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The Sibylline Books or Libri Sibyllini were a collection of oracular
Oracle

An oracle is a person or agency considered to be a source of wise counsel or prophecy opinion; an infallible authority, usually Spirituality in nature....
 utterances, set out in Greek
Ancient Greece

The term Ancient Greece refers to the period of History of Greece lasting from the Greek Dark Ages ca. 1100 BC and the Dorian invasion, to 146 BC and the Roman Republic conquest of Greece after the Battle of Corinth ....
 hexameter
Hexameter

Hexameter is a literature and poetry form, a Line consisting of six metrical foot, as in the Iliad. It was the standard epic metre in Greek and became standard for Latin too....
s, purchased from a sibyl
Sibyl

The word sibyl probably comes from the ancient Greek word sibylla, meaning prophetess. The earliest oracular seeresses known as the sibyls of antiquity, "who admittedly are known only through legend" prophesied at certain holy sites, under the divine influence of a deity, originally? at Delphi and Pessinos? one of the chthonic earth-go...
 by the last king of Rome
Ancient Rome

Ancient Rome was a civilization that grew out of a small agricultural community founded on the Italian Peninsula as early as the 10th century BC....
, Tarquinius Superbus, and consulted at momentous crises through the history of the Republic
Roman Republic

The Roman Republic was the phase of the Ancient Rome characterized by a republican form of government; a period which began with the overthrow of the Roman Roman Kingdom, c....
 and the Empire
Roman Empire

The Roman Empire was the Roman Republic phase of the Ancient Rome, characterised by an autocracy form of government and large territorial holdings in Europe and around the Mediterranean....
. Only fragments have survived, the rest being lost or deliberately destroyed
Book burning

Book burning is the practice of destroying, often ceremony, one or more copies of a book or other written material. In modern times, other forms of media, such as gramophone record, Video, and Compact disc have also been ceremoniously burned, torched, or shredded....
.

The Sibylline Books should not be confused with the so-called Sibylline Oracles
Sibylline oracles

The Sibylline Oracles are a collection of oracular utterances written in Dactylic hexameter ascribed to the Sibyls, prophetesses who uttered divine revelations in a frenzied state....
, twelve books of prophesies thought to be of Judaeo-Christian origin.

rding to the Roman tradition, the oldest collection of Sibylline books appears to have been made about the time of Solon
Solon

Solon was an Athens statesman, lawmaker, and lyric poetry. He is remembered particularly for his efforts to legislate against political, economic and moral decline in Archaic period in Greece Athens....
 and Cyrus at Gergis on Mount Ida
Mount Ida

In Greek mythology, two sacred mountains are called Mount Ida, the "Mountain of the Goddess": Mount Ida, Crete, and Mount Ida, Turkey, known as Mount Ida, Turkey in Classical times....
 in the Troad; it was attributed to the Hellespontine Sibyl
Hellespontine Sibyl

The Hellespont Sibyl was the priestess presiding over the Apollo oracle at Dardania . The Sibyl is sometimes referred to as the Trojan Sibyl....
 and was preserved in the temple of Apollo at Gergis.






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The Sibylline Books or Libri Sibyllini were a collection of oracular
Oracle

An oracle is a person or agency considered to be a source of wise counsel or prophecy opinion; an infallible authority, usually Spirituality in nature....
 utterances, set out in Greek
Ancient Greece

The term Ancient Greece refers to the period of History of Greece lasting from the Greek Dark Ages ca. 1100 BC and the Dorian invasion, to 146 BC and the Roman Republic conquest of Greece after the Battle of Corinth ....
 hexameter
Hexameter

Hexameter is a literature and poetry form, a Line consisting of six metrical foot, as in the Iliad. It was the standard epic metre in Greek and became standard for Latin too....
s, purchased from a sibyl
Sibyl

The word sibyl probably comes from the ancient Greek word sibylla, meaning prophetess. The earliest oracular seeresses known as the sibyls of antiquity, "who admittedly are known only through legend" prophesied at certain holy sites, under the divine influence of a deity, originally? at Delphi and Pessinos? one of the chthonic earth-go...
 by the last king of Rome
Ancient Rome

Ancient Rome was a civilization that grew out of a small agricultural community founded on the Italian Peninsula as early as the 10th century BC....
, Tarquinius Superbus, and consulted at momentous crises through the history of the Republic
Roman Republic

The Roman Republic was the phase of the Ancient Rome characterized by a republican form of government; a period which began with the overthrow of the Roman Roman Kingdom, c....
 and the Empire
Roman Empire

The Roman Empire was the Roman Republic phase of the Ancient Rome, characterised by an autocracy form of government and large territorial holdings in Europe and around the Mediterranean....
. Only fragments have survived, the rest being lost or deliberately destroyed
Book burning

Book burning is the practice of destroying, often ceremony, one or more copies of a book or other written material. In modern times, other forms of media, such as gramophone record, Video, and Compact disc have also been ceremoniously burned, torched, or shredded....
.

