Appian
Appian | |
---|---|
Roman Egypt | |
Died | c. 165 (aged around 70) |
Occupation(s) | Historian, lawyer |
Appian of Alexandria (.
He was born c. 95 in
His principal surviving work (Ρωμαϊκά Romaiká, known in
The Civil Wars, books 13–17 of the Roman History, concern mainly the end of the Roman Republic and take a conflict-based view and approach to history. Despite the lack of cited sources for his works, these books of the Roman History are the only extant comprehensive description of these momentous decades of Roman history. The other extant work of Appian is his "The Foreign Wars", which includes an ethnographic style history recounting the various military conflicts against a foreign enemy in Roman history, until the time of Appian.
Life
Little is known of the life of Appian of Alexandria. He wrote an autobiography that has been almost completely lost.
It is believed that Appian moved to Rome in 120, where he became a
Works
Appian's Roman History and The Civil Wars
Appian began writing his history around the middle of the second century AD.
Only sections from half of the original 24 books survive today of a much larger history known as The Roman History, namely books 6-7, much of 8, 9, and 11, and 12-17 (only fragments of books 1-5 and of the remainder of 8 and 9 are preserved, while books 10 and 18-24 are lost entirely).
Besides Appian, this period is also covered by a handful of ancient authors with varying degrees of detail and viewpoints. The commentaries of Julius Caesar record his personal, mainly military, observations of the
The Foreign Wars
Another work of Appian's history which still survives mostly extant is called The Foreign Wars. This history describes the wars the Romans fought against other cultures throughout their history. The mostly extant work narrates the wars in Spain (book 6), the
Of the books which are now entirely lost, book 10 described the wars in Greece and Ionia, books 18-21 discussed Egypt, book 22 covered the history of the Empire up to the reign of Trajan, book 23 covered Trajan's wars against the Dacians, the Jews, and the Parthians, and book 24 described his annexation of Arabia Petraea.[5]
Sources
One might expect that a historical work covering nine centuries and countless different peoples would involve a multitude of sources from different periods. However, Appian's sources remain uncertain, as he only mentions the source of his information under special circumstances. He may have relied primarily on one author for each book, whom he did not follow uncritically, since Appian also used additional sources for precision and correction.[citation needed] At our present state of knowledge questions regarding Appian's sources cannot be resolved.[citation needed]
Editions
- Appiani Alexandrini Historia Publio Candido interprete Ac praeterea Anonymi Compendium historiae ab excessu Constantini usque ad Ioannem XXIII (in Latin). World Digital Library. Retrieved 2014-02-28. (a translation of Appian's History into Latin)
- Editio princeps, 1551
- Schweighäuser, 1785
- Bekker, 1852
- Ludwig Mendelssohn, 1878–1905, Appiani Historia Romana, Bibliotheca Teubneriana
- Paul Goukowsky, 1997–, Appien. Histoire romaine (Greek text, French translation, notes), Collection Budé.
- Carsana, Chiara (ed.). Commento storico al libro II delle Guerre Civili di Appiano (parte I). Pisa: Edizioni ETS, 2007. 309 pp. (Pubblicazioni della Facoltà di Lettere e Filosofia dell'Università di Pavia, 116).
- English translations
- W. B., 1578 (black letter) – possibly Shakespeare
- J. D[avies], 1679
- Horace White, 1899 (Bohn's Classical Library);
- Book I edited by James Leigh Strachan-Davidson, 1902.
- Books XIII–XVII (Civil Wars), trans. John Carter, Penguin, Harmondsworth, 1996
References
Citations
- ^ ISBN 0-674-99002-1.
- ^ public domain: Chisholm, Hugh, ed. (1911). "Appian". Encyclopædia Britannica. Vol. 2 (11th ed.). Cambridge University Press. pp. 221–222. One or more of the preceding sentences incorporates text from a publication now in the
- ^ Appian Proem. 62
- ^ Michael Petrus Josephus Van Den Hout, A Commentary on the Letters of M. Cornelius Fronto, Volume 190 of Mnemosyne (Brill, 1999)
- ^ a b c Brodersen, Kai (1996). "Appian". In Hornblower, Simon; Spawforth, Antony (eds.). Oxford Classical Dictionary (3rd ed.). Oxford University Press. p. 130.
Bibliography
- William Smith (ed.) (1870), Dictionary of Greek and Roman Biography and Mythology, Vol. 1, pp. 247–248
External links
- Works by or about Appian at Wikisource
- Original Greek text of the Civil Wars (Mendelssohn ed.) at Perseus Digital Library.
- Appian at Livius.org
- Appian's Civil Wars at LacusCurtius
- Works by or about Appian at Internet Archive
- Works by Appian at LibriVox (public domain audiobooks)
- Review of Paul Goukowsky and Phillippe Torrens, eds., Appien: Histoire romaine. Tome X, livre XV: Guerres civiles, livre III in: Bryn Mawr Classical Review.