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Some of the men who wrote Roman history were Roman and some were Greek. They emerged around 200 BC with Quintus Fabius Pictor who was the first historian. Polybius (Greek) wrote the history of Rome in the period of the three Punic Wars in the second century BC. The major writes of the early history of Rome were Livy (Roman) Dionysius of Halicarnassus (Greek) and Diodorus Siculus (Greek). They wrote in the 1st century BC and have been called annalist because they relied on the annals to reconstruct the previous centuries of Roman history.

The main sources of information for the earlier Roman history were the annals and the fasti. During Roman Republic the Pontifex Maximus, the head of Roman state religion, kept the annales maximi. These annals recorded the key public events of the year (hence the name annals) and the names of each officer of state for that year. The Pontifex Maximus kept a detailed record and published an abbreviated version on a white board (tabula dealbata) outside the Regia, his residence, from the Republican period onward. The Romans also kept the fasti triumphales, a record of all Roman triumphs in battle, and, in the republican period, the fasti consulares, a list of all the consuls, the two annually elected heads of the city and the army during the Republic. The men who started writing the history of early Rome relied on these documents.

Important historians in the first century AD were Tacitus, Pliny the Elder, Cassius Dio and Josephus (A Roman Jew). The major historians in the second century AD were Suetonius and Appian (Greek).The quality of historiography after this was not as good and there were many writers of brief histories, such as Aurelius Victor, Eutropius, Festus and Epitome de Caesaribus.

The early Roman history also has mythologised accounts of important events. It is likely that these were stories which were passed on to the next generations orally and were written at a later stage. In oral tradition story telling was very important. Therefore, aspects of these stories were fictionalised and mythical elements were also inserted. They are often inaccurate as detailed memories were lost.

Prestigious families also wrote their own family histories. Livy noted that these histories were untrustworthy because they usually were aimed at aggrandising the families.

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Just about every Roman who had a pen and papyrus wrote. Histories were popular, Livy, Appian, Seutonius, Tacitus, Dio, and many others. Caesar wrote about his conquests, Vergil, Horace, Catalus, Juvenal and Marital wrote poems of various types and Cicero wrote speeches and a multitude of letters. Plautus and Terrance wrote plays. It was also the custom of famous people to write their memoirs. Unfortunately most of them have been lost or are only in fragments, but the Deeds of the Divine Augustus remain.
There were thousands of writers over the 1,200 years of ancient Rome: poets, tragedists, dramatists, playwrights, rhetoricians, historians, philosophers, natural historians, etc.

The three canonical authors of classical Latin literature were Virgil, Horace and Ovid. The best prose was written by Cicero who was also the best rhetorician. Another great rhetorician was Quintilian. Quintus Ennius Marcus Pacuvius. Lucius Accius and Gnaeus Naevius were great dramatists. Plautus and Terentius (Terence) were the best writers of comedies. Tibullus and Propertius were great elegists (an elegy is a mournful, melancholic poem). Gaius Valerius Flaccus, Statius and Silius Italicus wrote epic poems. Juvenal was the greatest satirist. Catullus wrote great lyric poetry. Martial was the best writer of epigrams (brief, interesting, memorable, and sometimes surprising or satirical statements). Petronius wrote the first novel. Seneca was the most important philosophical writer. Pliny the Elder wrote about natural history. Marcus Terentius Varro was the best grammarian. Viotruvius wrote a textbook of architecture and engineering, Historians were: Fabius Pictor, Cato the Elder, Sallust Livy, Tacitus, and Suetonius. Some writers on Roman hostoryu were Greeks: Polybius, Dionysius of Halicarnassus, Diodorus Siculus and Appian and Cssius Dio.

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Just about every Roman who had a pen and papyrus wrote. Histories were popular, Livy, Appian, Seutonius, Tacitus, Dio, and many others. Caesar wrote about his conquests, Vergil, Horace, Catalus, Juvenal and Marital wrote poems of various types and Cicero wrote speeches and a multitude of letters. Plautus and Terrance wrote plays. It was also the custom of famous people to write their memoirs. Unfortunately most of them have been lost or are only in fragments, but the Deeds of the Divine Augustus remain.

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  1. Virgil
  2. Horce
  3. Livy
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9y ago

marcus aurilious

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Q: Who were famous Roman writer in Ancient History?
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