The Sibylline Books should not be confused with the so-called Sibylline Oracles
Sibylline oracles

The Sibylline Oracles are a collection of oracular utterances written in Dactylic hexameter ascribed to the Sibyls, prophetesses who uttered divine revelations in a frenzied state....
, twelve books of prophesies thought to be of Judaeo-Christian origin.

History

Erythraeansibylbymichelangelo
According to the Roman tradition, the oldest collection of Sibylline books appears to have been made about the time of Solon
Solon

Solon was an Athens statesman, lawmaker, and lyric poetry. He is remembered particularly for his efforts to legislate against political, economic and moral decline in Archaic period in Greece Athens....
 and Cyrus at Gergis on Mount Ida
Mount Ida

In Greek mythology, two sacred mountains are called Mount Ida, the "Mountain of the Goddess": Mount Ida, Crete, and Mount Ida, Turkey, known as Mount Ida, Turkey in Classical times....
 in the Troad; it was attributed to the Hellespontine Sibyl
Hellespontine Sibyl

The Hellespont Sibyl was the priestess presiding over the Apollo oracle at Dardania . The Sibyl is sometimes referred to as the Trojan Sibyl....
 and was preserved in the temple of Apollo at Gergis. From Gergis the collection passed to Erythrae
Erythrae

Erythrae or Erythrai later Litri, was one of the Ionian League Ionian cities of Asia Minor, situated 22 km north-east of the port of Cyssus , on a small peninsula stretching into the Bay of Erythrae, at an equal distance from the mountains Mimas and Corycus , and directly opposite the island of Chios....
, where it became famous as the oracles of the Erythraean Sibyl
Erythraean Sibyl

The Erythraean Sibyl, by the name of Herophile, was the prophetess of classical antiquity presiding over the Apollonian oracle at Erythrae, a town in Ionia opposite Chios....
. It would appear to have been this very collection that found its way to Cumae
Cumae

Cumae is an ancient Greek settlement lying to the northwest of Naples in the Italian region of Campania. Cumae was the first Greek colony on the mainland of Italy and is perhaps most famous as the seat of the Cumaean Sibyl....
 (see the Cumaean Sibyl
Cumaean Sibyl

The ageless Cumaean Sibyl was the priestess presiding over the Apollonian oracle at Cumae, a Greek colony located near Naples, Italy.The word Sibyl comes from the ancient Greek word sibylla, meaning prophetess....
) and from Cumae to Rome.

The story of the acquisition of the Sibylline Books by Tarquinius, is one of the famous mythic elements of Roman history. At Cumae, Virgil
Virgil

Publius Vergilius Maro was a classical Roman poet, best known for three major works?the Bucolics , the Georgics and the Aeneid?although several Appendix Vergiliana are also attributed to him....
 has Aeneas
Aeneas

This article is about the Roman hero. For other uses, see Aeneas .In Greco-Roman mythology, Aeneas was a Troy hero, the son of prince Anchises and the goddess Venus_....
 consult the Cumaean Sibyl
Cumaean Sibyl

The ageless Cumaean Sibyl was the priestess presiding over the Apollonian oracle at Cumae, a Greek colony located near Naples, Italy.The word Sibyl comes from the ancient Greek word sibylla, meaning prophetess....
 before his descent to the lower world (Aeneid
Aeneid

The Aeneid is a Latin Epic poetry written by Virgil in the late 1st century BC that tells the legendary story of Aeneas, a Troy who traveled to Italy, where he became the ancestor of the Rome....
 VI, 10). The Cumaean Sibyl offered to Tarquinius nine books of these prophecies; and as the king declined to purchase them, owing to the exorbitant price she demanded, she burned three and offered the remaining six to Tarquinius at the same stiff price, which he again refused, whereupon she burned three more and repeated her offer. Tarquinius then relented and purchased the last three at the full original price and had them preserved in a vault beneath the Capitoline temple of Jupiter. The story is alluded to in Varro
Marcus Terentius Varro

Marcus Terentius Varro , also known as Varro Reatinus to distinguish him from his younger contemporary Varro Atacinus, was a Ancient Rome scholar and writer....
's lost books quoted in Lactantius
Lactantius

Lucius Caelius Firmianus Lactantius was an early Christian author ....
 Institutiones Divinae (I: 6) and by Origen
Origen

Origen was an Early Christianity scholar, theology, and one of the most distinguished of the early Church father of the Christian Church. According to tradition, he is held to have been an Ancient Egypt who taught in Alexandria, reviving the Catechetical School of Alexandria where Clement of Alexandria had taught....
.

