The ancient Greek historians (Harvard lectures) by J. B. Bury.

VI[

TACITUS

229

the relations of the speeches which Tacitus has
introduced, to those actually delivered. A bronze
tablet of Lyons preserves a considerable portion
of the harangue which the Emperor Claudius
addressed to the Senate when he conferred the
ius hionorum on the inhabitants of Gaul. Tacitus
professes to reproduce this speech. A comparison
of his version with the original shows that he took
it as his basis, but remodelled it, rearranging the
order, adding some new matter, cutting down
tedious passages, adapting it to his own style, and
eliminating the Emperor's ungainly mannerisms.
For instance, Claudius in the middle of his speech
suddenly addressed himself: "It is high time,
0 Tiberius Caesar Germanicus, to disclose yourself
to the Senate and show whither your oration
tends." This eccentric transition does not appear
in Tacitus. But the general tenor and argument
are the same. The case is highly instructive as
exemplifying how the best historians like Tacitus
and Thucydides constructed their speeches. When
an original speech had been published, historians
refrained from reproducing it. The literary canon
of homogeneity of style, which the Tacitean treatment of the oration of Claudius illustrates so well,
forbade them to transcribe it; and it would have
been obviously out of place to challenge comparison by a paraphrase. We can prove this rule
in the case of Livy, who expressly declines to give
a speech of Cato for the Rhodians, which Cato
had included in his own history, and in the case of