Historiarum Libri Quinque: Hegesippus between Josephus and Sallust

Abstract

This article examines the influence of Sallust on Hegesippus, the fourth-century historian and adaptor of Josephus (commonly referred to as pseudo-Hegesippus). Analysis of the structure of his work reveals that Hegesippus strove to write in five books to mirror the Histories of Sallust. Consideration of the lengths of those books and of other evidence then shows that Sallust’s Histories were themselves written in five substantial books of ca. 20,000 words. Finally, it is suggested that comparison of writers in the Sallustian tradition may be able to expand our knowledge of Sallust’s largely lost magnum opus.