The Sibylline Books were entrusted to the care of two patrician
Patrician

The term "patrician" originally referred to a group of elitism citizens in ancient Rome, including both their natural and adopted members. In the late Roman empire, the class was broadened to include high council officials, and after the fall of the Western Empire became a term for Byzantine Imperial governors in the West....
s; after 367 BC ten custodians were appointed, five patricians and five plebeians, who were called the decemviri sacris faciundis; subsequently (probably in the time of Sulla
Lucius Cornelius Sulla

Lucius Cornelius Sulla Felix , or simply Sulla, was a Roman general and politician, holding the office of consul twice as well as the Roman dictator....
) their number was increased to fifteen, the quindecimviri sacris faciundis. They were usually ex-consuls or ex-praetors. They held office for life, and were exempt from all other public duties. They had the responsibility of keeping the books in safety and secrecy. These officials, at the command of the Senate, consulted the Sibylline Books in order to discover, not exact predictions of definite future events in the form of prophecy
Prophecy

Prophecy, generally, describes the disclosing of information that is not known to the prophet by any ordinary means. In religion, this is thought to be a divinely inspired revelation or interpretation....
, but the religious observances necessary to avert extraordinary calamities and to expiate ominous prodigies (comets and earthquakes, plague and the like). It was only the rites of expiation prescribed by the Sibylline Books, according to the interpretation of the oracle that were communicated to the public, and not the oracles themselves, which left ample opportunity for abuses.

In particular the keepers of the Sibylline Books had the superintendence of the worship of Apollo
Apollo

In Greek mythology and Roman mythology, Apollo , is one of the most important and many-sided of the Twelve Olympians. The ideal of the kouros , Apollo has been variously recognized as a god of light and the sun; truth and prophecy; archery; medicine and healing; music, poetry, and the arts; and more....
, of the "Great Mother" Cybele
Cybele

Cybele , was the Phrygian deification of the Earth Mother. As with Greek Gaia , or her Minoan civilization equivalent Rhea , Cybele embodies the fertile Earth, a goddess of caverns and mountains, walls and fortresses, nature, wild animals ....
 or Magna Mater, and of Ceres
Ceres (mythology)

| Image = Ceres_statue.jpg| Caption = This statue depicting Ceres holding wheat is on display at the Louvre in Paris, France.| Name = Ceres| God_of = Goddess of growing plants and motherly love...
, which had been introduced by the Sibylline Books. Thus one important effect of the Sibylline Books was their influence on applying Greek cult practice and Greek conceptions of deities to indigenous Roman religion, which was already indirectly influenced through Etruscan
Etruscan mythology

The Etruscan civilizations were a people of unknown origin living in Northern Italy, who were eventually integrated into Roman culture and politically became part of the Roman Republic....
 religion. As the Sibylline Books had been collected in Anatolia
Anatolia

Anatolia or Asia Minor is a region of Western Asia, comprising most of the modern Republic of Turkey. It is a geographic region bounded by the Black Sea to the north, the Caucasus to the northeast, the Aegean Sea to the west, the Mediterranean Sea to the south, and the Iranian plateau to the east and southeast....
, in the neighborhood of Troy
Troy

Troy is a legendary city and center of the Trojan War, as described in the Epic Cycle, and especially in the Iliad, one of the two epic poems attributed to Homer....
, they recognized the goddesses and gods and the rites observed there and helped introduce them into Roman State worship, a syncretic amalgamation of national deities with the corresponding deities of Greece, and a general modification of the Roman religion.

