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Project

Of Monsters and Men. The Reception of Suetonius Lives of the Twelve Caesars in the Renaissance.

As monsters rather than men: that is how the Latin historian Gaius Suetonius Tranquillus portrayed the first Roman emperors. Not surprisingly, then, his Lives of the Twelve Caesars (a fascinating potpourri of fact, rumor and scandal, dixit Stadter 2007) have amused, shocked and intrigued readers from Late Antiquity onwards. Although in the Early Modern period, when the rise of absolute monarchs made his Lives increasingly relevant to the readers own times, Suetonius work became even more popular than it had been in the Middle Ages, its fortuna in the Renaissance is largely unexplored. By studying Suetonius biographies from Caesar to Domitian (which do not only paint a unique picture of the looks and character of the Roman emperors, but also provide invaluable inside information on life at the imperial court) both as literary models, antiquarian-historical sources, mirrors-for-princes and vehicles for political propaganda, the envisaged research project will explore the different ways in which Suetonius was read and used between 1400 and 1700.
Date:1 Oct 2014 →  8 Mar 2022
Keywords:Suetonius Lives, Twelve Caesars, Renaissance., Reception, Of Monsters and Men
Disciplines:Linguistics, Theory and methodology of linguistics, Other languages and literary studies