Episode 59. Augustus, Part Three: The Succession Unmade cover art

Episode 59. Augustus, Part Three: The Succession Unmade

Episode 59. Augustus, Part Three: The Succession Unmade

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Works CitedPrimary Sources
  • Cassius Dio. Roman History, Books 54–55. The narrative backbone for this episode. Dio covers Agrippa's death in the closing sections of Book 54, and the main subsequent events in Book 55. He is working two centuries after the events from sources he does not name.
  • Cenotaphia Pisana (CIL XI 1420–1421). The inscribed decrees from the town of Pisa voting public mourning for Lucius in 2 CE and for Gaius in 4 CE. Primary epigraphic evidence for how the deaths were received in provincial Italy.
  • Macrobius. Saturnalia, Book 2. Preserving earlier collected anecdotes of Julia's wit. The late date (early fifth century CE) counsels caution, but the material has the texture of authentic first-century traditions.
  • P. Colon. inv. 4701. The papyrus fragment of Augustus's funeral oration for Agrippa, preserved from Egypt and now held in the University of Cologne. One of the few documents in the Augustan corpus allowing us to hear the emperor in his own words.
  • Pliny the Elder. Natural History, 7.149. Catalogues the private disasters that marred Augustus's public fortune, including Julia's conduct and the deaths of Gaius and Lucius.
  • Res Gestae Divi Augusti, section 14. Augustus's own brief account of the adoption of Gaius and Lucius and the offices he arranged for them, written after both were dead.
  • Seneca the Younger. De Beneficiis, 6.32. The fullest ancient meditation on the Julia case and what it revealed about the nature of imperial power exercised within the family.
  • Suetonius. Life of Augustus, chapters 63–65. On Julia, the marriages, and the crisis of 2 BCE. The detail that Augustus wept composing the letter to the Senate and refused visitors for days afterward is chapter 65.
  • Suetonius. Life of Tiberius, chapters 7–15. The central character source for Tiberius in this period. The Vipsania-in-the-street passage is chapter 7. The Rhodes withdrawal and the years on the island are chapters 10–13.
  • Tacitus. Annals, Book 1. Retrospective from the Tiberian reign, essential for political analysis but coloured by what Tiberius became as emperor.
  • Velleius Paterculus. Roman History, Book 2, chapters 96–102. The most important contemporary witness. Velleius served under Tiberius in Germany and under Gaius Caesar in Armenia. He is an eyewitness for the Artagira incident in 3 CE.
Secondary Sources
  • Barrett, Anthony. Livia: First Lady of Imperial Rome. Yale University Press, 2002. Essential for the domestic politics and the role Livia played in the Tiberius negotiations.
  • Fantham, Elaine. Julia Augusti: The Emperor's Daughter. Routledge, 2006. The fullest modern treatment of Julia, invaluable for reading against the hostile ancient tradition.
  • Goldsworthy, Adrian. Augustus: First Emperor of Rome. Weidenfeld and Nicolson, 2014. The best general biography, with a good narrative of the 2 BCE crisis.
  • Levick, Barbara. Tiberius the Politician. Revised edition, Routledge, 1999. The standard modern treatment, with a careful reconstruction of the Rhodes period and the reasons for the withdrawal.
  • Syme, Ronald. The Augustan Aristocracy. Oxford University Press, 1986. Essential for the prosopographical reconstruction of the senatorial class and the Julia conspiracy reading.
  • Syme, Ronald. The Roman Revolution. Oxford University Press, 1939. Foundational on the dynastic politics and the political interpretation of the 2 BCE crisis.


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