小普林尼最著名的是他的書信。他一共收集和發(fā)表了10卷,369封信。其中前9卷包括248封信,這248封信是寫給105個不同的收信人的,其中包括朋友、熟人和當時的知名人士。這些信都在普林尼赴比提尼亞前發(fā)表的。第十卷包括他與圖拉真之間的書信往來(共12封信,其中包括圖拉真的回信)。在這些信中小普林尼也探討了如何對待基督教的問題。在給塔西佗的信中普林尼描述了使他的叔叔和導師老普林尼喪生的那場維蘇威火山的爆發(fā)。小普林尼在發(fā)表他的書信時特別注意保持書信的格式(包括收信人、發(fā)信人、稱呼等等格式)。在每封信中他都會討論一個問題。他的書信涉及到羅馬上層社會幾乎所有的生活問題。雖然這些書信是經(jīng)過加工后發(fā)表的,而且其詮言風格“一般”,但是他為后人提供了當時羅馬社會、生活和政治的詳細的描述。比如他描述了個人的事務、報道、政治、對他的莊園的描寫、對風景的描寫、教育問題等等。只有第十卷中的書信是按照其發(fā)送時間排列的。 Pliny the Younger or Caius Plinius Caecilius Secundus (62-c.115): Roman senator, nephew of Pliny the Elder, governor of Bithynia-Pontus (109-111), author of a famous collection of letters.
The Columbia Encyclopedia, Sixth Edition. 2001.
Pliny the Elder
(Caius Plinius Secundus) (pl′n) (KEY) , c.A.D. 23–A.D. 79, Roman naturalist, b. Cisalpine Gaul. He was a friend and fellow soldier of Vespasian, and he dedicated his great work to Titus. He died of asphyxiation in the neighborhood of Vesuvius, having gone to investigate the eruption. His one surviving work is an encyclopedia of natural science (Historia naturalis). It is divided into 37 books and, after a preface, deals with the nature of the physical universe; geography; anthropology; zoology; botany, including the medicinal uses of plants; curatives derived from the animal world; and mineralogy, including an account of the uses of pigments and a history of the fine arts. Pliny’s industry was immense and his knowledge of sources extensive, but his information is mostly secondhand and quite useless as science. 1 See Selections from the History of the World, ed. by P. Turner (1962). 2
His nephew and ward, Pliny the Younger (Caius Plinius Caecilius Secundus), A.D. 62?–c.A.D. 113, was an orator and a statesman. He was quaestor (A.D. 89), tribune (A.D. 91), and praetor (A.D. 93) and subsequently held treasury posts. He was consul (A.D. 100) and died in his proconsular province of Pontus-Bithynia. His fame rests on his letters, written probably for publication, which are an excellent mirror of Roman life. 3
See his Letters and Panegyricus, tr. by B. Radice (2 vol., 1969); studies by S. E. Stout (1954) and A. N. Sherwin-White (1966). 4