Nepos
1.
Cornelius. A Roman historical writer, born in Northern Italy
about B.C. 100. He was the friend of Cicero, Atticus, and of the poet Catullus, who dedicated
to him a volume of poems. He died about B.C. 24. Besides erotic poems, three books of
Chronica, five books of
Exempla (probably an account of the
men who were typical of the early Roman virtues), biographies of Cato and Cicero, and a
geographical treatise, all of which, except a few fragments, are lost, he wrote a series of
biographies in at least sixteen books (
De Viris Illustribus), in which the
lives of famous Greeks and Romans were narrated in parallel arrangement. Of this work there
remain the part treating of foreign generals and the biographies of Cato and Atticus. The
style of Nepos is not good, as it borders on the colloquial; but the biographies are of
considerable historical value, as being fair, sympathetic, and well arranged. The best MS. of
Nepos is the Codex Parcensis at Louvain, dating from the fifteenth century. Others of a
greater age exist, but are of an inferior “family,” and very corrupt.
Principal editions are those of Lambinus
(Paris, 1569); Bremi
(4th ed.
Zürich, 1827); Roth
(Basel, 1841); with commentary by Nipperdey
(Leipzig, 1849; rev. ed. by Lupus, Berlin, 1879); Siebelis
(11th
ed. 1885); with index by Gitlbauer
(Freiburg, 1883); Weidner
(2d
ed. Prague, 1888); with English notes by O. Browning
(Oxford, 1868); and
by Lindsay
(last ed. New York, 1895). There is a lexicon in Halm's ed. by Haacke
(9th ed. Leipzig, 1887), by Jahr in Andresen's ed.
(Prague, 1884);
and by Koch and Georges
(5th ed. Hanover, 1885).
2.
Iulius. A Roman emperor of the West, the last but one, reigning
A.D. 474-475. He was placed on the throne by the Byzantine emperor Leo, the usurper Glycerius
being deposed. Nepos, however, was, in his turn, soon deposed by his general Orestes, who
soon crowned his own son Romulus Augustulus. Nepos went into exile in Dalmatia, where he was
killed in A.D. 480.
