The Twelve Caesars - Suetonius

Gaius Suetonius Tranquillis, more commonly known as Suetonius, was, to the best of our knowledge, born in 69 A.D, a year in which the Roman Empire was plagued by instability and which has become known as the 'Year of Four Emperors'. Son of a Roman knight, Suetonius quickly rose to prominence during the reign of Emperor Hadrian (117 - 138 AD) rising to the position of chief secretary. As the name implies, in The Twelve Caesars Suetonius chronicles the lives of the first Twelve Caesars of the Roman Empire from the Julio-Claudian and Flavian dynasties, spanning from Julius Caesar to Domitian. What stands this out from other Roman histories, such as the work by ...  Read the complete review

So who is Suetonius? Born 69/70 AD, he was about 27 when the last of his subjects in this book died. He was born in Algeria and moved to Rome to teach literature and then practice law. Under the emperors Trajan and Hadrian he worked in the imperial libraries and then dealt with the correspondence of the emperors themselves….right up to the point when he was rude to Hadrian’s wife Sabina and was dismissed (I would have loved to have known what he did!). He claimed to have interviewed eye witnesses and to have checked his facts carefully for this book; he also appears to have included everything he was told as anecdotes are often contradictory e.g Tiberius as a ...  Read the complete review

Anyone who thinks that scandal is a modern art and that our celebrities get up to weird antics should read Suetonius’s biography of the first 12 Roman emperors. In fact today’s celebs and politicos are rank amateurs compared to the devious and debauched Caesars who commanded absolute power in the Roman empire. At least that’s how they come across in the 2nd century AD historian and muck-raker’s classic, racy account of the rulers at the heart of the ancient superpower. Suetonious wrote a chapter about each Caesar in order, offering revealing portraits of each; from bad, sad Tiberius, wise exceptions-to-the-rule Augustus and Claudius ...  Read the complete review