Since they were written in hexameter verse and in Greek, the college of curators was always assisted by two Greek interpreters. The books were kept in the Temple of Jupiter on the Capitol
Capitoline Hill

The Capitoline Hill , between the Roman Forum and the Campus Martius, is one of the seven hills of Rome of Rome. By the 16th century, Capitolinus had become Campidoglio in the Romanesco....
, and when the temple burned in 83 BC, they were lost. The Roman Senate sent envoys in 76 BC to replace them with a collection of similar oracular sayings, in particular collected from Ilium
Troy

Troy is a legendary city and center of the Trojan War, as described in the Epic Cycle, and especially in the Iliad, one of the two epic poems attributed to Homer....
, Erythrae, and Samos
Samos Island

Samos is a Greece island in the North Aegean sea, south of Chios, north of Patmos and the Dodecanese, and off the Ionian coast of Turkey....
, Sicily and Africa. This new Sibylline collection was deposited in the restored temple, together with similar sayings of native origin, e.g. those of the Sibyl at Tibur (the 'Tiburtine Sibyl
Tiburtine Sibyl

The Tiburtine Sibyl was a Ancient Rome sibyl, whose seat was the ancient Etruscan civilization town of Tibur .The mythic meeting of Caesar Augustus with the Sibyl, of whom he inquired whether he should be worshiped as a god, was a favored wiktionary:motif of Christian artists....
') of the brothers Marcius, and others. The priests then sorted them, retaining only those that appeared true to them (Tacitus, Annales, VI, 12). From the Capitol, they were transferred by Augustus as pontifex maximus in 12 BC, to the temple of Apollo Patrous on the Palatine, after they had been examined and copied; there they remained until about AD 405. According to the poet Rutilius Claudius Namatianus
Rutilius Claudius Namatianus

Rutilius Claudius Namatianus was a ancient Rome poet, notable as the author of a Latin poem, De Reditu Suo, in elegiac metre, describing a coastal voyage from Rome to Gaul in 416....
, the general Flavius Stilicho
Stilicho

Flavius Stilicho was a high-ranking general , Patrician and Consul of the Western Roman Empire, notably of barbarian birth....
 (died AD 408) burned them, as they were used to attack his government.

Some genuine Sibylline verses are preserved in the Book of Marvels or Memorabilia of Phlegon of Tralles
Phlegon of Tralles

Phlegon, of Tralles in Asia Minor, Greece writer and freedman of the emperor Hadrian, lived in the 2nd century.His chief work was the Olympiads, an historical compendium in sixteen books, from the 1st down to the 229th Olympiad , of which several chapters are preserved in Eusebius' Chronicle, Photios I of Constantinople and Syncellu...
 (2nd century AD). These represent an oracle, or a combination of two oracles, of seventy hexameters in all. They report the birth of an androgyne
Androgyny

Androgyny is a term derived from the Greek language words a??? and ???? that can refer to either of two related concepts about gender: the mixing of masculinity and femininity characteristics, as in fashion statements; or the balance of "anima and animus" in Analytical psychology....
, and prescribe a long list of rituals and offerings to the gods.

Relationship with the "Sibylline Oracles"

The Sibylline Oracles were quoted by the Roman-Jewish historian Josephus
Josephus

Josephus , also known as Yosef Ben Matityahu and, after he became a Roman citizenship, as Titus Flavius Josephus, was a first-century Jewish historian and apologist of priestly and royal ancestry who survived and recorded the destruction of Jerusalem in AD 70....
 (late 1st century) as well as by numerous Christian writers of the second century, including Athenagoras of Athens
Athenagoras of Athens

Athenagoras was a Christian apologist who lived during the second half of the 2nd century of whom little is known for certain, besides that he was Athens , a philosopher, and a convert to Christianity....
 who, in a letter addressed to Marcus Aurelius
Marcus Aurelius

Marcus Aurelius Antoninus Augustus was Roman Emperor from 161 to his death in 180. He was the last of the "Five Good Emperors", and is also considered one of the most important stoicism philosophy....
 in ca. AD 176, quoted verbatim a section of the extant Oracles, in the midst of a lengthy series of other classical and pagan references such as Homer
Homer

Homer is traditionally held to be the author of the ancient Greek language epic poems the Iliad and the Odyssey, as well as of the Homeric Hymns....
 and Hesiod
Hesiod

Hesiod was a Greek language oral poet, his date is uncertain but leading scholars agree that Hesiod lived in the latter half of the Eighth-century BCE....
, stating several times that all these works should already be familiar to the Roman Emperor. Copies of the actual Sibylline Books (as reconstituted in 76 BC) were still in the Roman Temple at this time. The Oracles are nevertheless thought by modern scholars to be anonymous compilations that assumed their final form in the fifth century, after the Sibylline Books perished. They are a miscellaneous collection of Jewish and Christian portents of future disasters, that may illustrate the confusions about sibyls that were accumulating among Christians of Late Antiquity
Late Antiquity

Late Antiquity is a periodization used by historians to describe the transitional centuries from Classical antiquity to the Middle Ages, in both mainland Europe and the Mediterranean world: generally from the end of the Roman Empire's Crisis of the Third Century to the Islamic conquests and the re-organization of the Byzantine Empire under...
 .

