Livy's only surviving work is commonly known as History of Rome (or Ab Urbe Condita, 'From the Founding of the City'). Together with Polybius it is considered one of the main accounts of the Second Punic War.[21]
When he began this work he was already past his youth, probably 33; presumably, events in his life prior to that time had led to his intense activity as a historian. He continued working on it until he left Rome for Padua in his old age, probably in the reign of Tiberius after the death of Augustus. Seneca the Younger[22] says he was an orator and philosopher and had written some historical treatises in those fields.[iii]
History of Rome also served as the driving force behind the "northern theory" regarding the Etruscans' origins. This is because in the book Livy states, "The Greeks also call them the 'Tyrrhene' and the 'Adriatic ... The Alpine tribes are undoubtedly of the same kind, especially the Raetii, who had through the nature of their country become so uncivilized that they retained no trace of their original condition except their language, and even this was not free from corruption".[23] Thus, many scholars, like Karl Otfried Müller, utilized this statement as evidence that the Etruscans or the Tyrrhenians migrated from the north and were descendants of an Alpine tribe known as the Raeti.[24]
