The Augustan History (Lat. Historia Augusta) is a collection of biographies of Roman Emperors and usurpers during the period 117 to 284. Although it is supposedly an assemblage of works by six different writers (collectively known as the Scriptores Historiae Augustae), there is considerable doubt concerning not only the authorship of the work, but also when it was written and how much of the content is fictitious. Even so, it is the only continuous account for its period and thus of considerable interest. Latin is an ancient Indo-European language originally spoken in the region around Rome called Latium. ... Roman Emperor is the term historians use to refer to rulers of the Roman Empire, after the epoch conventionally named the Roman Republic. ... Usurpers were a common feature of the late Roman Empire, especially from the so-called crisis of the third century onwards, when political instability became the rule. ... Events Emperor Trajan dies, leaving the Roman Empire at its maximal territorial extent. ... For other uses, see number 284. ...

The name originated with Isaac Casaubon, who produced a critical edition in 1603, working from a complex manuscript tradition with a number of variant versions. A section covering the years 238 to 252 is missing in all the manuscripts, and it has been argued that biographies of Nerva and Trajan have also been lost at the beginning of the work, which would therefore have been a direct continuation of Suetonius. Isaac Casaubon (February 18, 1559 - July 1, 1614) was a classical scholar, first in France then later in England, regarded by many at the time as the most learned in Europe. ... King James I of England/VII of Scotland, the first monarch to rule the Kingdoms of England and Scotland at the same time Events March - Samuel de Champlain, French explorer, sails to Canada March 24 - Elizabeth I of England dies and is succeeded by her cousin King James I of... A manuscript (Latin manu scriptus, written by hand), strictly speaking, is any written document that is put down by hand, in contrast to being printed or reproduced some other way. ... Events Carpians invade Moesia, Maximinus Thrax campaigns against them. ... Events Sun Liang succeeds Sun Quan as king of the Chinese Kingdom of Wu. ... Marcus Cocceius Nerva (November 8, 30 –January 27, 98), Roman emperor (96–98), was a member of the Italian nobility rather than one of the elite of Rome; in this he was like Vespasian, the founder of the Flavian dynasty. ... Marcus Ulpius Nerva Traianus (September 18, 53 – August 9, 117), Roman Emperor (98-117), commonly called Trajan, was the second of the Five Good Emperors of the Roman Empire. ... Gaius Suetonius Tranquillus (c. ...

The biographies are dedicated to Diocletian, Constantine, and various private persons, and so ostensibly were written around the beginning of the 4th century. Emperor Diocletian Gaius Aurelius Valerius Diocletianus (245?–312?), born Diocles, was Roman Emperor as Diocletian from November 20, 284 to May 1, 305. ... Contemporary bronze head of Constantine. ... As a means of recording the passage of time, the 4th century was that century which lasted from 301 to 400. ...

In 1889, Hermann Dessau proposed that the six Scriptores - "Aelius Spartianus", "Iulius Capitolinus", "Vulcacius Gallicanus", "Aelius Lampridius", "Trebellius Pollio", and "Flavius Vopiscus" - were all fictitious, and that the work was composed by a single author in the late fourth century; among the evidence was that the life of Septimius Severus was copied from Aurelius Victor, and that the life of Marcus Aurelius uses material from Eutropius. Recent studies also show much consistency of style, and most scholars now accept the theory of a single late author of unknown identity. Computer-aided stylistic analysis of the work has, however, returned ambiguous results; some elements of style are quite uniform throughout the work, while others vary in a way that suggests multiple authorship. 1889 (MDCCCLXXXIX) was a common year starting on Tuesday (see link for calendar). ... Lucius Septimius Severus, (April 11, 146-February 4, 211) was Roman emperor from April 9, 193 to 211. ... Sextus Aurelius Victor, prefect of Pannonia about 360 ( xxi. ... Marcus Aurelius depicted in The Thoughts of Marcus Aurelius Antoninus, as translated by George Long Imperator Caesar Marcus Aurelius Antoninus Augustus (April 26, 121 – March 17, 180) was Roman Emperor from 161 to his death in 180. ... Eutropius was a pagan Roman historian of the later 4th century, writing in Latin, whose brief remarks about himself let us know that he had served under Emperor Julian the Apostate (ruled 361 - 363) and his history covers the reigns of Valentinian and Valens (died 378). ... A computer is a machine capable of undergoing complex calculations. ...

