City Travel Guides > Books > Pre-500

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.Hadrian: Empire and Conflict
City Travel Guides > Books > Pre-500
by: Thorsten Opper

July 07, 2008
The Roman empire of the second century AD - Gibbon's golden age in all recorded history - suffers from a relative paucity of good historical sources when compared to say the Late Republic, the Julio-Claudian period or the 4th c. AD. How can the lives of that century's mostly good emperors compete in fascination with the likes of Caligula or Nero or, if you're looking for an interesting good guy let's say Augustus, when the written sources are so poor? We know that Hadrian was one of the greatest and pychologically most complex and interesting of all of the Roman emperors and yet for many of the details of his life we have to rely on the woefully inadequate biography in the Historia Augusta so that much of our understanding of the man and his ... Read More:
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.Ancient Rome: The Rise and Fall of an Empire
City Travel Guides > Books > Pre-500
by: Simon Baker

June 07, 2007
This must the best introduction to Roman history written so far, and one not likely to be superseded in a hurry. Not only that but it has features which can benefit anyone well read in the subject since it casts a new light on some of the most important events in that history.
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.The Roman Empire: A Very Short Introduction (Very Short Introductions)
City Travel Guides > Books > Pre-500
by: Christopher Kelly

August 24, 2006
This excellent introduction to the Roman Empire is succinct and selective rather than superficial. Its compass ranges from the iconography of the Imperial cult to contemporary perceptions of Rome in the cinema.

Far from being a conventional, political history centred on the Roman elite, Kelly is most impressive when trying to recreate the ordinary lives of the silent and all but invisible majority, who have left no historical trace and only the faintest of impressions in the archaeological record. He is especially interesting and perceptive when writing about elusive topics like population studies within the Empire. Hard evidence on such matters is, naturally, very scant. Kelly uses statistical models and contemporary demographic studies ... Read More:
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.History of the Peloponnesian War (Classics)
City Travel Guides > Books > Pre-500
by: Thucydides

February 28, 1974
Thucydides follows self-consciously on from Herodotus as a 'historian' but takes a very different tack. Partly this is due to their place in history: Herodotus was the product of a triumphant Athens leading the mediterannean world after shockingly defeating the huge Persian invasion of Greece, while Thucydides lives through the decline of Athens from her high point under Pericles through to her final defeat under Sparta. A critic of Athenian democracy and the rise of the demagogues, Thucydides is also a participant in the 37 years long war, as strategos (General) who was defeated at Amphipolis and exiled from Athens. What is amazing is his ability to stay detached and analytical, despite his personal involvement in events.
This is a heart-breaking ... Read More:
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.Persian Fire: The First World Empire, Battle for the West
City Travel Guides > Books > Pre-500
by: Tom Holland

August 03, 2006
I greatly enjoyed Tom Holland's 'Rubicon', full of juicy gossip about those naughty Romans but also genuinely respectful of the little that was worthwile in their legacy. 'Persian Fire' is a bit different, being a retelling of a story in which the stakes were considerably higher. If the Persians had conquered Greece, there is no doubt that the history of Europe would have ended up being very different. Not necessarily very much worse, just not the same. The Greeks would not have been allowed to develop the way that they did; the histories of philosophy, literature, drama and political theory would undoubtedly have been seriously affected. Whatever we may feel about the Romans (and I personally am not a huge fan of the Roman Empire), the Greek defeat ... Read More:
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.The Twelve Caesars (Penguin Classics)
City Travel Guides > Books > Pre-500
by: Suetonius, Robert Graves

October 25, 2007
I only endured two or three episodes of the TV series "Rome", supposedly the most expensive television series ever made. Oh, really? Presumably, they spent so much cash on the uniforms, that they forgot to pay the scriptwriter. I have seldom seen such ridiculous trash on TV.

Do you want real gossip about Julius Caesar and the Roman emperors? Then, buy this book. Its a modern translation of an ancient Roman book, written by the historian Suetonius. Its most famous for two passing references to Christians, but if thats all you know about it, you are missing out...

Not being a historian, I cant judge how reliable the information given by Suetonius really is. But as a collection of funny gossip about Caesar and the emperors, it must be ... Read More:
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.The Fall of the Roman Empire: A New History
City Travel Guides > Books > Pre-500
by: Peter Heather

May 05, 2006
While this is not a bad history I would echo some points made by other reviewers here; not so much about The Fall of Rome as The Rise of the Barbarians and marred by some inaccuracies, would-be hip phrases and chapter headings and particularly by suppositions being referred to as facts. It is also over-long and suffers a tendency to digression in places. For those wishing to delve into the fall of the empire in the west it would be preferable to begin with Michael Grant's excellent 'The Fall of the Roman Empire' and Arthur Ferrill's 'The Fall of the Roman Empire - The Military Explanation'. Heather is particularly weak on military aspects and an understanding of these is crucial as to why the Western Roman Empire fell. Incidentally, Ferrill and Grant are both ... Read More:
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.The Oxford History of Greece and the Hellenistic World
City Travel Guides > Books > Pre-500
from: Oxford Paperbacks

May 31, 2001
This book is a collection of chapters from various historians pulled together in one book that covers the Heroic Age through to the Hellenistic world (a long time)! Most of the authors are easy to read and write in a way where the average reader can get a lot from them, however, some are not as good. This book is probably recommended to somebody who has read a few books on the Greeks before, since many of the terms are not explained (it is assumed the reader already knows). A good book to expand previous knowledge on the Ancient Greeks.

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.The Letters of Pliny the Younger (Penguin Classics)
City Travel Guides > Books > Pre-500
by: Pliny the Younger

January 31, 1974
Many books have been penned about Ancient Rome. Some are well written and know what the're talking about - whilst others are long-winded and can bore you to tears in thirty seconds. Well, how about slicing through all that - and reading the words of a man who was actually there?

Pliny (the Younger) was a Roman nobleman born around 61AD. He served as a magistrate under the emperor Trajan, and was the nephew of Pliny (the Elder) the famous statesman and writer. It's refreshing to read the words of an actual Roman for a change instead of those of ancient or modern historians, and Pliny's letters cover many fascinating aspects of roman life. Also gratifying is that often we are also given the replies.

Among the topics covered are; family, villas, court cases, ... Read More:
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.Britannia - The Failed State: Tribal Conflicts and the End of Roman Britain: Tribal Conflict and the End of Roman Britain
City Travel Guides > Books > Pre-500
by: Stuart Laycock

June 06, 2008
A number of commentators in recent years have noted how the human propensity for stories, hard wired into our minds, provides the mechanism by which humans understand the world. Myths are stories we generate to serve as starting points to sharing our understanding of a subject, and sometimes to preserving a particular social or cultural point of view. The mythic Fall of the Roman Empire generates new books and cinema releases on a regular basis. One of greatest mysteries coming out of that fall is the transmutation of the Roman province of Britannia into Anglo-Saxon England despite the doomed heroism of the often reworked figure[s] of Ambrosius/Arthur.


In 1980, a revolution occurred in our stories explaining another popular conundrum, What Killed The Dinosaurs? ... Read More:
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