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Tacitus 115 CE
| Tetrarchy of Church Forgeries | Web Publication by Mountain Man Graphics, Australia
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Tacitus 115 CE
| Tetrarchy of Church Forgeries | Web Publication by Mountain Man Graphics, Australia
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~ Sherlock Holmes
 111 CE Pliny "Letter" 111 CE Trajan "Letter" 115 CE Tacitus "Annals" 122 CE Suetonius "Lives"
| Tetrarchy of Church ForgeriesThe term "tetrarchy" (from the Greek τετραρχία "leadership of four [people]") describes any form of government where power is divided among four individuals. The earliest and most prestigious references to the persecution of "Early Christians" by Roman Emperors are divided among the manuscripts attributed to these four individual authors. This tetrarchy of authors binds together strongly, supporting each other in their testimony of Christian persecution in the rule of the Roman Emperor Nero. Collectively this "leadership of four" sources represents a tetrarchy of government directly related to authenticity of historical events in Rome in the later 1st century of the common era. One of the core principles for determining reliability using the historical method is that "If a number of independent sources contain the same message, the credibility of the message is strongly increased". As a result the references to the Christians in this tetrarchy of Roman writers are generally accepted as authentic. With only a few exceptions, the consensus of opinion among modern historians is that the persecution of Christians under Nero is an actual historical event. This may be stated in another form: the hypothesis that Nero persecuted the Christians is generally accepted as being true.However in this article, the exceptions to this consensus are gathered, and the counter-arguments to authenticity are outlined in their basic form. Another of the core principles for determining reliability using the historical method is that "Any given source may be forged or corrupted. Strong indications of the originality of the source increase its reliability." Many of the academics who have argued against the authenticity of some or all of these references have done so on the basis that they suspect them of being forged, or corrupted in some manner. Many of the manuscripts containing these references were "suddenly and unexpectedly discovered" in the manuscript archives of the church, which will here not be treated as a "Divine Institute" but rather as a "Church Organisation" or "Church [Belief] Industry", and associated with political, financial and business agendas. The manuscripts of four individual Roman authors - Pliny, Trajan, Tacitus and Suetonius - have certainly not been "miraculously and immaculately transmitted from antiquity. It needs to be stated quite clearly that history has demonstrated that the church organisation slash industries (and their CEO's) have perpetuated themselves (business as usual) from antiquity by means of .... atrocities, exiles, tortures, executions, inquisitions, book burning and prohibition of books, censorship, and (one of the most vital instruments of deceit) literary forgery. Accordingly it needs to be stressed that the organisation that was responsible for the "miraculous and immaculate transmission of these manuscripts from antiquity was itself utterly corrupt, at least from the 4th century when it became a political instrument of the Roman Emperor Constantine. It will be argued that this literary evidence currently attributed to this tetrarchy of Roman authors was probably forged by the church organisation during the Middle Ages, and that, as a result, the hypothesis that Nero persecuted the Christians is probably false. |
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115 - Tacitus, "Annals" 15:44
122 - Suetonius, "Lives", Nero, 16:
192 - Tertullian, "Apology" 5:
324 - Eusebius of Caesarea, "Historia Ecclesiastica" 2.25
325 - Lactantius, "On the Manner in which the Persecutors Died"", Chapter 2
4th - Seneca to Paul, Letter 12: "Dear Paul, How goeth the church industry? Your good buddy, Seneca"
403 - Sulpicius Severus, "Chronicle" 2.29.1-4a: "phrases and even sentences from many classical authors are interwoven here and there"
??? - Jerome, Orosius, Sidonius Apollinaris, and Cassiodorus.
Middle Age Sources____________________________________
1071 - Oldest manuscript (Annals 15:44) dated palaeographically: Second Medicean manuscript, Benedictine abbey, Monte Cassino, using the Beneventan script
1513 - John de Medici (Pope Leo X) increases the price of rewards to persons who procured new MS. copies of ancient Greek and Roman works
1514 - Angelo Arcomboldi, Pope Leo X's "Thesaurum Quaestor Pontificius" ("steward", "receiver", or "collector") discovers the manuscripts of Annals 1-6
1515 - Publication of Annals 1-6 by Beroaldus in Rome
1559 - Index Librorum Prohibitorum
16th - Last known exemplars authored using the Beneventan script
Modern Sources____________________________________
1878 - John Wilson Ross, "Tacitus and Bracciolini: The Annals Forged in the 15th Century" (Ross disputes the Annals in its entirety but accepts the History)
1885 - Polydore Hochart "Études au sujet de la persécution des Chrétiens sous Néron"
1890 - Polydore Hochart "De l'authenticité des Annales et des Histoires de Tacite" (Hochart questions both the Annals and the History)
1902 - Georg Andresen commented on the "Chrestians"
1910 - W.B. Smith's "The Silence of Josephus and Tacitus", largely duplicated in "Ecce Deus"
1912 - Arthur Drews, "The Witnesses to the Historicity of Jesus" summarising Hochart: middle age forgery
1913 - W.B. Smith's "Ecce Deus" (Smith questions only the genuineness of the passage in the Annals about "Christus" and "Christians")
1947 - Arnaldo Momigliano, "The First Political Commentary on Tacitus"
2014 - Richard Carrier "The Prospect of a Christian Interpolation in Tacitus, Annals 15.44"
Links - Further references
Consequently, to get rid of the report, Nero fastened the guilt and inflicted the most exquisite tortures on a class hated for their abominations, called Christians by the populace. Christus, from whom the name had its origin, suffered the extreme penalty during the reign of Tiberius at the hands of one of our procurators, Pontius Pilatus, and a most mischievous superstition, thus checked for the moment, again broke out not only in Judaea, the first source of the evil, but even in Rome, where all things hideous and shameful from every part of the world find their centre and become popular. Accordingly, an arrest was first made of all who pleaded guilty; then, upon their information, an immense multitude was convicted, not so much of the crime of firing the city, as of hatred against mankind.
