Annals (Tacitus) in the context of "Histories (Tacitus)"

Publius Cornelius Tacitus, known simply as Tacitus (/ˈtæsɪtəs/ TAS-it-əs, Latin: [ˈtakɪtʊs]; c. AD 56 – c. 120), was a Roman historian and politician. Tacitus is widely regarded as one of the greatest Roman historians by modern scholars.

Tacitus's two major historical works, Annals (Latin: Annales) and the Histories (Latin: Historiae), originally formed a continuous narrative of the Roman Empire from the death of Augustus (14 AD) to the end of Domitian's reign (96 AD). The surviving portions of the Annals focus on the reigns of Tiberius, Claudius, Nero, and those who reigned in the Year of the Four Emperors (69 AD).

Bella Germaniae (English: The History of the Germanic Wars) was a twenty-volume historical work written by the Roman author and commander Pliny the Elder. It is now a lost literary work. The history chronicled the Roman–Germanic wars during the 1st century AD and was written from the perspective of a Roman who had served in Germania.

Bella Germaniae was a significant and respected source, used by later Roman historians such as Plutarch, Tacitus, and Suetonius. Tacitus, in particular, is believed to have used it as a primary source for his own works on the Germanic peoples and wars, including De origine et situ Germanorum and the Annales.

Roman historian and politician Tacitus referred to Jesus, his execution by Pontius Pilate, and the existence of early Christians in Rome in his final work, Annals (written c. AD 116), book 15, chapter 44. The context of the passage is the six-day Great Fire of Rome that burned much of the city in AD 64 during the reign of Roman Emperor Nero. The passage is one of the earliest non-Christian references to the origins of Christianity, the execution of Christ described in the canonical gospels, and the presence and persecution of Christians in 1st-century Rome.

There are two points of vocabulary in the passage. First, Tacitus may have used the word "Chrestians" (Chrestianos) for Christians, but then speaks of "Christ" (Christus) as the origin of that name. Second, he calls Pilate a "procurator", even though other sources indicate that he had the title "prefect". Scholars have proposed various hypotheses to explain these peculiarities. The scholarly consensus is that Tacitus's reference to the execution of Jesus by Pontius Pilate is both authentic, and of historical value as an independent Roman source. However, Tacitus does not reveal the source of his information. There are several hypotheses as to what sources he may have used.