The name Historia Augusta originated with Isaac Casaubon, who produced a critical edition in 1603, working from a complex manuscript tradition with a number of variant versions. The title as recorded on the Codex Palatinus … See more

Existing manuscripts and witnesses of the Historia Augusta fall into three groups:
1. A manuscript of the first quarter of the ninth century, Vatican Pal. lat. 899 (Codex Palatinus), known as P, and its direct and indirect copies. P was written at Lorsch in Caroline minuscule. … See more

A unique feature of the Historia Augusta is that it purports to supply the biographies not only of reigning Emperors (called "primary lives" by modern scholars), but also "secondary … See more

From the sixth century to the end of the 19th century, historians had recognized that the Historia Augusta was a flawed and not a particularly … See more

In 1776, Gibbon observed that there was something wrong with the numbers and names of the imperial biographers, and that this had already been recognised by older historians who … See more

Linked to the problem of dating the composition of the History is the question about the authorship of the work. Taking the History at face value, there is clearly a division between the authors named prior and after the presence of the interrupting lacuna. For the first … See more

Interpretations of the purpose of the History also vary considerably, some considering it a work of fiction or satire intended to entertain (perhaps in the vein of 1066 and All That), others viewing it as a pagan attack on Christianity, the writer having concealed … See more