Mockery of every sort was added to their deaths. Covered with the skins of beasts, they were torn by dogs and perished, or were nailed to crosses, or were doomed to the flames and burnt, to serve as a nightly illumination, when daylight had expired. Nero offered his gardens for the spectacle, and was exhibiting a show in the circus, while he mingled with the people in the dress of a charioteer or stood aloft on a car. Hence, even for criminals who deserved extreme and exemplary punishment, there arose a feeling of compassion; for it was not, as it seemed, for the public good, but to glut one man's cruelty, that they were being destroyed.". See the details of the oldest Tacitus manuscript (11th century) which when subject to ultra-violet examination an alteration was conclusively shown to have been made, from "Chrestians" to "Christians".
Consult your own records : there you will find that Nero was the first to furiously attack with the imperial sword this sect then rising into notice especially at Rome 13. But in such an originator of our condemnation we |18 indeed glory. For whoever knows him can understand that nothing but what was sublimely good was condemned by Nero. Domitian also, somewhat of a Nero in cruelty, attempted the same, but inasmuch as he had some human feelings, he soon stopped the proceedings, and those whom he had banished were recalled 14. Such have ever been our persecutors,— the unjust, the impious, the base, whom you yourselves have been accustomed to condemn, and to restore those condemned by them.
The Roman Tertullian is likewise a witness of this. He writes [Tertullian, Apol. V.] as follows:
And while Nero reigned, the Apostle Peter came to Rome, and, through the power of God committed unto him, wrought certain miracles, and, by turning many to the true religion, built up a faithful and stedfast temple unto the Lord. When Nero heard of those things, and observed that not only in Rome, but in every other place, a great multitude revolted daily from the worship of idols, and, condemning their old ways, went over to the new religion, he, an execrable and pernicious tyrant, sprung forward to raze the heavenly temple and destroy the true faith. He it was who first persecuted the servants of God; he crucified Peter, and slew Paul: nor did he escape with impunity; for God looked on the affliction of His people; and therefore the tyrant, bereaved of authority, and precipitated from the height of empire, suddenly disappeared, and even the burial-place of that noxious wild beast was nowhere to be seen. This has led some persons of extravagant imagination to suppose that, having been conveyed to a distant region, he is still reserved alive; and to him they apply the Sibylline verses concerning The fugitive, who slew his own mother, being to come from the uttermostboundaries of the earth; as if he who was the first should also be the last persecutor, and thus prove the forerunner of Antichrist! But we ought not to believe those who, affirming that the two prophets Enoch and Elias have been translated into some remote place that they might attend our Lord when He shall come to judgment, also fancy that Nero is to appear hereafter as the forerunner of the devil, when he shall come to lay waste the earth and overthrow mankind.
Christians and Jews are commonly executed as contrivers of the fire. Whoever the criminal is whose pleasure is that of a butcher, and who veils himself with a lie, he is reserved for his due season: and as the best of men is sacrificed, the one for the many, so he, vowed to death for all, will be burned with fire. A hundred and thirty-two houses and four blocks have been burnt in six days, the seventh brought a pause. I pray you may be well, brother. Given the 5th of the kalends of April; Frugi and Bassus consuls (64).
It is mostly associated with Italy south of Rome, but it was also used in Beneventan-influenced centres across the Adriatic Sea in Dalmatia. The script was used from approximately the mid-8th century until the 13th century, although there are examples from as late as the 16th century.
There were two major centres of Beneventan usage: the monastery on Monte Cassino, and Bari. The Bari type developed in the 10th century from the Monte Cassino type; both were based on Roman cursive as written by the Langobards. In general the script is very angular. According to Lowe, the perfected form of the script was used in the 11th century, while Desiderius was abbot of Monte Cassino, declining thereafter.
John Wilson Ross, "Tacitus and Bracciolini: The Annals Forged in the 15th Century"
John de Medici, that magnificent Pope, had been scarcely elected to the Pontifical chair by the title of Leo X. in the spring of 1513, when he caused it to be publicly made known that he would increase the price of rewards given by his predecessors to persons who procured new MS. copies of ancient Greek and Roman works. More than a year, nearly two years elapsed; then his own "Thesaurum Quaestor Pontificius"--"steward," "receiver," or "collector",-- Angelo Arcomboldi, brought to him a new MS. of the works of Tacitus, with a most startling novelty--THE FIRST SIX (or, as then divided, FIVE) BOOKS OF THE ANNALS! Everybody was amazed; and everybody was extremely anxious to know where and how it had been obtained. The story of Arcomboldi was that he had found the stranger among the treasures on the well-stored shelves in the Library of the Benedictine monastery on the banks of the Weser, at Corvey, in Westphalia, long famed for the high culture of its learned inmates. The MS. was given out as being of great antiquity, traceable to, at the very least, the commencement of the ninth century; for it was said to have belonged to one of the most distinguished and accomplished scholars of the abbey, Anschaire, whom Gregory IV. in the year 835 appointed his Legate Apostolic in Denmark and Sweden, and who Christianized the whole northern parts of Europe.
