This post is to deal with some erroneous stuff recently posted here about Tacitus:In the Annals Tacitus wrote a long discourse (15.38-44) on the great fire of Rome that destroyed much of the city during the reign of Nero. After describing the course of fire and various actions that stemmed from dealing with the fire ("the precautions of human wisdom"), this follows:
Annals 15.44 wrote:Such indeed were the precautions of human wisdom. The next thing was to seek means of propitiating the gods, and recourse was had to the Sibylline books, by the direction of which prayers were offered to Vulcanus, Ceres, and Proserpina. Juno, too, was entreated by the matrons, first, in the Capitol, then on the nearest part of the coast, where water was procured to sprinkle the temple and image of the goddess. And there were sacred banquets and nightly vigils celebrated by married women. But no human efforts, nor the lavish gifts of the emperor, or the propitiations of the gods, could banish the sinister belief that the conflagration was the result of an order. Consequently, to get rid of the report, Nero fastened the guilt and inflicted the most exquisite tortures on a class hated for their abominations, called Christians by the populace. Christus, from whom the name had its origin, suffered the extreme penalty during the reign of Tiberius under the procurator, Pontius Pilatus, and a most mischievous superstition, thus checked for the moment, again broke out not only in Judaea, the first source of the evil, but even in Rome, where all things hideous and shameful from every part of the world find their centre and become popular. Accordingly, an arrest was first made of all who pleaded guilty; then, upon their information, an immense multitude was convicted, not so much of the crime of firing the city, as of hatred against mankind. Mockery of every sort was added to their deaths. Covered with the skins of beasts, they were torn by dogs and perished, or were nailed to crosses, or were doomed to the flames and burnt, to serve as a nightly illumination, when daylight had expired. Nero offered his gardens for the spectacle, and was exhibiting a show in the circus, while he mingled with the people in the dress of a charioteer or stood aloft on a car. Hence, even for criminals who deserved extreme and exemplary punishment, there arose a feeling of compassion; for it was not, as it seemed, for the public good, but to glut one man's cruelty, that they were being destroyed.
(The grey section represents what I believe to be the part that Tacitus actually wrote.)
There are several problems with Annals 15.44:
- Tacitus says what he wanted to in way of conclusion, "But no human efforts, nor the lavish gifts of the emperor, or the propitiations of the gods, could banish the sinister belief that the conflagration was the result of an order." Without Tacitus accusing Nero of anything, he leaves the emperor holding the bag for the fire, ie everyone knew he ordered it. But Tacitus, known as one of the greatest orators of his era, immediately changes topic from the involvement of Nero regarding the fire to the horrors of the persecution of christians and loses focus in his attack on Nero by hiding this sharp criticism of Nero with a passage about christians.
- It erroneously calls Pontius Pilate a "procurator" when Tacitus is a major source for the fact that procurators weren't given control of provinces before the time of Claudius. (See below.)
- It has Nero's gardens being given over to the burning of christians at night in 15.44.5, when the gardens were filled with people made homeless by the fire who were waiting while new dwellings were being built (15.39.2).
- It is a passage about something Nero attempted in order to dispel the rumours that he'd started the fire, after Tacitus stated that none of his efforts could dispel the rumours.
- Tacitus, known as one of the greatest orators of his era, writes a passage that blames the christians for something, but is unclear as to what it was that they pleaded guilty of.
- The style of the passage wildly does not reflect Tacitus's renowned style of reserve and understatement.
- The passage is functionally a martyrdom story outlining how awfully the christians were treated--so badly that passers by could feel pity (this is in the city where people went to the amphitheatre to watch people being torn apart by wild animals for entertainment). Arguing that the picture was not favorable to christians, is merely an accusation that a christian interpolator was incapable of trying to fit into the style of the original writer.
Considering this nexus of problems, errors, and unlikely stylistic issues, it is improbable that Tacitus would have written such a schemozzle. Suetonius, who was director of imperial archives, strangely knew nothing about a christian connection with the Neronian fire. The first person to make the connection between christians and the fire was Sulpicius Severus (c. 363 – c. 425), the christian writer of Chronicles (see
2.29). Annals 15.44 is a christian forgery written after the time of Sulpicius Severus, that amplifies Severus's work. It adds the confused accusation against the christians and the story of Nero's double use of the gardens. (See my presentation
here.)
Procurator Pontius PilateA prefect was in origin a military posting. A procurator was someone appointed to look after the finanial side of administration.
Here's a pre-Claudian reference in the Annals to a procurator is 4.15:
Everything indeed was as yet in the hands of the Senate, and consequently Lucilius Capito, procurator of Asia, who was impeached by his province, was tried by them, the emperor vehemently asserting "that he had merely given the man authority over the slaves and property of the imperial establishments; that if he had taken upon himself the powers of a praetor and used military force, he had disregarded his instructions; therefore they must hear the provincials."
You note that the procurator has no judicial powers, but merely had charge of the province's property. The province of Asia was ruled by a proconsul, eg Caius Silanus (3.66) or Junius Silanus (13.1). The role of the procurator changed with Claudius in A.12.60:
That same year the emperor was often heard to say that the legal decisions of his procurators ought to have the same force as if pronounced by himself.
They didn't have judicial power in their own right because they weren't patricians. Judicial power was necessary to make legal decisions necessary as a provincial governor. Suetonius alludes to the same decision (Claud. 12):
[Claudius]requested of [the senate] permission for the prefect of the military tribunes and pretorian guards to attend him in the senate-house; and also that they would be pleased to bestow upon his procurators judicial authority in the provinces.
And so started the governance of imperial provinces by procurators alluded to in Histories 5.9,
The kings were either dead, or reduced to insignificance, when Claudius entrusted the province of Judaea to the Roman Knights or to his own freedmen, one of whom, Antonius Felix, indulging in every kind of barbarity and lust, exercised the power of a king in the spirit of a slave.
Procurators were not a part of the Roman
cursus honorum, the sequential order of public offices. They were Roman knights or freedmen and so not being patricians were ineligible to enter the
cursus honorum. Until the time of Claudius, they had no power to tell Romans who were in the
cursus honorum what to do, so couldn't govern. Tacitus, knew the
cursus honorum inside out, having risen through those ranks to become a proconsul himself. He knew when procurators gained judicial power and was well aware that prior to Claudius no procurator had the power to govern.
Pilate was not a procurator. He was a military prefect, as indicated by an inscription found in Caesarea Maritima, in charge of a small province answerable directly to the proconsular legate in Antioch. (And bringing up Richard Carrier's opinions as to the possibility of Pilate being a procurator is pure desperation.)
Tacitus obviously didn't write about Pilate as governor of Judaea being a procurator. Such a blunder was made by someone who didn't know about such things, someone writing long afterwards.
Thanks for all the fish.
by 
