ancient (101) ancient history (361) Ancient Rome (285) antiquity (108) biography (624) Caesar (53) classic (60) classical (50) classical history (54) classical literature (68) classics (389) Folio Society (129) history (1,420) Italy (55) Latin (269) Latin literature (96) literature (85) Loeb (64) Nero (45) non-fiction (393) Penguin Classics (72) read (48) Roman (180) Roman Empire (174) Roman History (359) Roman literature (49) Rome (459) Suetonius (124) to-read (283) translation (103)

Common Knowledge

Canonical name: Suetonius
Legal name: Tranquillus, Gaius Suetonius
Birthdate: 69 (circa)
Date of death: 131 (circa)
Gender: male
Occupations: historian
Nationality: Roman Empire
Birthplace: Hippo Regius, Roman Africa (probably)
Places of residence: Hippo Regius
Map Location: Italy

Members

Discussions

On Suetonius, and TV about Roman Art. in Ancient History (May 2013)

Suetonius' Twelve Caesars in Ancient History (September 2010)

Reviews

Featured Recent Thumbs

All Ratings
43
½7
30
½6
9
½1
3
4
No Rating

All Languages
English120
Spanish13
French5
Italian4
Danish3
Catalan2
Dutch1
Hungarian1
Portuguese (Portugal)1
Swedish1

151 reviews

larryking1 68 reviews

The Twelve Caesars by Suetonius

I find it heartening to enjoy with such gusto a 2,000 year old historical account by the Emperor Hadrian's secretary, he being one Suetonius! In his narrative, he describes the biographies of twelve members of Rome's ruling class who led its Empire at its height, beginning with Julius Caesar and ending over a century later with the hapless Domitian. This was a groundbreaking work because, for the first time a writer relied on what we know today as "primary" sources, either direct interviews show more or documents from those times. There was little heresay and religious or otherworldly accounts, for the most part, were left out of his narrative. What was left in, however, was an entirely different matter: all kinds of depravity and mayhem and violence, and, best of all, decadence, of the most titillating sort, are described with a descriptive delight bordering on the salacious! Keep in mind that, among these Caesars we have Caligula and Nero, two despots we still talk about today! And most of these rulers came to very bad ends, all described with a zeal that makes the reader want to turn the page to find out about the next one and the next one after that! Of note is the masterful translation by Robert Graves who used his ability and knowledge to novelize the life of the Emperor Claudius into two exquisite novels. show less

Feb 26, 202082 other reviews

meandmybooks 203 reviews

Caligula (Penguin Little Black Classics) by Suetonius

Horrifying, but also weirdly fascinating. It's sort of amazing that Caligula was tolerated as emperor as long as he was (nearly four years), given the level of his vicious, flamboyant insanity, but according to Suetonius he was initially quite popular among the common people and the military. He started by staging some spectacularly extravagant performances and making some dramatic shows of sympathy for wronged Roman citizens, and it required truly egregious behavior to exhaust the tolerance show more of his supporters. But he was up to the task and then some. Unrestrained lechery, exhibitionism, egomania, sadism, paranoia... Suetonius tells us that

”He nearly assumed a royal diadem then and there, transforming an ostensible principate into an actual kingdom. However, after his courtiers reminded him that he already outranked any king or local ruler, he insisted on being treated as a god – arranging for the most revered or artistically famous statues of the gods, including that of Jupiter at Olympia, to be brought to Greece and have their heads replaced by his own.... He established a shrine to his own godhead, with priests, the costliest possible victims, and a life-sized golden image, which was dressed every day in clothes identical with those that he happened to be wearing.”

Furthermore, Suetonius tells us that, always desperate for the spotlight,

”Anger incited him [Caligula] to a flood of verbiage; he moved about excitedly while speaking, and his voice carried a great distance. At the start of each speech he would threaten to 'draw the sword which he had forged in his midnight study'; yet he so despised more elegant and melodious styles that he discounted Seneca...

