It was history as a story that knew itself as such; it was politics as storytelling, the production of a narrative specifically intended to inspire in its audience a potential for change and to reclaim some kind of goal for a people thrown into confusion by the traumas of the past.

We have read (legimus) that when Thrasea Paetus was praised by Arulenus Rusticus and Helvidius Priscus by Herennius Senecio, it was a capital crime, and cruelty was exercised not only against the authors, but also against their books, since the triumviral committee was delegated to ensure that these monuments to the noblest of talents (monumenta clarissimorum ingeniorum) were burnt in the comitium and forum.