viii INTRODUCTION. Inscriptions, which form so extensive a portion of the memorials of later times, were very scanty in the period prior to the development of literature. The family records and traditions of noble houses doubtless constituted an important element in the formation of the national history, and a still more important element were the oral traditions of the people and the metrical lays, whereby they half unconsciously preserved from age to age the legends of the olden time. Historical poetry. About two hundred years B. C., the earliest poets, Naevius and Ennius, treated themes taken from the national history in poetical form, the one dealing thus with the first Punic war, the other with the traditional period from Aeneas to his own age. Soon after began the practice of writing prose annals, The Annalists. that is, histories in strictly chronological arrangement, with the events of each year placed by themselves. Nearly contemporary with Ennius was Q. Fabius Pictor, the first annalist, whose grandfather had gained this curious surname by painting a battle picture in the temple of Salus, and who was himself a prominent public man at the time of the Hannibalic war. Fabius Pictor. After this war was over, he wrote in Greek an account of it, addressed to the educated among his own countrymen and to the Hellenic public, intended to offset the account given by Silenus, which he regarded as too favorable to the Carthaginians, intended also to glorify the achievements of his great kinsman, Fabius the Dictator. A general sketch of the national history constituted the introductory portion of this work, which was, upon the whole, of such a character that Fabius was not undeservedly called the father of Roman history. Livy highly respected him and often quoted his statements, but at second hand out of later nalists. in Latin, also took the initiative in breaking away from the Cato. annalistic method. In his Origines he omitted the whole period for which the earlier annalists constituted the chief authority. Coelius. Some years later L. Coelius Antipater (after 120 B. C.) wrote his account of the second Punic war independently of the annalists. He was a man of great culture and learning, a friend of C. Gracchus and the younger Scipio and Laelius. Dissatisfied with previous accounts of the war, written entirely from the Roman point of view, in his desire for impartiality he was the first of the Romans to consult the history of Silenus, Hannibal's Greek historiographer, and to compare it with the accounts given by his own country men. And this was not his only merit, for he tried also to introduce a better literary style, and made the innovation of inserting speeches into the course of his narrative, not merely to explain it, but also as a means of giving expression to his own reflections, and the supposed views of the actors in the story. Though there were other writers who decidedly opposed the annalistic method, yet it seems, on the whole, to have retained its popularity with both authors and readers. Besides general histories, there were numerous biographies, memoirs, and monographs, dealing with the careers of individuals or with short periods or episodes in the Special works, career of the nation. In fact the catalogue of historical writers in the various departments is surprisingly but no great long. Yet Cicero (De Leg. I. 5) laments "Abest general history. historia litteris nostris," for none of the histories that had then appeared were worthy as literature of a place beside the poetry and oratory that had reached so high a degree of perfection. And though Sallust and Caesar soon. afterward published their works, which have been recognized |