Historia Augusta

Historia Augusta is a collection of Latin biographies of Roman emperors and usurpers, conventionally dated to late antiquity. Its authorship, date, and historical reliability remain disputed.

Aelius Spartianus: A named author in the Historia Augusta's fictionalized attribution of its biographies. One of the six supposed biographers whose historical existence is debated.
Roman imperial biography: The Latin literary tradition of writing the lives of Roman emperors. Historia Augusta belongs to this genre while departing sharply from its earlier examples.
Life of Elagabalus: The Historia Augusta biography of the emperor Elagabalus, notorious for extravagant and often unreliable anecdotes. Its sensational portrait exemplifies the collection's difficulty as a source for imperial conduct.
Cassius Dio: A Greek historian whose Roman History covers events from Rome's origins through the third century. His earlier account provides an independent comparison for several emperors treated in the collection.
Ronald Syme: A British historian of Rome who wrote influential studies of the Historia Augusta. His investigations helped define modern debate over the collection's author and composition.
Julius Capitolinus: A named author to whom several biographies in the Historia Augusta are attributed. His attributed biographies belong to the collection's invented authorial framework.
Historia Augusta manuscripts: The surviving manuscript witnesses through which the Historia Augusta's text is transmitted. Their late and imperfect transmission constrains reconstruction of the collection.
Life of Aurelian: The Historia Augusta biography of the emperor Aurelian, containing historical material and disputed details. Its mixture of useful evidence and questionable narrative typifies source-critical problems across the collection.
Herodian: A Greek historian who wrote a history of the Roman Empire from 180 to 238. His narrative offers a contrasting account of emperors also covered by Historia Augusta.
Hermann Dessau: A German historian who argued that the Historia Augusta had one author writing in the late fourth century. His challenge to the traditional authorship model transformed the collection's scholarly study.

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