an orator and historian, who lived under Augustus and Tiberius. He drew up an account of the Roman wars in Germany, and also wrote a work upon Roman history of a more general character, which was continued, in thirty-one books, by the elder Pliny. No fragment of his compositions has been preserved. (Dialog. de Orat. 23; Quint. Inst. 10.1, 102, &c.; Senec. Suasor. 6, Ep. xxx., which perhaps refers to a son of this individual; Plin. H. N. Praef., Ep. 3.5, 9. ed. Titze.) It will be clearly perceived, upon comparing the two passages last referred to, that Pliny wrote a continuation of the general history of Bassus, and not of his history of the German wars, as Bahr and others have asserted. His praenomen is uncertain. Orelli (ad Dialog. de Orat. 100.23) rejects Titus, and shews from Priscian (lib. viii. p. 371, ed. Krehl), that Publius is more likely to be correct.
[W.R]A Dictionary of Greek and Roman biography and mythology
Smith, William
A Dictionary of Greek and Roman biography and mythology. William Smith, LLD, ed. 1890