Interpretations of the purpose of the History also vary considerably, some considering it a work of fiction or satire intended to entertain (perhaps in the vein of 1066 and All That), others viewing it as a pagan attack on Christianity, the writer having concealed his identity for personal safety. Satire is a literary technique of writing or art which exposes the follies of its subject (for example, individuals, organizations, or states) to ridicule, often as an intended means of provoking or preventing change. ... 1066 and All That is a work of tongue-in-cheek fake history by W. C. Sellar and R. J. Yeatman. ... Paganism (from Latin paganus) and Heathenry are catch-all terms which have come to connote a broad set of spiritual/religious beliefs and practices of a natural religion, as opposed to the Abrahamic religions. ... Christianity is a monotheistic religion centered on the life, teachings, and actions of Jesus as recounted in the New Testament. ...

A peculiarity of the work is its inclusion of a large number of professedly authentic documents such as extracts from Senate proceedings and letters written by imperial personages. Records like these are quite distinct from the rhetorical speeches often inserted by ancient historians - it was accepted practice for the writer to invent these himself - and on the few occasions when historians (such as Sallust in his work on Catiline) include such documents, they have generally been regarded as genuine; but almost all those found in the Historia Augusta have been rejected as fabrications, partly on stylistic grounds and partly because they refer to military titles or points of administrative organisation which are otherwise unrecorded until long after the purported date. Sallust (Gaius Sallustius Crispus) (86-34 BC), Roman historian, belonging to a well-known plebeian family, was born at Amiternum in the country of the Sabines. ... Lucius Sergius Catilina (108 BC?–62 BC), known in English as Catiline, was a Roman politician of the 1st century BC who is best known for the Catiline (or Catilinarian) conspiracy, an attempt to overthrow the Roman Republic, and in particular the power of the aristocratic Senate. ...

On the other hand, the classicist Anthony Birley has defended the value of specific parts of this work, arguing that the lives up to Septimius Severus are based on the now-lost history of Marius Maximus, which was written as a sequel to Suetonius' Lives of the Twelves Caesars. As a result, his translation of the History for Penguin Books covers only the first half, and was pubished as Lives of the Later Caesars with himself supplying biographies of Nerva and Trajan which are not part of the original texts, which begin with Domitian. Gaius Suetonius Tranquillus (c. ... Penguin Books is a British publisher founded in 1935 by Allen Lane. ... Marcus Cocceius Nerva (November 8, 30 –January 27, 98), Roman emperor (96–98), was a member of the Italian nobility rather than one of the elite of Rome; in this he was like Vespasian, the founder of the Flavian dynasty. ... Marcus Ulpius Nerva Traianus (September 18, 53 – August 9, 117), Roman Emperor (98-117), commonly called Trajan, was the second of the Five Good Emperors of the Roman Empire. ... Domitian bust in the Louvre Titus Flavius Domitianus (24 October 51 – 18 September 96), commonly known as Domitian, was a Roman emperor of the gens Flavia. ...

The editio princeps was published at Milan in 1475. An English translation of the complete work with facing Latin text is available in the Loeb Classical Library. Milan (Italian: Milano; Milanese dialect: Milán) is the main city in northern Italy, and is located in the plains of Lombardy, the most populated and developed region in Italy. ... Events August 29 - Treaty of Picquigny ends a brief war between France and England. ... The Loeb Classical Library is a series of books, today published by the Harvard University Press, which present important works of ancient Greek and Latin Literature in a way designed to make the text accessible to the broadest possible audience, by presenting the original Greek or Latin text on each...

See also

• Thirty Tyrants (Roman) - about the Tyranni Triginta, one of the books of the Historia Augusta

The Thirty Tyrants, or Thirty Pretenders (Latin: Tyranni Triginta) were a group of thirty men and two women declared by the author of the notoriously unreliable Historia Augusta, writing under the name Trebellius Pollio, to have been pretenders to the throne of the Roman Empire in the time of the...

External links

• Latin text and English translation at LacusCurtius
• Introduction