Bassus, Auffi'dius
an orator and historian, who lived under Augustus and Tiberius.
He drew up an account of the Roman wars in Germany, and also wrote a work upon Roman history of a more general character, which was continued, in thirty-one books, by the elder Pliny. No fragment of his compositions has been preserved. (
Dialog. de Orat. 23;
Quint. Inst. 10.1,
102, &c.; Senec.
Suasor. 6,
Ep. xxx., which perhaps refers to a son of this individual; Plin.
H. N. Praef.,
Ep. 3.5, 9. ed. Titze.)
It will be clearly perceived, upon comparing the two passages last referred to, that Pliny wrote a continuation of the general history of Bassus, and not of his history of the German wars, as Bahr and others have asserted. His praenomen is uncertain. Orelli (
ad Dialog. de Orat. 100.23) rejects
Titus, and shews from Priscian (lib. viii. p. 371, ed. Krehl), that
Publius is more likely to be correct.
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W.R]
