Florus

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For other uses, see Florus (disambiguation).

Florus, Roman historian, lived in the time of Trajan and Hadrian.

He compiled, chiefly from Livy, a brief sketch of the history of Rome from the foundation of the city to the closing of the temple of Janus by Augustus (25 BC). The work, which is called Epitome de T. Livio Bellorum omnium annorum DCC Libri duo, is written in a bombastic and rhetorical style, and is rather a panegyric of the greatness of Rome, whose life is divided into the periods of infancy, youth and manhood. It is often wrong in geographical and chronological details; but, in spite of its faults, the book was much used in the Middle Ages as a handy epitome, and survived as a textbook into the nineteenth century.

In the manuscripts the writer is variously given as Julius Florus, Lucius Anneus Florus, or simply Annaeus Florus. From certain similarities of style he has been identified with Publius Annius Florus, poet, rhetorician and friend of Hadrian, author of a dialogue on the question of whether Virgil was an orator or poet, of which the introduction has been preserved.

The most accessible modern text and translation are in the Loeb Classical Library (no. 231, published 1984, ISBN 0674992547).