Dio's Rome

This is probably one of the most intricate and exhaustive histories written of Rome, particularly the B.C. years of Rome. The author, a Roman senator, wrote this history around 216 A.D. Interestingly, he like Josephus, mentions nothing of a Jesus or a threat of the Christians against Rome. However, there is an interesting expansion of history of the Jewish revolt against Rome, including Jewish cannibalism, from the Roman point of view.

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EXCERPT

Cassius Dio Cocceianus, Roman senator and prætor, when about forty years of age delivered himself of a pamphlet describing the dreams and omens that had led the general Septimius Severus to hope for the imperial office which he actually secured. One evening there came to the author a note of thanks from the prince; and the temporary satisfaction of the recipient was continued in his dreams, wherein his guiding angel seemed to urge him to write a detailed account of the reign of the unworthy Commodus (Book Seventy-two), just ended. Once again did Dio glow beneath the imperial felicitations and those of the public. Inoculated with the bacillus of publication and animated by a strong desire for immortality,-a wish happily realized,-he undertook the prodigious task of giving to the world a complete account of Roman events from the beginning to so late a date as Fortune might vouchsafe.

Forthwith he began the accumulation of materials, a task in which ten active years (A.D. 200 to 210) were utilized. The actual labor of composition, continued for twelve years more at intervals of respite from duties of state, brought him in his narrative to the inception of the reign of his original patron, the first Severus.-All the foregoing facts are given us as Dio's own statement, in what is at present the twenty-third chapter of the seventy-second book, by that painter in miniature, Ioannes Xiphilinus.

It was now the year A.D. 223, Dio was either consul for the first time (as some assert) or had the consular office behind him, the world was richer by the loss of Elagabalus, and Alexander Severus reigned in his stead. Under this emperor the remaining books (Seventy-three to Eighty, inclusive) must have been composed, for Dio puts the finishing touches on his history in 229. Since by that time he was nearly eighty years of age and since he has written of no reign subsequent to Alexander's, we may conclude that he did not survive his master, who died in 235. The sum total of his efforts, then, as he left it, consisted of eighty books, covering a period from 1064

EXCERPT

While Nero was still in Greece, the Jews revolted openly and he sent Vespasian against them. The inhabitants of Britain and of Gaul, likewise, oppressed by the taxes, experienced an even keener distress, which added fuel to the already kindled fire of their indignation. --There was a Gaul named Gaius Julius Vindex , descended from the native royal race and on his father's side entitled to rank as a Roman senator. He was strong of body, had an intelligent mind, was skilled in warfare and was full of daring for every enterprise.

Now this Vindex made an assembly of the Gauls, who had suffered much during the numerous forced levies of money, and were still suffering at Nero's hands. And ascending a tribunal he delivered a long and detailed speech against Nero, saying that they ought to revolt from the emperor and join him in an attack --"because," said he, "he has despoiled the whole Roman world, because he has destroyed all the flower of their senate, because he debauched and likewise killed his mother, and does not preserve even the semblance of sovereignty. Murders, seizures and outrages have often been committed and by many other persons: but how may one find words to describe the remainder of his conduct as it deserves?

I have seen, my friends and allies,--believe me,--I have seen that man (if he is a man, who married Sporus and was given in marriage to Pythagoras) in the arena of the theatre and in the orchestra, sometimes with the zither, the loose tunic, the cothurnus, 23 sometimes with wooden shoes 24 and mask. I have often heard him sing, I have heard him make proclamations, I have heard him perform tragedy. I have seen him in chains, I have seen him dragged about, pregnant, bearing children, going through all the situations of mythology, by speech, by being addressed, by being acted upon, by acting.

Who, then, will call such a person Caesar and emperor and Augustus? Let no one for any consideration so abuse those sacred titles. They were held by Augustus and by Claudius. This fellow might most properly be termed Thyestes and Oedipus, Alcmeon and Orestes. These are the persons he represents on the stage and it is these titles that he has assumed rather than the others.

Therefore now at length rise against him: come to the succor of yourselves and of the Romans; liberate the entire world!"