Poggio Bracciolini "served under four successive popes (1404–1415); first as scriptor (writer of official documents), soon moving up to abbreviator, then scriptor penitentiarius, and scriptor apostolicus. Under Martin V he reached the top rank of his office, as Apostolicus Secretarius, papal secretary. As such, he functioned as a personal attendant (amanuensis) of the Pope, writing letters at his behest and dictation, with no formal registration of the briefs, but merely 'preserving' copies."
BOOK ONE - TACITUS
CHAPTER I - TACITUS COULD BARELY HAVE WRITTEN THE ANNALS.
1. From the chronological point of view.
2. The silence preserved about that work by all writers
till the fifteenth century.
3. The age of the MSS. containing the Annals.
CHAPTER II - A FEW REASONS FOR BELIEVING THE ANNALS TO BE A FORGERY.
1. The fifteenth century an age of imposture, shown in the
invention of printing.
2. The curious discovery of the first six books of the Annals.
3. The blunders it has in common with all forged documents.
4. The Twelve Tables.
5. The Speech of Claudius in the Eleventh Book of the Annals.
6. Brutus creating the second class of nobility.
7. Camillus and his grandson.
8. The Marching of Germanicus.
9. Description of London in the time of Nero.
10. Labeo Antistius and Capito Ateius; the number of people executed
for their attachment to Sejanus; and the marriage of Drusus, the
brother of Tiberius, to the Elder Antonia.
CHAPTER III - SUSPICIOUS CHARACTER OF THE ANNALS FROM THE POINT OF TREATMENT.
1. Nature of the history.
2. Arrangement of the narrative.
3. Completeness in form.
4. Incongruities, contradictions and disagreements from the
History of Tacitus.
5. Craftiness of the writer.
6. Subordination of history to biography.
7. The author of the Annals and Tacitus differently illustrate
Roman history.
8. Characters and events corresponding to characters and
events in the XVth century.
9. Greatness of the Author of the Annals.
CHAPTER IV - HOW THE ANNALS DIFFERS FROM THE HISTORY.
1. In the qualities of the writers; and why that difference.
2. In the narrative, and in what respect.
3. In style and language.
4. The reputation Tacitus has of writing bad Latin due to the
mistakes of his imitator.
CHAPTER V - THE LATIN AND THE ALLITERATIONS IN THE ANNALS.
1. Errors in Latin, (_a_) on the part of the transcriber;
(_b_) on the part of the writer.
2. Diction and Alliterations: Wherein they differ from those
of Tacitus.
BOOK TWO - BRACCIOLINI.
CHAPTER I - BRACCIOLINI IN ROME.
1. His genius and the greatness of his age.
2. His qualifications.
3. His early career.
4. The character of Niccolo Niccoli, who abetted him in the
forgery
5. Bracciolini's descriptive writing of the Burning of Jerome
of Prague compared with the descriptive writing of the
sham sea fight in the Twelfth Book of the Annals.
CHAPTER II - BRACCIOLINI IN LONDON.
1. Gaining insight into the darkest passions from associating
with Cardinal Beaufort.
2. His passage about London in the Fourteenth Book of the
Annals examined.
3. About the Parliament of England in the Fourth Book.
CHAPTER III - BRACCIOLINI SETTING ABOUT THE FORGERY OF THE ANNALS
1. The Proposal made in February, 1422, by a Florentine, named
Lamberteschi, and backed by Niccoli.
2. Correspondence on the matter, and Mr. Shepherd's view that
it referred to a Professorship refuted.
3. Professional disappointments in England determine
Bracciolini to persevere in his intention of forging
the Annals.
4. He returns to the Papal Secretaryship, and begins the
forgery in Rome in October, 1423.
CHAPTER IV - BRACCIOLINI AS A BOOKFINDER
1. Doubts on the authenticity of the Latin, but not the
Greek Classics.
2. At the revival of letters Popes and Princes offered large
rewards for the recovery of the ancient classics.
3. The labours of Bracciolini as a bookfinder.
4. Belief put about by the professional bookfinders that
MSS. were soonest found in obscure convents in barbarous
lands.
5. How this reasoning throws the door open to fraud and
forgery.
6. The bands of bookfinders consisted of men of genius in
every department of literature and science.
7. Bracciolini endeavours to escape from forging the Annals by
forging the whole lost History of Livy.
8. His Letter on the subject to Niccoli quoted, and examined.
9. Failure of his attempt, and he proceeds with the forgery of
the Annals.
BOOK THREE - THE LAST SIX BOOKS OF THE ANNALS.
CHAPTER I - THE CHARACTER OF BRACCIOLINI.
1. The audacity of the forgery accounted for by the mean
opinion Bracciolini had of the intelligence of men.
2. The character and tone of the last Six Books of the Annals
exemplified by what is said of Sabina Poppaea, Sagitta,
Pontia and Messalina.
