''De Bello Africo'' (also ''Bellum Africum''; ''On the African War'') is a

Latin Latin (, or , ) is a classical language belonging to the Italic languages, Italic branch of the Indo-European languages. Latin was originally a dialect spoken in the lower Tiber area (then known as Latium) around present-day Rome, but through ...

work continuing

Julius Caesar Gaius Julius Caesar (; ; 12 July 100 BC – 15 March 44 BC), was a Roman general and statesman. A member of the First Triumvirate, Caesar led the Roman armies in the Gallic Wars before defeating his political rival Pompey in a civil war, an ...

's accounts of his campaigns, ''

De Bello Gallico ''Commentarii de Bello Gallico'' (; en, Commentaries on the Gallic War, italic=yes), also ''Bellum Gallicum'' ( en, Gallic War, italic=yes), is Julius Caesar's firsthand account of the Gallic Wars, written as a third-person narrative. In it Ca ...

'' and '' De Bello Civili'', and its sequel by an unknown author '' De Bello Alexandrino''. It details Caesar's campaigns against his Republican enemies in the province of

Africa Africa is the world's second-largest and second-most populous continent, after Asia in both cases. At about 30.3 million km2 (11.7 million square miles) including adjacent islands, it covers 6% of Earth's total surface area ...

Authorship

''De Bello Africo'' is preceded by '' De Bello Alexandrino'' and followed by '' De Bello Hispaniensi''. These three works end the Caesarean corpus relating

Caesar's Civil War Caesar's civil war (49–45 BC) was one of the last politico-military conflicts of the Roman Republic before its reorganization into the Roman Empire. It began as a series of political and military confrontations between Gaius Julius Caesar an ...

. The historical narratives, though attributed to Caesar, are assumed to have been written by three different anonymous authors around 40 BC. Though normally collected and bound with Caesar's authentic writings, their authorship has been debated since antiquity. One very plausible theory favors

Aulus Hirtius Aulus Hirtius (; – 43 BC) was consul of the Roman Republic in 43 BC and a writer on military subjects. He was killed during his consulship in battle against Mark Antony at the Battle of Mutina. Biography He was a legate of Julius Caesar's ...

as the author of '' De Bello Alexandrino'' (see there for details). But due to considerable differences in style, scholarly consensus has ruled out the author of the latter, as well as

, as the author or authors of the two last parts. It has been suggested that these were in fact rough drafts prepared at the request of Hirtius by two separate soldiers who fought in the respective campaign; and had he survived, Hirtius would have worked them up into more effective literary form. There are scholars who propose that he acted as editor to these historical narratives. Regarding ''De Bello Africo'', A.G. Way ventures: "The careful chronology and the faithful record of the feelings of the troops suggests a soldier - possibly a junior officer - who was on the spot. That he was young and inexperienced; an ardent, but not always a balanced, partisan; a keen observer of all that went on around him, but without access to the inner counsels of his C.-in-C."Caesar Alexandrian, African and Spanish Wars, with an English translation by A.G. Way, M.A., The

Loeb Classical Library The Loeb Classical Library (LCL; named after James Loeb; , ) is a series of books originally published by Heinemann in London, but is currently published by Harvard University Press. The library contains important works of ancient Greek and ...

, Harvard University Press, 1955, p.141.

References

{{AncientRome-work-stub Latin histories Africa (Roman province) Depictions of Julius Caesar in literature

Authorship

See also

References