ABSTRACT

The Parallel Lives appear to have been written in the second century A.D under the enlightened principates of Trajan and Hadrian. In one pervasive but inaccurate medieval tradition, Plutarch was said to have tutored the emperor Trajan, just as Aristotle taught Alexander. There is even a Latin version of a 'letter' supposedly written by Plutarch to Trajan and consisting of a compilation of quotations from the surviving works. The optimistic speech is organized around a series of antitheses which cast the dead Domitian as a tyrant and Trajan as an enlightened, hard-working ruler and ideal general. For the modern historian, Tacitus' history of the Roman empire abroad and at home, from the death of Augustus to the death of Domitian, is a crucially important source for this fascinating period. Tacitus' main interest in barbarians is in how Rome interacts with them, and how they may reflect on and contribute to Roman identity, troubled as it is in the imperial times.