3. A few errors that must have proceeded from Bracciolini
about the Colophonian Oracle of Apollo Clarius, the
Household Gods of the Germans, Gotarzes, Bardanes and,
above all, Nineveh.
4. The estimate taken of human nature by the writer of the
Annals the same as that taken by Bracciolini.
5. The general depravity of mankind as shown in the
Annals insisted upon in Bracciolini's Dialogue
"De Infelicitate Principum".
CHAPTER II - THE FIFTEENTH CENTURY.
1. The intellect and depravity of the age.
2. Bracciolini as its exponent.
3. Hunter's accurate description of him.
4. Bracciolini gave way to the impulses of his age.
5. The Claudius, Nero and Tiberius of the Annals
personifications of the Church of Rome in the
fifteenth century.
6. Schildius and his doubts.
7. Bracciolini not covetous of martyrdom: communicates his
fears to Niccoli.
8. The princes and great men in the Annals the princes and
great men of the XVth century, not of the opening period
of the Christian aera.
9. Bracciolini, and not Tacitus, a disparager of persons in
high places.
CHAPTER III - FURTHER PROOFS OF FORGERY.
1. "Octavianus" as the name of Augustus Caesar.
2. Cumanus and Felix as joint governors of Judaea.
3. The blood relationship of Italians and Romans.
4. Fatal error in the _oratio obliqua_.
5. Mistake made about "locus".
6. Objections of some critics to the language of Tacitus
examined.
7. Some improprieties that occur in the Annals found also in
Bracciolini's works.
8. Instanced in (_a_) "nec--aut".
(_b_) rhyming and the peculiar use of "pariter".
9. The harmony of Tacitus and the ruggedness of Bracciolini
illustrated.
10. Other peculiarities of Bracciolini's not shared by Tacitus:
Two words terminating alike following two others with like
terminations; prefixes that have no meaning; and playing
on a single letter for alliterative purposes.
CHAPTER IV - THE TERMINATION OF THE FORGERY.
1. The literary merit and avaricious humour of Bracciolini.
2. He is aided in his scheme by a monk of the Abbey of Fulda.
3. Expressions indicating forgery.
4. Efforts to obtain a very old copy of Tacitus.
5. The forgery transcribed in the Abbey of Fulda.
6. First saw the light in the spring of 1429.
CHAPTER V - THE FORGED MANUSCRIPT.
1. Recapitulation, showing the certainty of forgery.
2. The Second Florence MS. the forged MS.
3. Cosmo de' Medici the man imposed upon.
4. Digressions about Cosmo de' Medici's position, and fondness
for books, especially Tacitus.
5. The many suspicious marks of forgery about the Second
Florence MS.; the Lombard characters; the attestation
of Salustius.
6. The headings, and Tacitus being bound up with Apuleius,
seem to connect Bracciolini with the forged MS.
7. The first authentic mention of the Annals.
8. Nothing invalidates the theory in this book.
9. Brief recapitulation of the whole argument.
BOOK FOUR - THE FIRST SIX BOOKS OF THE ANNALS.
CHAPTER I - REASONS FOR BELIEVING THAT BRACCIOLINI
WROTE BOTH PARTS OF THE ANNALS.
1. Improvement in Bracciolini's means after the completion
of the forgery of the last part of the Annals.
2. Discovery of the first six books, and theory about their
forgery.
3. Internal evidence the only proof of their being forged.
4. Superiority of workmanship a strong proof.
5. Further departure than in the last six books from Tacitus's
method another proof.
6. The symmetry of the framework a third proof.
7. Fourth evidence, the close resemblance in the openings of
the two parts.
8. The same tone and colouring prove the same authorship.
9. False statements made about Sejanus and Antonius Natalis
for the purpose of blackening Tiberius and Nero.
10. This spirit of detraction runs through Bracciolini's works.
11. Other resemblances denoting the same author.
12. Policy given to every subject another cause to believe both
parts composed by a single writer.
13. An absence of the power to depict differences in persons
and things.
CHAPTER II - LANGUAGE, ALLITERATION, ACCENT AND WORDS.
1. The poetic diction of Tacitus, and its fabrication in
the Annals.
2. Florid passages in the Annals.
3. Metrical composition of Bracciolini.
4. Figurative words: (_a_) "pessum dare"
(_b_) "voluntas"
5. The verb "foedare" and the Ciceronian use of "foedus".
6. The language of other Roman writers,--Livy, Quintus Curtius
and Sallust.
7. The phrase "non modo--sed", and other anomalous expressions,
not Tacitus's.
8. Words not used by Tacitus, "distinctus" and "codicillus"
9. Peculiar alliterations in the Annals and works of
Bracciolini.
10. Monotonous repetition of accent on penultimate syllables.
11. Peculiar use of words: (_a_) "properus"
(_b_) "annales" and "scriptura"
(_c_) "totiens"
12. Words not used by Tacitus: (_a_) "addubitare"
(_b_) "extitere"
13. Polysyllabic words ending consecutive sentences.
14. Omissions of prepositions: (_a_) in.
(_b_) with names of nations.
CHAPTER III - MISTAKES THAT PROVE FORGERY
1. The gift for the recovery of Livia.
2. Julius Caesar and the Pomoerium.
3. Julia, the wife of Tiberius.
4. The statement about her proved false by a coin.
5. Value of coins in detecting historical errors.
6. Another coin shows an error about Cornatus.
7. Suspicion of spuriousness from mention of the
Quinquennale Ludicrum.
