# Tacitus composes the Annals of the Julio-Claudian principate from Tiberius through Nero, unfinished in the received text

Date: 116

## The fact

Late in [Trajan](/people/trajan)’s reign or under [Hadrian](/people/hadrian)’s first years as received, [Tacitus](/people/tacitus) wrote the Annals from Augustus’s death. Surviving books cover Tiberius, parts of Claudius, and Nero down to 66, then break. He did not sit in Tiberius’s Senate. The famous ‘sine ira et studio’ sentence is the preface’s method claim. Archival locator: The Latin Library — Tacitus, Annals 1 at https://www.thelatinlibrary.com/tacitus/tac.ann1.shtml (The Latin Library). Independent locator: Britannica — Tacitus at https://www.britannica.com/biography/Tacitus-Roman-historian (Encyclopaedia Britannica).

## Context

Education here is the public Julio-Claudian file. Manuscripts of Annals 1–6 and 11–16 are separate medieval stories, not his acts. Archival locator: The Latin Library — Tacitus, Annals 1 at https://www.thelatinlibrary.com/tacitus/tac.ann1.shtml (The Latin Library). Independent locator: Britannica — Tacitus at https://www.britannica.com/biography/Tacitus-Roman-historian (Encyclopaedia Britannica).

If a number is not in the two records named above, it is not supplied here.

## Evidence and sources

Latin Library Annals 1 and LacusCurtius are public. Britannica independently treats the Annals as his greatest work, covering 14–68 in plan. Loeb Jackson is later. Dickinson notes death shortly after 115 as received. No autograph. Archival locator: The Latin Library — Tacitus, Annals 1 at https://www.thelatinlibrary.com/tacitus/tac.ann1.shtml (The Latin Library). Independent locator: Britannica — Tacitus at https://www.britannica.com/biography/Tacitus-Roman-historian (Encyclopaedia Britannica).

Official or archival record: The Latin Library — Tacitus, Annals 1 (https://www.thelatinlibrary.com/tacitus/tac.ann1.shtml; The Latin Library).

## Significance

A canonical dark history of the principate is an education path for later political readers. High confidence on the surviving Latin as his; gaps are real. Later ‘Tacitism’ is reception. Archival locator: The Latin Library — Tacitus, Annals 1 at https://www.thelatinlibrary.com/tacitus/tac.ann1.shtml (The Latin Library). Independent locator: Britannica — Tacitus at https://www.britannica.com/biography/Tacitus-Roman-historian (Encyclopaedia Britannica).

Later competitions, monuments, translations, UNESCO listings, museums, and adaptations are not converted into extra lifetime acts.

## What is established and what is not

Established: Annals as his unfinished Julio-Claudian history. Not established: exact last year of writing, or the contents of lost Gaius books. Conventional 116. Not a 20th-century printed year as the act. Archival locator: The Latin Library — Tacitus, Annals 1 at https://www.thelatinlibrary.com/tacitus/tac.ann1.shtml (The Latin Library). Independent locator: Britannica — Tacitus at https://www.britannica.com/biography/Tacitus-Roman-historian (Encyclopaedia Britannica).

The attached driver is edu-[digital-learning-access](/drivers/edu-digital-learning-access). The welfare reading used in this dossier is improving. That reading is an impact-path choice, not a property stored on the Fact itself.

Confidence is stated on the impact path, not hidden in adjectives. Sejanus, Christians, and Boudica set-pieces are separate Facts, not eight book-clones. Mixed effects of Tacitus composes the Annals of the Julio-Claudian principate from Tiberius through Nero, unfinished in the received text are separate paths.

Shared responsibility is part of Tacitus composes the Annals of the Julio-Claudian principate from Tiberius through Nero, unfinished in the received text. Naming Tacitus does not delete co-authors, institutions, or later transmitters. The lag from 0116-01-01 to any measured indicator is not treated as zero. Alternative explanations — weather, other armies, later statutes, or independent cultural change — remain live where the sources do not close them.

## People

- Tacitus: https://factrail.ai/people/tacitus

## Drivers

- Digital Learning Access: https://factrail.ai/drivers/edu-digital-learning-access

## Sources

- https://www.thelatinlibrary.com/tacitus/tac.ann1.shtml
- https://www.britannica.com/biography/Tacitus-Roman-historian

## Methodology

https://factrail.ai/methodology

Canonical: https://factrail.ai/facts/tac-annals