Gaius [Caligula] practiced many other arts – most enthusiastically too. He made appearances as a Thracian gladiator and a charioteer, as a singer and a dancer; he would fight with real weapons and drive chariots in the circuses that he had built in many places. Indeed, he was so proud of his singing and dancing that he could not resist the temptation of supporting the tragic actors at public performances, and would repeat their gestures by way of praise or criticism. On the very day of his death he seems to have ordered an all-night festival so that he could take advantage of the free-and-easy atmosphere to make his stage debut. He often danced even at night, and once, at the close of the second watch, summoned three senators of consular rank to the palace; arriving half-dead with fear, they were conducted to a stage upon which, amid a tremendous racket of flutes and castanets, Gaius suddenly burst, dressed in a shawl and an ankle length tunic; he performed a song and dance, and disappeared as suddenly as he had entered.”

One wonders whether it was ultimately his erratic savagery or his sheer ludicrousness that inspired the tribunes and Praetorian prefects who ultimately murdered him. Likely both, I suppose. Anyway, Suetonius's narrative, offered here as No. 17 in Penguin's “Little Black Classics” series and extracted from Robert Graves's translation of Suetonius's The Twelve Caesars, is appalling but... lively. show less

Jan 16, 20179 other reviews

Glenn_Russell 713 reviews

The Lives of The Twelve Caesars: Tiberius by Suetonius

With the death of the great Augustus, Tiberius, already in his 50s, became the next Roman Emperor and ruled from 14 AD to 37 AD. In a way this was an unfortunate turn of events for the Roman people since Tiberius, always a dark, gloomy, reclusive man, really did not want the responsibility of being the leader of an entire empire. Predictably, not only does Roman biographer Suetonius outline the family history and overarching accomplishments of Tiberius’s 22 year reign, but provides much show more color commentary on the character of the man. Here are a few highlights along with my comments:

“He had such an aversion to flattery, that he would never suffer any senator to approach his litter, as he passed the streets in it, either to pay him a civility, or upon business. And when a man of consular rank, in begging his pardon for some offence he had given him, attempted to fall at his feet, he started from him in such haste, that he stumbled and fell.” ---------- Too bad life didn’t leave Tiberius alone, so he could live the last phase of his life in peace and quiet, far from the maddening crowd.

“He reduced the expense of the plays and public spectacles, by diminishing the allowances to actors, and curtailing the number of gladiators.” --------- I’m sure the Roman populous saw their emperor as a supreme killjoy. What was Tiberius thinking? The Roman people loved their comedies, farces, satires, chariot races and especially gladiator fights – the more the merrier. If you want to win the hearts of these people, give the people more plays and bloody games, not less.

“He published an edict against the practice of people's kissing each other when they met.” ---------- It takes a dark, gloomy, morose man to ban kissing. Come on, Tiberius, give us a break.

"A few days after his arrival at Capri, a fisherman coming up to him unexpectedly, when he was desirous of privacy, and presenting him with a large mullet, he ordered the man's face to be scrubbed with the fish; being terrified at the thought of his having been able to creep upon him from the back of the island, over such rugged and steep rocks. The man, while undergoing the punishment, expressing his joy that he had not likewise offered him a large crab which he had also taken, he ordered his face to be farther lacerated with its claws." ---------- Such cruelty. If the fisherman only realized how sadistic Tiberius was, he would have kept his mouth shut and thus avoided having his face lacerated.

"In his retreat at Capri, he also contrived an apartment containing couches, and adapted to the secret practice of abominable lewdness, where he entertained companies of girls and catamites, and assembled from all quarters inventors of unnatural copulations, whom he called Spintriae, who defiled one another in his presence, to inflame by the exhibition the languid appetite. . . . He likewise contrived recesses in woods and groves for the gratification of lust, where young persons of both sexes prostituted themselves in caves and hollow rocks, in the disguise of little Pans and Nymphs." ---------- That’s one way to try to overcome your gloominess – but far from the way any Greco-Roman philosopher would recommend.