8. Account of cities destroyed by earthquake contradicted by
a monument.
9. Bracciolini's hand shown by reference to the Plague.
10. Fawning of Roman senators more like conduct of Italians in
the fifteenth century.
11. Same exaggeration with respect to Pomponia Graecina.
12. Wrong statement of the images borne at the funeral
of Drusus.
13. Similar kind of error committed by Bracciolini in his
"Varietate Fortunae".
14. Errors about the Red Sea.
15. About the Caspian Sea.
16. Accounted for.
17. A passage clearly written by Bracciolini.
CHAPTER THE LAST - FURTHER PROOFS OF BRACCIOLINI BEING THE AUTHOR
OF THE FIRST SIX BOOKS OF THE ANNALS.
1. The descriptive powers of Bracciolini and Tacitus.
2. The different mode of writing of both.
3. Their different manners of digressing.
4. Two statements in the Fourth Book of the Annals that could
not have been made by Tacitus.
5. The spirit of the Renaissance shown in both parts of the
Annals.
6. That both parts proceeded from the same hand shown in the
writer pretending to know the feelings of the characters
in the narrative.
7. The contradictions in the two parts of the Annals and in
the works of Bracciolini.
8. The Second Florence MS. a forgery.
9. Conclusion.
No one has more decisively attacked the belief in the persecution of the Christians than Hochart, and it is therefore advisable to give a summary here of the critic's arguments. In the first place, he regards it as wholly improbable that the charge against Nero, of setting fire to the city himself, was made at all. The whole conduct of the emperor during and after the fire, as it is described by Tacitus, could not possibly have led to such a feeling among the people. Even Suetonius, who is so bent on throwing the blame of the fire on Nero, knows nothing of such a rumour, and, according to the account of Tacitus, the emperor suffered no loss of popularity with the people. Then the aristocrats, who were in conspiracy against him, did not venture to take any step against him, and the people were very far from disposed to take the part of the conspirators when they were tried. Hence the persecution of the Christians has no adequate motive, and cannot in any case have been due to the cause alleged in Tacitus. In this Schiller agrees with Hochart. In agreement also with Adolph Stahr, he regards the rumour that Nero was the author of the fire as utterly incredible. If any rumour of the kind arose, it -would, he believes, have been confined to the members of the aristocratic party, with whom Tacitus was in sympathy, and would not be found among the people, who considered him innocent. 1 There was, therefore, according to Schiller, with whom even Arnold agrees on this point,2 no reason why Nero should accuse the Christians of causing the fire. 3 In any case there can be no question of a Neronian " persecution of the Christians," even if Tacitus has discovered a statement handed down that, on the occasion of the fire, a number of Jewish sectaries, possibly including some Christians, were put to death on the charge of causing it.
The expression " Christians," which Tacitus applies to the followers of Jesus, was by no means common in the time of Nero. Not a single Greek or Roman writer of the first century mentions the name : neither Juvenal nor Persius, Lucian or Martial, the older Pliny or Seneca. Even Dio Cassius never uses it, and his abbreviator, the monk Xiphilinus, sees no reason to break his silence, but speaks of the Christians who were persecuted under Domitian as followers of the Jewish religion. 5 The Christians, who called themselves Jessreans, or Nazoraeans, the Elect, the Saints, the Faithful, etc., were universally regarded as Jews. They observed the Mosaic law, and the people could not distinguish them from the other Jews. That Tacitus applied the name, common in his time, to the Jewish sectaries under Nero, as Voltaire and Gibbon believe, is very improbable. The Greek word Christus (" the anointed ") for Messiah, and the derivative word Christian, first came into use under Trajan, in the time of Tacitus. Even then, however, the word Christus could not mean Jesus of Nazareth. All the Jews without exception looked forward to a Christus or Messiah, and believed that his coming was near at hand. It is, therefore, not clear how the fact of being a "Christian" could, in the time of Nero or of Tacitus, distinguish the followers of Jesus from other believers in a Christus or Messiah. This could only be at a time when the memory was lost of the many other persons who had claimed the dignity of Messiah, and the belief in the Messiah had become a belief in Jesus, not as one, but the Messiah, and Christ and Jesus had become equivalent terms. Not one of the evangelists applies the name Christians to the followers of Jesus. It is never used in the New Testament as a description of themselves by the believers in Jesus, and the relevant passage in Acts (xi, 26), according to which the name was first used at Antioch, has the appearance of a later interpolation, belonging to a time when the term had become a name of honour in the eyes of some and a name of reproach in the eyes of others.
With this is also connected the peculiar way in which Tacitus speaks of the execution of Christ under the procurator Pontius Pilate. He does not know the name Jesus which, we may note incidentally, would be impossible if he had had before his eyes the acta of the trial or the protocols of the Senate takes Christ to be a personal name, and speaks of Pilate as a person known to the reader, not as an historian would who seeks to inform his readers, but as a Christian to Christians, to whom the circumstances of the death of Christ were familiar. The Jews at Rome had gone there voluntarily in order to make their fortune in the metropolis of the empire, and on the whole they prospered. They may have been held of little account, or even despised, but no more so than the other oriental foreigners who endeavoured to make money at Rome by fortune-telling, domestic service, or trade. In any case there is so little question of a general "hatred" of the people for them that the Jewish historians, especially Josephus, do not make much complaint of the treatment accorded to their countrymen at Rome.2 It is incredible that the Jessaeans or Nazoraeans amongst them, who must in any case have been few in number at the time of the fire, were the object of an especial hatred, and so would be likely to bear the blame of the fire in the eyes of the people.
