Sextus Aurelius Victor was an imperial bureaucrat whose life spanned most of the fourth century AD. Harry Bird describes how Victor, a man of humble African origin, acquired by virtue of his education and personal qualities a consular governorship in Pannonia and the urban prefecture at Rome. Victor's short historical monograph, the De Caesaribus , reveals his attitudes towards education, culture, history and politics - attitudes which probably reflect those of a considerable segment of fourth-century society. We can therefore glimpse how the emperors, the senate, the army and the bureaucracy were perceived, how the changing role of Rome was regarded by many in the West, what was thought of certain provinces and their inhabitants and what was considered to be the raison d'être of the writing of history. All these, together with other minor topics, are explored in Harry Bird's thorough investigation into Victor's life and work. This book will interest students of late Latin literature and thought and those involved in late imperial and early medieval history. It should also appeal to scholars engaged in the study of the Historia Augusta, whether they agree with its findings or not.

A radical rewriting of the history of fourth-century Latin literature This book rediscovers a lost history of the Roman Empire, written by Sextus Aurelius Victor (ca. 320-390) and demonstrates for the first time both the contemporary and lasting influence of his historical work. Though little regarded today, Victor is the best-attested historian of the later Roman Empire, read by Jerome and Ammianus, honoured with a statue by the pagan Emperor Julian and appointed to a prestigious prefecture by the Christian Theodosius. Through careful analysis of the ancient evidence, including newly discovered material, this book re-examines the two short imperial histories attributed to Victor in the manuscripts, known today as the Caesares and the Epitome de Caesaribus, and discusses a wide range of both canonical and neglected authors and texts, from Sallust and Tacitus to Eunapius and the Historia Augusta. By providing a new account of the original scope and scale of Victor’s Historia, this book revolutionises our understanding of the writing of history in late antiquity. Not only does it have profound implications for the transmission of Classical texts in the Middle Ages and the history of Classical scholarship, but it also solves some of the enduring mysteries of later Latin literature.

Edinburgh Studies in Later Latin Literature offers a forum for new scholarship on important and sometimes neglected works.