The most ancient writer of Roman history was Fabius Pictor (fl. 219 B.C.). His principal work, written in Greek, was a history of the first and second Punic war, to which subsequent writers were much indebted. Contemporary with Fabius was Cincius Alimentus, also an annalist of the Punic war, in which he was personally engaged. He was a prisoner of Hannibal, who delighted in the society of literary men, and treated him with great kindness and consideration, and himself communicated to him the details of his passage across the Alps. Like Fabius, he wrote his work in Greek, and prefixed to it a brief abstract of Roman history. Though the works of these annalists are valuable as furnishing materials for more philosophical minds, they are such as could have existed only in the infancy of a national literature. They were a bare compilation of facts-- the mere framework of history--diversified by no critical remarks or political reflections, and meagre and insipid in style.
The versatility of talent displayed by Cato the censor (224-144 B.C.) entitles him to a place among orators, jurists, economists, and historians. His life extends over a wide and important period of literary history, when everything was in a state of change,--morals, social habits, and literary taste. Cato was born in Tusculum, and passed his boyhood in the pursuits of rural life at a small Sabine farm belonging to his father. The skill with which he pleaded the causes of his clients before the rural magistracy made his abilities known, and he rose rapidly to eminence as a pleader. He filled many high offices of state. His energies were not weakened by advancing age, and he was always ready as the advocate of virtue, the champion of the oppressed, and the punisher of vice. With many defects, Cato was morally and intellectually one of the greatest men Rome ever produced. He had the ability and the determination to excel in everything which he undertook. His style is rude, unpolished, ungraceful, because to him polish was superficial, and, therefore, unreal. His statements, however, were clear, his illustrations striking; the words with which he enriched his native tongue were full of meaning; his wit was keen and lively, and his arguments went straight to the intellect, and carried conviction with them.