Death by fire was not a form of punishment inflicted at Rome in the time of Nero. It is opposed to the moderate principles on which the accused were then dealt with by the State. The use of the Christians as " living torches," as Tacitus describes, and all the other atrocities that were committed against them, have little title to credence, and suggest an imagination exalted by reading stories of the later Christian martyrs. The often quoted statements of Juvenal and Seneca have no bearing on this ; they are not connected with the Christians, and need not in the least be regarded as references to the members of the new sect sacrificed by Nero. The victims cannot possibly have been given to the flames in the gardens of Nero, as Tacitus says. According to his own account, these gardens were the refuge of those whose homes had been burned, and were full of tents and wooden sheds. It is hardly probable that Nero would incur the risk of a second fire by his "living torches," and still less probable that he mingled with the crowd and feasted his eyes on the ghastly spectacle. Tacitus tells us in his life of Agricola that Nero had crimes committed, but kept his own eyes off them. The gardens of Nero (on the present Vatican) seem to have been chosen as the theatre of the deed merely to strengthen the legend that the holy of holies of Christianity, the Church of St. Peter, was built on the spot on which the first Christian martyrs had shed their blood.
Finally, there is the complete silence of profane writers and the vagueness of the Christian writers on the matter ; the latter only gradually come to make a definite statement of a general persecution of the Christians under Nero, whereas at first they make Nero put to death only Peter and Paul. The first unequivocal mention of the Neronian persecution in connection with the burning of Rome is found in the forged correspondence of Seneca and the apostle Paul, which belongs to the fourth century. A fuller account is then given in the Chronicle of Sulpicius Severus (died 403 A.D.), but it is mixed with the most transparent Christian legends, such as the story of the death of Simon Magus, the bishopric and sojourn of Peter at Eome, etc. The expressions of Sulpicius agree, in part, almost word for word with those of Tacitus. It is, however, very doubtful, in view of the silence of the other Christian authors who used Tacitus, if the manuscript of Tacitus which Sulpicius used contained the passage in question. We are therefore strongly disposed to suspect that the passage (Annals, xv, 44) was transferred from Sulpicius to the text of Tacitus by the hand of a monastic copyist or forger, for the greater glory of God and in order to strengthen the truth of the Christian tradition by a pagan witness.
In 1902 Georg Andresen commented on the appearance of the first 'i' and subsequent gap in the earliest extant, 11th century, copy of the Annals in Florence, suggesting that the text had been altered, and an 'e' had originally been in the text, rather than this 'i'.[17] "With ultra-violet examination of the MS the alteration was conclusively shown. It is impossible today to say who altered the letter e into an i. In Suetonius’ Nero 16.2, "christiani", however, seems to be the original reading".[18] Since the alteration became known it has given rise to debates among scholars as to whether Tacitus deliberately used the term "Chrestians", or if a scribe made an error during the Middle Ages.
We have no choice then. Coerced by this consilience of results, we must regard the passage as probably interpolated, unless there be some strong antecedent reason in favor of genuineness and against interpolation.
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Modern Source
Polydore Hochart "Études au sujet de la persécution des Chrétiens sous Néron"
Summary by Arthur Drews in "The Witnesses to the Historicity of Jesus" re: the Criticisms of Hochart.
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Modern Source
Polydore Hochart "De l'authenticité des Annales et des Histoires de Tacite" (Hochart questions both the Annals and the History)
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Modern Source
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Modern Source
THE SILENCE OF JOSEPHUS AND TACITUS
Author(s): William Benjamin Smith
Source: The Monist, Vol. 20, No. 4 (OCTOBER, 1910), pp. 515-550
Published by: Hegeler Institute
Stable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/27900278
By three entirely independent lines of inquiry we are led to precisely the same result. Look at it as you will, the chapter wears the appearance of being interpolated. Indeed, it must be, not unless one of these signs fail, but unless they all fail, unless all are simultaneously and in the same sense misleading. Even if the doubt raised by each one of these separate inquiries were not very strong, even if it still left the chances two to one in favor of the genuineness, yet the chance that all three would thus simultaneously deceive would be only eight in twenty-seven, the chances would be nineteen to eight in favor of interpolation.
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Modern Source
Arthur Drews in "The Witnesses to the Historicity of Jesus" summarising Hochart's position
:
But how could the legend arise that Nero was the first to persecute the Christians? It arose, says Hochart, under a threefold influence. The first is the apocalyptic idea, which saw in Nero the Antichrist, the embodiment of all evil, the terrible adversary of the Messiah and his followers. As such he was bound, by a kind of natural enmity, to have been the first to persecute the Christians; as Sulpicius puts it, “because vice is always the enemy of the good.”[68] The second is the political interest of the Christians in representing themselves as Nero's victims, in order to win the favour and protection of his successors on that account. The third is the special interest of the Roman Church in the death of the two chief apostles, Peter and Paul, at Rome. Then the author of the letters of Seneca to Paul enlarged the legend in its primitive form, brought it into agreement with the ideas of this time, and gave it a political turn. The vague charges of incendiarism assumed a more definite form, and were associated with the character of Antichrist, which the Church was accustomed to ascribe to Nero on account of his supposed diabolical cruelty. He was accused of inflicting horrible martyrdoms on the Christians, and thus the legend in its latest form reached the Chronicle of Sulpicius. Finally a clever forger (Poggio?) smuggled the dramatic account of this persecution into the Annals of Tacitus, and thus secured the acceptance as historical fact of a purely imaginary story.