“Of many who were condemned, their wives and children shared the same fate; and for those who were sentenced to death, the relations were forbid to put on mourning.” ---------- Can you imagine? Prohibiting family members mourning the death of their loved ones murdered unjustly?

“The people were so much elated at his death, that when they first heard the news, they ran up and down the city, some crying out, "Away with Tiberius to the Tiber;" others exclaiming, "May the earth, the common mother of mankind, and the infernal gods, allow him no abode in death, but amongst the wicked." ---------- Good riddance! If I were living in Rome at the time, I’d be running and dancing up and down the city streets celebrating the death of a such a foul, decrepit and heartless emperor.

Suetonius available on-line: http://www.gutenberg.org/files/6400/6... show less

Nov 13, 20183 other reviews

AThomas83 824 reviews

The Twelve Caesars: Suetonius (Penguin Classics) by Suetonius

Ha! Here's a massive must-read about Roman history; especially the rise of the Empire - from Julius Caesar's death and its consequences upon the establishment of the Principate, up to the fall of Domitian. The problem is, this is not history how I personally like it; if it can be called 'history' at all!

I get it: Suetonius writes biographies, and biography, for him, means mainly focusing on private lives. This is not an innocent approach. Private lives are his way to gauge the personalities show more and characters of his subjects, and, so, 'explain' their achievements as rulers. What's the issue with that, then? Well...

Then as now, I don't see how bringing forth the family issues, sexuality, eccentricities, vices and individual shortcomings of people in power can serve as a reliable tool to judge of their deeds as politicians. What goes on in private is what goes on in private; and public life is often all other and unrelated. True, in Ancient Rome both were often going hand-in-hand (eg. one cannot understand the political feuds within a dynasty without knowing about the familial and marital conflicts plaguing it). But, then as now, such failures of characters and supposed feuds and how they went on is more often than not relying on gossips, libels, hearsays, and, so, should be taken with a serious pinch of salt! Is this all true and reliable? Or are these 'supposed' vices and outrageous behaviours just deliberate slanders playing into political agendas? Politics was a dirtier business back then that it is now! But, I get that too: then as now, Suetonius's delights in dragging most of his subjects into the mud by overplaying the scandalous will be as entertaining and crusty as the crass and vulgar tabloids of our days. Such gossips and lurid details, after all, became the stuff of history (Tiberius, Caligula, Nero... it's all in there!). So what did I expect?

Well, when it comes to such primary sources, I like history as a narrative. I like reading about achievements (military, political...) and, so, I have no patience for the privy and gossipy. I'm not saying Suetonius has no historical interest! He relies on primary sources too (eg letters from Augustus and Mark Anthony, memoirs of Tiberius and Claudius, poetry of Nero... all quoted verbatim). He also quotes popular songs and jokes which tells a lot about how rulers were perceived by their subjects. But, you would be very hard-pressed to find anything detailed about their deeds (eg Julius Caesar might have been a great conqueror, you wouldn't know it reading this!).

Now, some are clearly admired (Julius Caesar again, Augustus, even Vespasian comes out fine...). The other biographical snapshots, however, are striking (and, to me, annoying) for their downright and always predictable negativity. Tiberius? He claims: 'Some aspects of his criminal obscenities are almost too vile to discuss, much less to believe' (before, of course, discussing them at length!). Claudius? He is completely dismissed: 'all these acts, and others like them - indeed, one might say throughout his reign - were dictated by his wives and freedmen: he practically always obeyed their whims rather than his own judgement.' And it goes on. And on. And on. And on! The negativity, in fact, is quite boring; especially when coupled with the lack of depth when it comes to public achievements.

So? Well... These biographies might be crusty for their sensationalism, nearly all men here exposed in their supposed trashy behaviours; and, this might make for an entertaining read. However, I, for one, rather go and read Tacitus... There: Suetonius is not for me. show less

Jan 6, 202682 other reviews

See More Reviews