viii, 113 p. / This thesis analyzes various literary, numismatic, and epigraphical narratives of the Roman civil war of 69CE, and the representations of the four emperors who fought in it. In particular the focus is on how the narratives and representations relate to one another. Such an investigation provides us with useful insight into the people and events of 69 and how contemporaries viewed the actors and the events. These various presentations, most notably the works of five ancient historians and biographers, give 69 the distinction of being one of the best documented years in all antiquity. Historical scholarship has typically sought to determine which of these authors was the most accurate on the points which they disagreed. These points of difference, largely subjective opinion and therefore equally valid, illuminate instead the diverse ways in which an event can be interpreted. This thesis will focus on why there is such diversity and its usefulness to the historian. / Committee in charge: Dr. John Nicols, Chair; Dr. Sean Anthony, Member; Dr. Mary Jaeger, Member

Doctorat en philosophie et lettres / info:eu-repo/semantics/nonPublished

This thesis provides a fresh investigation of a collection of Roman imperial biographies conventionally known as the 'Historia Augusta'. The thesis supports the authenticity of the texts included in this corpus, in particular the claims they make about their dates, authorship, and scope, through philological, literary, prosopographical, and historical arguments. It shows that this corpus of texts, if the main conclusions are accepted, potentially improves our understanding of the tetrarchic-Constantinian era. It also explores the wider implications for the historiography of the fourth century; the transmission and formation of multi-author corpora in antiquity and the middle ages. It also suggests that the canon of Latin imperial biographies be widened. The thesis has two parts. Part I explores the actual state of the corpus, its textual transmission, and relation to other texts. It shows that the ancient and medieval paratexts presented the corpus as a collection of imperial biographies. The paratexts are compatible with the authorial statements in the main text. It then explores the corpus' medieval transmission, and the interest medieval scholars had in such texts. This part suggests that the corpus’s current state explains well the inconsistencies found in it. Finally, it shows that words and phrases, once thought peculiar to the corpus and the holy grail of the forgery argument, are intertextual links to earlier texts. Part II explores chronological statements and historical episodes relevant to the Diocletianic-Constantinan period. It establishes the actual dates of each author, and suggests that the confusion found in these biographies is similar to that of other contemporaries. The few apostrophes are shown to be authentic, and the historical and prosopographical passages are shown to represent, and improve our understanding of, the zeitgeist and history of the period. The final conclusion weaves the various arguments together, and emphasises the authenticity and significance of the corpus' texts. It suggests separating the composition of the texts from the disinterested formation of the corpus as a whole, as part of a new hypothesis and further lines of enquiry.