We need not recognise all Hochart's arguments as equally sound, yet we must admit that in their entirety and agreement they are worthy of consideration, and are well calculated to disturb the ingenuous belief in the authenticity of the passage of Tacitus.
But even Tertullian reveals no notion of such a Neronian persecution as we read of in Tacitus. Yet he was acquainted with this historian, whose Histories he cites at length, on whose name he puns, whom he cordially hates for defaming the Jews. Had he read of Nero's burning the Christians alive, would he have used such vague and commonplace imagery as "raged with Caesarean sword" and "through Nero's cruelty they sowed Christian blood"? Remember that Tertullian was a rhetorician to his fingertips. Would he have neglected such an exceptional opportunity for the display of his thrice-favourite art? It seems needless to discuss still later testimony, as that of Lactantius (De mort, persec, 2), of Origen (Eus., H. E,, ni, i), of Eusebius {H. E., H, 25), and of Jerome.
These late writers have at last learned, after two centuries or more of ignorance, that Peter and Paul fell victims to Neronian fury ; but they still have no idea that Nero falsely accused the Christians of setting the city on fire, nor do they hint that a "vast multitude" lit up the Roman night with the flames of their burning bodies. Not until the fourth century, in Ep. 12 of the forged correspondence of Paul and Seneca, do we read that " Christians and Jews, as if contrivers of (a) conflagration, when put to death are wont to be burned." But even here the allusion, if there be any, to the Neronian persecution is extremely vague.
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Here, then, we stand in presence of the unbroken and \ universal silence of over two hundred years concerning an alleged event of capital importance, transacted in the very centre of knowledge and information and rumour, yet never once mentioned by any one among many whose especial interest it was to tell of it often and to dwell on it at length. Nor can any one suggest the slightest reason for this silence, for this studied suppression of a highly momentous and dramatic incident in a reign that was a favourite subject of historic delineation, and that lent itself especially to high colouring and picturesque exaggeration. Such considerations seem ample to weight the scale heavily against the genuineness of the passage in question.
.... We conclude, then, that this famous chapter, as it now stands, is with compelling probability to be ascribed to another hand than that of Cornelius Tacitus.
(Academia.edu) Advances the argument of Rougé to find that in all probability Tacitus never actually referred to Christ at all, and the famous passage now in the manuscripts originally referenced a Jewish rebel group formed by Chrestus a decade later, unconnected to Christianity, and Christian scribes subsequently "improved" the passage by inserting a line about Christ.
Conclusion:
In the final analysis, given the immensity of the persecution Tacitus describes, its scale in terms of the number of victims, its barbarity, and the injustice of it being based on a false accusation of arson to cover up Nero’s own crimes, what are the odds that no Christian would ever have heard of it or made use of it or any reference to it for over three hundred years? By any reasonable estimate, quite low. Not even prolific and erudite professors of Latin like Tertullian or Lactantius? Lower still. That for nearly three centuries no Christian martyr tradition would develop from either the event or Tacitus’ account of it? Lower still. That no known legends, martyrologies, or tales would adapt or employ it as a motif in any way, not even in the various stories and legends of the persecutions and martyrdoms under Nero that we know did develop and circulate? Lower still. And on top of all that is the additional unlikelihood that all other pagan critics of Christianity (like Suetonius and Pliny the Younger, but even such critics as Celsus) would also somehow not have heard of the event or never make any mention of it.
Lowering the probability further is the way Tacitus describes the event. Tacitus treats the persecuted group as unusually large, and no longer existing, and at the time widely and inexplicably regarded as composed of the most vile criminals, who could credibly have committed arson—three features that do not fit “Christians” that well, but would have fit followers of the instigator Chrestus. It is certainly less likely that Tacitus would say these three things about the Christians in Rome in the year 64 than that he would say them of the Chrestians.
For all these reasons in combination I believe we should conclude the suspect line was probably not written by Tacitus, and was most likely interpolated into its present position sometime after the middle of the 4th century A.D. More likely Tacitus was originally speaking of the Chrestians, a violent group of Jews first suppressed under Claudius, and not the Christians, and accordingly did not mention Christ. We should so conclude because alternative explanations of the evidence require embracing a long series of increasingly improbable assumptions. So the line should be rejected as spurious, or at least held in reasonable suspicion. And this conclusion should now be taken into account when assessing the evidence for Christ and Christianity, and also when translating and interpreting Tacitus and the events following the burning of Rome under Nero. The whole passage in Annals 15.44 should instead be considered as possible evidence supplementing Suetonius on the matter of “Chrestus the instigator” and Jewish unrest at Rome.
