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A History of Rome Down to the Reign of Constantine
'A unique achievement in its genre: a masterly synthesis of a huge mass of material. It deals with the political, military, social & cultural aspects of Roman civilisation, extending over a millennium.'--KLEIO
'We must indeed be grateful for what we have been given, which is immense. It is not often that a new edition of an old book can be hailed as a major event but this is the exception.'-- Times Literary Supplement
'Almost nothing has escaped Scullard's attention, including some extremely recent items. It will be an ideal work of reference for students.'--Times Higher Education Supplement
The aim of this now classic work on the history of Rome is to provide a comprehensive survey of Roman history down to the dawn of the Middle Ages, within the compass of one volume. It contains a profusion of maps & photographs as well as many coin photographs, covering almost the entire period of Roman history.
'We must indeed be grateful for what we have been given, which is immense. It is not often that a new edition of an old book can be hailed as a major event but this is the exception.'-- Times Literary Supplement
'Almost nothing has escaped Scullard's attention, including some extremely recent items. It will be an ideal work of reference for students.'--Times Higher Education Supplement
The aim of this now classic work on the history of Rome is to provide a comprehensive survey of Roman history down to the dawn of the Middle Ages, within the compass of one volume. It contains a profusion of maps & photographs as well as many coin photographs, covering almost the entire period of Roman history.
836 pages, Hardcover
First published January 1, 1935
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Displaying 1 - 10 of 10 reviews
March 5, 2016
Makes all other textbooks look like wimpy posers. Clear writing, clear hypotheses, and without much of the jargon that makes Roman history so difficult. I teach Rome from this book.
June 19, 2021
"A History of Rome" must be one of the finest historical surveys ever written: sweepingly comprehensive, providing bold yet nuanced judgments, presented in a lively style that sparkles across all 783 pages.
Covering a more complete time span than Gibbon’s classic history – one that includes the origins of Rome as well as the entire republican period – it is sharper and more incisive than recent textbooks.
The book’s wisdom starts on page one of the preface:
“The chief requirement in a book of this kind is not that it should be meticulously exact and up to date in all its facts, but that it should arrange and evaluate the facts in due order and proportion.”
Following that principle, Cary’s chapters survey the evolution of Rome and its civilization at several levels.
His political narrative gives equal attention to the republican and imperial periods. In addition to the succession of consuls and emperors – their personalities, power struggles, and frequently bloody demises – Cary describes in detail the development of administrative organization of both civilian and military affairs. His coverage of the twists and turns of the many civil and foreign wars is complete. This includes instances of honorable as well as treacherous Roman behavior, which together enabled Rome to achieve control over the entire Mediterranean region, east and west, and then to sustain several hundred years of relative stability.
Interspersed throughout the political chronology are discussions of society and private life, economic conditions, literature, the arts, and religion. There is less on science: “A congenital lack of speculative imagination among the Romans stifled their interest in natural science, save for narrowly utilitarian purposes.”
The Romans maintained their cultural essence even as they willingly learned from cosmopolitan Greek civilization – often through contact with their own Greek slaves.
Roman politics and society, Cary observes, had their roots in the patriarchal family structure. The paterfamilias had absolute authority over his wife, sons, and unmarried daughters. Men who grew up in this environment distinguished themselves again and again in fields of warfare with their “doggedness”: utter tenacity together with a streak of brutality that at times matched or exceeded that of their adversaries, whether in Germany, Greece, North Africa, or Israel.
In depth and detail, Cary’s appraisal of the impacts of Roman imperialism is intelligent and balanced. He doesn’t avoid the many instances of Roman ruthlessness, such as when Germanicus “systematically devastated the land and butchered the inhabitants” of northern Germany in AD 14. On the other hand, he shows how Rome gradually extended its privileges of citizenship and participation to all free men, first across Italy and later throughout the empire.
The latter section of the book describes how the civil and foreign wars of the third century disrupted trading markets and freedom of travel, damaging economic confidence. Morale was further eroded by arbitrary taxation of merchants and secondary landowners. People began to clutch financial security by hoarding coins rather than investing them, even though their metal content and value had been repeatedly debased.
In his final chapter, Cary presents a summary of theories that have been proposed to explain Rome’s continuous decline from about 250 AD until the fifth-century invasions of the western empire by Franks, Goths, Vandals, and Germans. He rejects as explanations weather patterns, plagues and epidemics – all of which were intermittent – as well as alleged racial deterioration related to cross-breeding and deaths from warfare (though the latter had a severe impact in Italy itself).
Certain social trends, such as moral profligacy – a frequent theme of Latin writers – and avoidance of child-bearing, negatively impacted a part of the elite in Rome itself, but Cary asserts they were not sufficiently widespread to degrade the entire empire.
In his analysis, the later Roman conquests around the Mediterranean created a dependent, powerless class and a governing aristocracy which held power but failed to maintain order. In order to maintain stability, the monarchy evolved into a centralized dictatorship supported by an autocratic and capricious bureaucracy.
Control of the empire from the top was everything. When professional soldiers in the provinces began to engage in civil wars to resolve disputed imperial successions, they opened up fissures which fatally impaired defenses along the empire’s periphery. This vulnerability, aggravated by economic deterioration, enabled the fifth-century invasions and the destruction of Rome itself.