Consultations of the Books cited in history

An incomplete list of consultations of the Sibylline Books recorded by historians:

  • 399 BC: The books were consulted following a pestilence, resulting in the institution of the lectisternium
    Lectisternium

    Lectisternium , in ancient Rome, was a propitiatory ceremony, consisting of a meal offered to gods and goddesses, represented by their busts or statues, or by portable figures of wood, with heads of bronze, wax or marble, and covered with drapery....
     ceremony. (Livy
    Livy

    Titus Livius , known as Livy in English language, was a Ancient Rome historian who wrote a monumental history of Rome, Ab Urbe Condita, from its founding through the reign of Augustus in Livy's own time....
     5,13)
  • 295 BC: They were consulted again following a pestilence, and reports that large numbers of Appius Claudius
    Appius Claudius

    There were a number of Ancient Rome named Appius Claudius:* Appius Claudius Sabinus Inregillensis, consul in 495 BC* Appius Claudius Crassus, a decemvir in 451 BC...
    ' army had been struck by lightning. A Temple was built to Venus near the Circus Maximus. (Livy 10,31)
  • 293 BC: After yet another plague, the books were consulted, with the prescription being 'that Aesculapius must be brought to Rome from Epidaurus
    Epidaurus

    Epidaurus was a small city in ancient Greece, at the Saronic Gulf. The modern town Epidavros , part of the prefecture of Argolis, was built near the ancient site....
    '; however, the Senate, being preoccupied with the Samnite wars
    Samnite Wars

    The First, Second, and Third Samnite wars, between the early Roman Republic and the tribes of Samnium, extended over half a century, involving almost all the states of Italy, and ended in Roman domination of the Samnites....
    , took no steps beyond performing one day of public prayers to Aesculapius. (Livy 10,47)
  • 240/238 BC: The Ludi Florales
    Religious festival

    A religious festival is a time of special importance marked by adherents to that religion. Religious festivals are commonly celebrated on recurring cycles in a calendar year or lunar calendar....
    , or "Flower Games", were instituted after consulting the books.
  • 216 BC: When Hannibal annihilated the Roman Legions at Cannae
    Battle of Cannae

    The Battle of Cannae was a major battle of the Second Punic War, taking place on August 2, 216 BC near the town of Cannae in Apulia in southeast Italy....
    , the books were consulted, and on their recommendation, two Gauls and two Greeks were buried alive in the city's marketplace.
  • 204 BC: During the Second Punic War
    Second Punic War

    The Second Punic War lasted from 218 BC to 201 BC and involved combatants in the western and eastern Mediterranean. It was the second of three major wars between Carthage and the Roman Republic....
    , upon interpreting the oracles in the Sibylline Books, Scipio Africanus
    Scipio Africanus

    Publius Cornelius Scipio Africanus also known as Scipio Africanus, Scipio the Elder, and Africanus the Elder was a general in the Second Punic War and statesman of the Roman Republic....
     brought an image of Cybele
    Cybele

    Cybele , was the Phrygian deification of the Earth Mother. As with Greek Gaia , or her Minoan civilization equivalent Rhea , Cybele embodies the fertile Earth, a goddess of caverns and mountains, walls and fortresses, nature, wild animals ....
     from Pessinos and established her cult in Rome.
  • 63 BC: Believing in a prediction of the books that 'three Cornelii' would dominate Rome, Publius Cornelius Lentulus Sura took part in the conspiracy of Catiline
    Catiline

    Lucius Sergius Catilina , known in English language as Catiline, was a Roman Republic politician of the 1st century BC who is best known for the Catiline conspiracy, an attempt to overthrow the Roman Republic, and in particular the power of the aristocratic Roman Senate....
     (Plutarch, Life of Cicero, XVII)
  • ca. 55 BC: As Romans deliberated sending a force to restore Ptolemy XII to the throne of Egypt, lightning struck the statue of Jupiter
    Jupiter (mythology)