Since the 18th century at least five attempts have been made to challenge the authenticity of the Annals as having been written by someone other than Tacitus, Voltaire's criticism being perhaps the first. Voltaire was generally critical of Tacitus and said that Tacitus did not comply with the standards for providing a historical background to civilization. In 1878 John Wilson Ross and in 1890 Polydore Hochart suggested that the whole of the Annals had been forged by the Italian scholar Poggio Bracciolini (1380–1459). According to Robert Van Voorst this was an "extreme hypothesis" which never gained a following among modern scholars.
The provenance of the manuscripts containing the Annals goes back to the Renaissance. While Bracciolini had discovered three minor works at Hersfeld Abbey in Germany in 1425, Zanobi da Strada (who died in 1361) had likely earlier discovered Annals 11-16 at Monte Cassino where he lived for some time. The copies of Annals at Monte Cassino were likely moved to Florence by Giovanni Boccaccio (1313 – 1375), a friend of da Strada, who is also credited with their discovery at Monte Cassino. Regardless of whether the Monte Cassino manuscripts were moved to Florence by Boccaccio or dal Strada, Boccaccio made use of the Annals when he wrote Commento di Dante c. 1374 (before the birth of Poggio Bracciolini), giving an account of Seneca's death directly based on the Tacitean account in Annals book 15. Francis Newton states that it is likely that Annals 11-16 were in Monte Cassino during the first half of the rule of Abbot Desiderius (1058–1087) who later became Pope Victor III. Annals 1-6 were then independently discovered at Corvey Abbey in Germany in 1508 and were first published in Rome in 1515.
"But all human efforts, all the lavish gifts of the emperor, and the propitiations of the gods, did not banish the sinister belief that the conflagration was the result of an order. Consequently, to get rid of the report, Nero fastened the guilt and inflicted the most exquisite tortures on a class hated for their abominations, called Christians by the populace. Christus, from whom the name had its origin, suffered the extreme penalty during the reign of Tiberius/[Nero] at the hands of one of our procurators, Pontius Pilatus/[Porcius Festus], and a most mischievous superstition, thus checked for the moment, again broke out not only in Judaea, the first source of the evil, but even in Rome, where all things hideous and shameful from every part of the world find their centre and become popular. Accordingly, an arrest was first made of all who pleaded guilty; then, upon their information, an immense multitude was convicted, not so much of the crime of firing the city, but as of hatred against mankind. Mockery of every sort was added to their deaths. Covered with the skins of beasts, they were torn by dogs and perished, or were nailed to crosses, or were doomed to the flames and burnt, to serve as a nightly illumination, when daylight had expired. Nero offered his gardens for the spectacle, and was exhibiting a show in the circus, while he mingled with the people in the dress of a charioteer or stood aloft on a car. "
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Does this mean the Annals is a pseudo epigraph, a forgery end to end and not just in the passages traditionally suspected of interpolation? I am a latinist and I admire Tacitus; but I also know palaeography. I mentioned Fulgentius’ note on a now lost “Book of pleasing Anecdotes,” the Facetiae. Instead of wholesale forgery we should consider the possible condition of a medieval manuscript rediscovered after half a millennium of obscurity on the mouldy shelves of a draughty monastery. The size and amount of lacunae in such manuscript could easily have given Bracciolini the licence he needed to improvise his “restoration” without actually violating the overall format. I see an unrelenting defamation, digging out every scandal and every rumor that could make the men in the purple look bad – certainly something down the lane of the conservative senator Tacitus – I see the biographical focus and the overall anecdotal structure – the palimpsest underlying Braciolini’s “restoration” could easily be the book Fulgentius was mentioning, just not recognised for what it was when Bracciolini laid his hands on it, while Sulpicius’ paraphrase is nothing of the kind but an original quote from his own work, rephrased by the restorer to be grafted into the manuscript of the Annals, filling another of numerous gaps. As far as I know nobody has considered this possibility yet.
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I would also like to present Erik Zara’s arguments in favour of the Christ-passage being a forgery; that “the sentence about Christus was a marginal gloss, later inserted to the text”. This list he published at Jesus Mysteries Discussion board. However, one needs to be a member in order to access the files. Over to Erik Zara:
2) Also, traditional Christianity cannot be said to have had its origin in Judaea. Probably the Chrestiani referred to some other, now unknown, Jewish messianic group, which would explain Tacitus’ use of the past tense (”chrestianos appellabat”, they WERE called chrestians) instead of the present form (”chrestianos appellat”, they ARE called chrestians).
3) If (and I mean only _if_) the Sulpicius Severus’ passage about the Christiani being involved in the first Jewish War, is from Tacitus, this would also indicate that some other group than the rather peaceful Pauline Christians, described by Pliny, are meant.
4) If the Christus sentence was a marginal gloss, this would also explain the discrepancy in the text – chrEstianos but chrIstus; the words would then have different sources – ”chrestianos” Tacitus and ”Christus” the marginal gloss.
5) It would also explain why Christians until (or for centuries after) Sulpicius Severus did not refer to the passage – it was not about them!
6) Pontius Pilate is in the Christus sentence mentioned as a procurator. No other Roman historian deemed it necessary to even mention Pilate, and therefore it is perhaps not plausible that Tacitus’ readers would know who he was. Christians of course did, and they called him procurator and not prefect (“Pontio Pilato, Syriam tunc ex parte Romana procuranti” – Tertullian, Apology XXI.18, “Pontius Pilatus procurator Judaeae a Tiberio mittitur” – Eusebius’ Chronicle in Jerome’s translation).
