The first in a four-volume edition of Tacitus Annals 1-6. The Annals are Tacitus' brilliant account of Roman imperial history from the death of Augustus to the death of Nero. Books 1-6 describe the reign of Tiberius. Professor Goodyear's introduction to the series deals concisely with the background to the Annals. He outlines the history of Tacitean scholarship to the present day and shows how Tacitus' historical judgements were sometimes distorted by his preoccupations with style and with the moral function of historical writing. The commentary attends equally to literary, historical and textual questions. There are several appendixes on topics of more specialized interest.

Tacitus' account of Nero's principate is an extraordinary piece of historical writing. His graphic narrative (including Annals XV) is one of the highlights of the greatest surviving historian of the Roman Empire. It describes how the imperial system survived Nero's flamboyant and hedonistic tenure as emperor, and includes many famous passages, from the Great Fire of Rome in AD 64 to the city-wide party organised by Nero's praetorian prefect, Tigellinus, in Rome. This edition unlocks the difficulties and complexities of this challenging yet popular text for students and instructors alike. It elucidates the historical context of the work and the literary artistry of the author, as well as explaining grammatical difficulties of the Latin for students. It also includes a comprehensive introduction discussing historical, literary and stylistic issues.

Helps students and instructors read and appreciate this extraordinary piece of historical writing about Nero's infamous reign as emperor.

"The Annals" from Cornelius Tacitus. Senator and a historian of the Roman Empire (54-117).

The Annals Tacitus Translated by Alfred John Church and William Jackson Brodribb The Annals (Latin: Annales) by Roman historian and senator Tacitus is a history of the Roman Empire from the reign of Tiberius to that of Nero, the years AD 14-68. The Annals are an important source to modern understanding of the history of the Roman Empire during the first century; it is Tacitus' final work, and modern historians generally consider it his greatest writing. Historian Ronald Mellor calls it "Tacitus's crowning achievement" which represents the "pinnacle of Roman historical writing". Tacitus' Histories and Annals together amounted to 30 books; although some scholars disagree about which work to assign some books to, traditionally 14 are assigned to Histories and 16 to Annals. Of the 30 books referred to by Jerome about half have survived. Modern scholars believe that as a Roman senator, Tacitus had access to Acta Senatus--the Roman senate's records--which provided a solid basis for his work. Although Tacitus refers to part of his work as "my annals", the title of the work Annals used today was not assigned by Tacitus himself, but derives from its year-by-year structure. The name of the current manuscript seems to be "Books of History from the Death of the Divine Augustus" (Ab Excessu divi Augusti Historiarum Libri). Table of Contents BOOK I, A.D. 14, 15 BOOK II, A.D. 16-19 BOOK III, A.D. 20-22 BOOK IV, A.D. 23-28 BOOK V, A.D. 29-31 BOOK VI, A.D. 32-37 BOOK VII-- X, A.D. 37, 47 BOOK XI, A.D. 47, 48 BOOK XII, A.D. 48-54 BOOK XIII, A.D. 54-58 BOOK XIV, A.D. 59-62 BOOK XV, A.D. 62-65 BOOK XVI, A.D. 65, 66