Tacitus the Epic Successor: Virgil, Lucan, and the Narrative of Civil War in the __Histories__

Allusions to the epic poets Virgil and Lucan in the writing of the Roman historian Tacitus (c. 55 - c. 120 C.E.) have long been noted. This monograph argues that Tacitus fashions himself as a rivaling literary successor to these poets; and that the emulative allusions to Virgil's 'Aeneid' and Lucan's 'Bellum Civile' in Books 1-3 of his inaugural historiographical work, the 'Histories', complement and build upon each other, and contribute significantly to the picture of repetitive, escalating civil war inthe work. The argument is founded on the close reading of a series of related passages in the 'Histories', and it also broadens to consider certain narrative techniques and strategies that Tacitus shares with writers of epic. Tacitus the Epic Successor: Virgil, Lucan, and the Narrative of Civil War in the Histories 4 Contents 8 Preface 10 Introduction. Tacitus the Epic Successor 14 Virgil, Tacitus, and the Trope of Repetition 16 Epic Allusion in the Histories 22 Tacitus' Readers 26 Lucan's Death and Afterlife in Ann. 15.70 30 Maternus and Virgil in the Dialogus 31 A Virgilian Stylistic Program: Annals 3.55.5 and 4.32.2 35 1. History as Epic 42 Opus adgredior 43 Tacitus' Expansive Wars 46 In medias res 50 The Catalogue of Combatants 55 Foreshadowing in the Catalogue 61 A Model Reading of Civil War: Hist. 1.50 66 Pharsaliam Philippos 70 A Proem in the Middle 75 "The Same Anger of the Gods" 80 "The Same Madness of Humans" 86 2. The Deaths of Galba and the Desecration of Rome 92 Galba and Priam 92 Additional Galban Intertexts (by Way of Priam?) 98 The Scene of the Crime 101 Galba's Death Lives On 108 Galba and the Capitol: Repetitions 111 A Fall Worse than Troy's 116 More War (and More Virgil) at Rome 119 3. The Battles of Cremona 126 The Two Cremonas: Repetitions 128 Ever Fleeting Commiseration 134 The Sieges at Placentia and Cremona 139 Epic Battles Fought again at Cremona 142 The Settlement of Cremona - into Flames 148 A Snapshot of Civil War's Repetitiveness: Hist. 2.70 157 4. Otho's Exemplary Response 166 In ullum rei publicae usum 169 Otho the Anti-Aeneas? 172 Epilogue. "Savage Even in Its Peace" 182 Civil War in the Senate 185 "Savagery in the City" in the Lost Books? 193 Bibliography 204 Abbreviations 204 Other Works 204 General Index 218 Index of Passages Discussed 222 Allusions to the epic poets Virgil and Lucan in the writing of the Roman historian Tacitus (c. 55 - c. 120 C.E.) have long been noted. This monograph argues that Tacitus fashions himself as a rivaling literary successor to these poets; and that the emulative allusions to Virgil's 'Aeneid' and Lucan's 'Bellum Civile' in Books 1-3 of his inaugural historiographical work, the 'Histories', complement and build upon each other, and contribute significantly to the picture of repetitive, escalating civil war in the work. The argument is founded on the close reading of a series of related passages in the 'Histories', and it also broadens to consider certain narrative techniques and strategies that Tacitus shares with writers of epic