    In Roman mythology, Jupiter or Jove was the king of the gods,and the god of sky and thunder. He is the equivalent of Zeus in the Greek pantheon....
     on the Alban Mount; the oracles were consulted and one found to read "If the King of Egypt comes to you asking for assistance, refuse him not your friendship, yet do not grant him any army, or else you will have toil and danger". This considerably delayed Ptolemy's return. (Dio Cassius
    Dio Cassius

    Lucius Cassius Dio Cocceianus , known in English language as Cassius Dio, Dio Cassius, or Dio was a noted Roman Empire historian and public servant....
     History of Rome 39:15)
  • 44 BC: According to Suetonius
    Suetonius

    Gaius Suetonius Tranquillus, commonly known as Suetonius , was an equestrian and a historian during the Roman Empire. His most important surviving work is a set of biographies on the battles of twelve successive Roman rulers, from Julius Caesar until Domitian, entitled On the Life of the Caesars....
    , a sibylline prediction that only a king could triumph over Parthia
    Parthia

    Parthia is a region of north-eastern Iran, best known for having been the political and cultural base of the Arsacid dynasty, after which the Arsacid Empire is then also known as the 'Parthian Empire'....
     fueled rumors that Caesar
    Julius Caesar

    'Gaius Julius Caesar' , July 13, 100 BC ? March 15, 44 BC,) was a Roman Republic military and political leader. He played a critical role in the transformation of the Roman Republic into the Roman Empire....
    , leader of the then-republic, was aspiring to kingship. *15 AD: When the Tiber river flooded the lower parts of Rome, one of the priests suggested consulting the books, but Emperor Tiberius
    Tiberius

    Tiberius Julius Caesar Augustus, born Tiberius Claudius Nero , was the second Roman Emperor, from the death of Augustus in AD 14 until his own death in 37....
     refused, preferring to keep the divine things secret. (Tacitus, Annales I, 72)
  • 271: The books were consulted following the Roman defeat at Placentia
    Battle of Placentia

    The Battle of Placentia was fought in January 271 between a Roman Empire army led by Emperor Aurelian and the Alamanni , near modern Piacenza....
     by the Alamanni
    Alamanni

    The Alamanni, Allemanni, or Alemanni were originally an alliance of Germanic languagess located around the upper Main river . One of the earliest references to them is the cognomen Alamannicus assumed by Caracalla, who ruled the Roman Empire from 211?17 and claimed thereby to be their defeater....
    .
  • 312: Maxentius
    Maxentius

    Marcus Aurelius Valerius Maxentius was Western Roman Emperor from 306 to 312. He was the son of former emperor Maximian, and the son-in-law of Galerius, also an emperor....
     consulted the Sibylline Books in preparation for combat with Constantine, who had recently switched his allegiance from Apollo
    Apollo

    In Greek mythology and Roman mythology, Apollo , is one of the most important and many-sided of the Twelve Olympians. The ideal of the kouros , Apollo has been variously recognized as a god of light and the sun; truth and prophecy; archery; medicine and healing; music, poetry, and the arts; and more....
     to Christ
    Jesus

    Jesus of Nazareth , also known as Jesus Christ, is the central figure of Christianity and is revered by most Christian churches as the Son of God and the Incarnation ....
    .
  • 363: Julian the Apostate
    Julian the Apostate

    Flavius Claudius Julianus, known also as Julian or Julian the Apostate , was Roman Emperor of the Constantinian dynasty. He was the last non-Christian Roman Emperor, and expended much energy during his reign attempting to supplant the growing power of Christianity within the empire with officially revived Religion in ancient Rom...
     consulted the books in preparation for marching against the Parthians. The response mailed from Rome "manifestly supported crossing the border this year." (Ammianus Marcellinus
    Ammianus Marcellinus

    Ammianus Marcellinus was a fourth-century Ancient Rome historian. His is the last major historical account of the late Roman empire which survives today....
    , History of Rome, XIII, 7)
  • 405: Stilicho
    Stilicho

    Flavius Stilicho was a high-ranking general , Patrician and Consul of the Western Roman Empire, notably of barbarian birth....
     ordered the destruction of the Sibylline Books, possibly because Sibylline prophecies were being used to attack his government in the face of the attack of Alaric I
    Alaric I

    Alaric I , was likely born about 370 on an Peuce Island at the mouth of the Danube. He was king of the Visigoths from 395–410 and the first Germanic peoples leader to take the city of Rome....
    .


External links