emperors, but Rome. It would have been very near to Hadrian and Trajan. Like A. Michel, “Tacit says it is presented a little in the form of Alceste of the History: because he does not want to flatter anybody, he says evil of all; however, one always tests a little embarrassment to be gone similar to Philinte and to give him wrong. ”

Tacit in its work a great place grants to the philosophy, which he undoubtedly knows thanks to the Greek Masters who were in Rome at his time. It is the only one with speaking about stoical in its work. Lastly, while writing, it forever ceased thinking of its time. The broad topics of the work of Tacit are the glorification of the large administrators, the liberal defense of the Roman domination, the criticism of tyranny, and the praise of philosophical wisdom moderated by confidence with regard to fanaticism and of dogmatism.

The writer

Tacit, that Root, in the foreword of Britannicus , called the “great painter of Antiquity”, is at the same time man of culture and man of order. It was formed by Marcus Aper and Julius Secundus which it puts in scene in the Dialog of the Speakers . It is by listening to its Masters, like him Gaulois of origin, that Tacite nourished its talent. Like his friend Pline, he was a brilliant and famous speaker who admires Cicéron, but does not imitate it. He seeks not abundance but the expressive force, which Pline calls the semnotès , Greek word meaning serious. He was appreciated for his sharp style and concis.
Tacit could make imposing and sober portraits of its characters. Besides the history offered beautiful subjects to him which it succeeds in putting in scene. In its work, the size always united with the irony or the bitterness. Its literary production, lying within the scope of its friendship for Trajan and Pline the Young person, was appreciated by the imperial medium. Tacit was the semi-official historian of the mode, which did not prevent it from being also a critical historian.