SVETONIO (Gaius Suetonius Tranquillus). — Historian, born around 75 A.D.; his birthplace is unknown. Under Trajan he was secretary of the imperial administration, and in this capacity had the opportunity to consult official documents, which he often cites (ego in actis regorio...). In 122 he was relieved of his office and withdrew into private life; he died around 160.
He wrote: Prata, encyclopedic in character, now lost; Roma, historical in character, also lost; De viris illustribus, transmitted incomplete, divided into five books devoted respectively to poets, orators, historians, philosophers, grammarians, and rhetoricians; the biographies of Terenzio, Orazio, and Lucano (incomplete), of Passieno Crispo, of Plinio il Vecchio (incomplete), and 25 lives from the section on grammarians and rhetoricians remain. His most important work is De Vita Caesarum, in eight books, containing biographies, of Alexandrian type, of the first six emperors, from Cesare to Domiziano, written in 120, valuable for its information, objective, and well documented. Written in the form of biography, it lacks synthetic perspectives and does not shine for literary elegance, although it is not lacking in correctness and sobriety of style; but it is extremely useful as a historical source and as a factual confirmation of the profound psychological analysis that Tacito makes of certain emperors.
S. is of interest to the history of Christianity because of the brief but severe judgment he gives of the Christians: « genus hominum superstitionis novae ac maleficæ », which reproduces the hostility common to the entire population, which in fact 1) hated superstitions—that is, for a Roman, whatever was foreign to the norm established by the official religion; 2) and hated them all the more when they were new, that is, contrary to what was legitimized by ancient religious tradition; and, moreover, of a harmful character, that is, not unrelated to occult magical practices and incantations. There is no need to demonstrate the falsity of these accusations, whose complete lack of foundation Plinio, in his letter to Traiano, affirmed at the same time; they serve only to document the hostility of the Roman environment toward the new religion.
Another passage in S. relating to Christianity is the one concerning the dispute between the Jews and the followers of Cresto
(= χριστός, that is, the Messiah), a dispute that persuaded Claudio to expel them from Rome: « Iudaeos impulsore Chresto assidue tumultuantes Roma expulit » (Claud., 25). The expulsion took place around 49, at which time, therefore, a Christian community already existed in Rome, though the pagan environment poorly distinguished it from the Jews.