Gaius Asinius Quadratus
Asinius Quadratus was a Greek Roman historian writing at the time of the kingdom crisis of the 3rd century.
Life
Asinius Quadratus probably came from an Italian family, Senator. Whether he can be, however, equated with the known in an undated inscription from Olympia C. Asinius Quadratus, proconsul of the province of Achaea, or the consular C. Asinius Quadratus Protimus is controversial in research and hardly provable.
Works
Asinius Quadratus wrote at least two works of history in the Greek language. These are, like most works of history from the time of the kingdom crisis of the 3rd century, almost entirely lost today, only a few brief fragments (quotations by later authors ) have been preserved.
His major work apparently represented a 1000 -year history ( Chilieteris ) in 15 books, with which he celebrated the millennium of the founding of the city of Rome and perhaps reached to 248. The work should probably compete with the extensive historical work of Cassius Dio, who was a contemporary of Quadratus. The fragments obtained only allow a few specific statements, but it seems the historical work focuses on deals with the history of the Republic and the imperial period only compressed portrayed to have.
Furthermore Quadratus wrote an essay on the wars of Rome against the Parthians in 9 books ( Parthika ). He may have been from the under Gordian III. newly erupted war against the Sassanid Empire inspired to draw up, but much remains uncertain. The fragments ( for Parthika especially when Stephanos of Byzantium gave very brief information ) do not allow detailed insight so treated period and content are quite speculative.
The research is partially believed Asinius Quadratus 've written a third font ( Germanika ), which has the Roman- Germanic battles described ( in the 2nd / 3rd century ) and was designed ethnographically (like the Parthika ). This is sometimes closed for a surviving fragment in Agathias ( Histories I 6 ). Such a work can not be completely ruled out, but the statement in Agathias can also refer to a passage in the 1000 -year history and is not necessarily a separate font.
His works seem to have been quite popular in the subsequent time, because Asinius Quadratus is approximately in the Historia Augusta ( 400 ), mentioned by Zosimus, and Agathias Scholasticus Evagrius. Zosimus the material for the particular job ( Zosimus 5.27 ) was probably mediated by Olympiodorus of Thebes, while Evagrius probably by Eustathius of Epiphaneia at least had knowledge of the author.
The fragments are collected in: The fragments of Greek historians (No. 97 ) or in Brill 's New Jacoby (No. 97, with English translation, commentary and biographical sketch of Michael Meckler ) and in The Fragments of the Roman Historians (No. 102, with English translation and commentary).