Livy's Introduction Flashcards
How he treats poets
“I don’t intend to prove it right or wrong”
How he considers the work
A really big job
Goes back more than 700 years
How he talks about Rome
There has never been a country either more powerful or with better morals or with so many good examples to follow
-openly biased
Doesn’t care if the stories are believable as long as they show the Romans in a good way
How he said he will begin his work
I would much rather begin by using the poets way of doing things
With good omens and wishes and prayers to the gods and goddesses to ask them to give a favourable and successful outcome to the great task before me
Talk about Rhea Silvia biasedness
I think that the beginning of such a great city and the start of the greatest empire on earth was fated to happen
Evander to Hercules biased words
One day the most successful people in the world will call the greatest and they will worship your cult
Livy’s goals
Doesn’t intend to prove the old stories true or false
-he was more bothered in getting his message across
-he wanted to stop the moral decline by showing the good and bad of the Romans
-he makes a prayer to the gods very much like virgils
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Lives sources
The first roman to write about Rome history was Fabius Pictor
Alive 200Bc -300 years after the end of the monarch
-alot of his other sources were all men with jobs in the government writing history as a hobby, no interest in historical research, history as a tool for the issues and debate of their time
-claimed the Romans were so good because of their ‘heritage”
We’re most of his stories come from
Traditional version of events
Come from Greek myths (Romulus and Remus)
Other sources of information
Roman archeology
