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Natalie Haynes Stands Up for the Classics Podcast
Tacitus

Tacitus

Natalie Haynes Stands Up for the Classics vor 2 Jahren

The great historian of imperial Rome, Tacitus can persuade you of just about anything.

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27:31

Tacitus is the great historian of imperial Rome. His writing is
beautiful, unsettling, extraordinarily persuasive. We know many
of his likes and dislikes about people and politics, but facts
about his personal life? Not so much.

His memoir of Agricola tells us much fascinating detail about
Roman Britain: that it's an island (the Roman fleet sailed all
the way round, just to check), that it's very close to Spain
(with only Ireland in between); that invading Anglesey was a
great victory for the Romans. He notes that it rains a lot, but
omits to mention the Druids. He is also, he says, dedicated to
writing impartially. Natalie may disagree. Who needs evidence
when you have Tacitus' persuasive prose? It's not as if we can
cross-check, because so little of the written record of the time
survives to us. Natalie's guest, (modern) historian Dan Snow,
finds this hard to fathom. Her other guest, Professor Llewelyn
Morgan, knows it's unwise to lament the lost work. We should
value what remains and hope that some new bits of Tacitus may
appear in the future.

And it turns out that by boat, Britain IS actually close to
Spain. Travelling overland was hard going in Tacitus' day, so
compared to that, the sea journey to Spain was easy.

'Rock star mythologist’ and reformed stand-up Natalie Haynes is
obsessed with the ancient world. Here she explores key stories
from ancient Rome and Greece that still have resonance today.
They might be biographical, topographical, mythological or epic,
but they are always hilarious, magical and tragic, mystifying and
revelatory. And they tell us more about ourselves now than seems
possible of stories from a couple of thousand years ago.

Producer...Mary Ward-Lowery