SOURCE: Benario, Herbert W. “The Minor Works.” In An Introduction to Tacitus, pp. 22-42. Athens: University of Georgia Press, 1975.

In the following essay, Benario examines the themes of the Agricola, the Germania, and the Dialogus de oratoribus.

Early in 98, Tacitus published his first work. It was a biography of his father-in-law, Gnaeus Julius Agricola. Agricola was a remarkable man, as great, it might be said, as a private citizen could be in this age. He was born in a.d. 40. His political career is marked by a steady advance through the cursus honorum, culminating in the consulship at an age some five years before the normal or customary year, although it is difficult to speak of a norm during the principate when a man could advance by as many as ten years depending upon the prestige of his family and the number of children whom he sired, since...