Cary concludes his narrative with a beautiful short sketch of how the Roman world evolved into the Byzantine and Holy Roman Empires.
This is a rich, deeply informative book. College professors who still teach Western Civilization would do well to assign it to students. Not only will they learn about Roman civilization, but from the quality of this work they can see what civilization means. It could provide a lifetime of inspiration.
This review is based on the second edition, published in 1954.
Covering a more complete time span than Gibbon’s classic history – one that includes the origins of Rome as well as the entire republican period – it is sharper and more incisive than recent textbooks.
The book’s wisdom starts on page one of the preface:
“The chief requirement in a book of this kind is not that it should be meticulously exact and up to date in all its facts, but that it should arrange and evaluate the facts in due order and proportion.”
Following that principle, Cary’s chapters survey the evolution of Rome and its civilization at several levels.
His political narrative gives equal attention to the republican and imperial periods. In addition to the succession of consuls and emperors – their personalities, power struggles, and frequently bloody demises – Cary describes in detail the development of administrative organization of both civilian and military affairs. His coverage of the twists and turns of the many civil and foreign wars is complete. This includes instances of honorable as well as treacherous Roman behavior, which together enabled Rome to achieve control over the entire Mediterranean region, east and west, and then to sustain several hundred years of relative stability.
Interspersed throughout the political chronology are discussions of society and private life, economic conditions, literature, the arts, and religion. There is less on science: “A congenital lack of speculative imagination among the Romans stifled their interest in natural science, save for narrowly utilitarian purposes.”
The Romans maintained their cultural essence even as they willingly learned from cosmopolitan Greek civilization – often through contact with their own Greek slaves.
Roman politics and society, Cary observes, had their roots in the patriarchal family structure. The paterfamilias had absolute authority over his wife, sons, and unmarried daughters. Men who grew up in this environment distinguished themselves again and again in fields of warfare with their “doggedness”: utter tenacity together with a streak of brutality that at times matched or exceeded that of their adversaries, whether in Germany, Greece, North Africa, or Israel.
In depth and detail, Cary’s appraisal of the impacts of Roman imperialism is intelligent and balanced. He doesn’t avoid the many instances of Roman ruthlessness, such as when Germanicus “systematically devastated the land and butchered the inhabitants” of northern Germany in AD 14. On the other hand, he shows how Rome gradually extended its privileges of citizenship and participation to all free men, first across Italy and later throughout the empire.
The latter section of the book describes how the civil and foreign wars of the third century disrupted trading markets and freedom of travel, damaging economic confidence. Morale was further eroded by arbitrary taxation of merchants and secondary landowners. People began to clutch financial security by hoarding coins rather than investing them, even though their metal content and value had been repeatedly debased.
In his final chapter, Cary presents a summary of theories that have been proposed to explain Rome’s continuous decline from about 250 AD until the fifth-century invasions of the western empire by Franks, Goths, Vandals, and Germans. He rejects as explanations weather patterns, plagues and epidemics – all of which were intermittent – as well as alleged racial deterioration related to cross-breeding and deaths from warfare (though the latter had a severe impact in Italy itself).
Certain social trends, such as moral profligacy – a frequent theme of Latin writers – and avoidance of child-bearing, negatively impacted a part of the elite in Rome itself, but Cary asserts they were not sufficiently widespread to degrade the entire empire.
In his analysis, the later Roman conquests around the Mediterranean created a dependent, powerless class and a governing aristocracy which held power but failed to maintain order. In order to maintain stability, the monarchy evolved into a centralized dictatorship supported by an autocratic and capricious bureaucracy.
Control of the empire from the top was everything. When professional soldiers in the provinces began to engage in civil wars to resolve disputed imperial successions, they opened up fissures which fatally impaired defenses along the empire’s periphery. This vulnerability, aggravated by economic deterioration, enabled the fifth-century invasions and the destruction of Rome itself.
Cary concludes his narrative with a beautiful short sketch of how the Roman world evolved into the Byzantine and Holy Roman Empires.
This is a rich, deeply informative book. College professors who still teach Western Civilization would do well to assign it to students. Not only will they learn about Roman civilization, but from the quality of this work they can see what civilization means. It could provide a lifetime of inspiration.
This review is based on the second edition, published in 1954.
August 7, 2012
The textbook for several classes that I took in college, it is definitive source material for life in the Roman world, from foundation till nearly the fall of the empire. Richly detailed and annotated; if you have to have a go-to source for modern scholarship on Rome and only have room on your shelf for one book, make it this one.
July 19, 2021
Max Cary's "A History of Rome" isn't perfect, but it is a wonderful, informative and accessible journey through Ancient Roman history, a subject that can be daunting and impenetrable to all but Classically-trained scholars of academia. Cary's book starts all the way back with the first human settlements in Italy, but focuses on the early Etruscan and Greek civilizations that sprouted on the centrally-located peninsula in the Mediterranean. At last, a small village in Latium, on the banks of the Tiber, is founded, and Rome enters the historical landscape.
Part of what makes Cary's book, and most every book that seeks to span Roman history, imperfect is the sheer volume of characters and controversies to cover. Names are tossed on one page, never to return, while a whole new cast of senators, consuls, tribunes or emperors pop up on the next one. Cary's prose is easy, though quite matter-of-fact, allowing the flow of Roman history to set the stage itself.
When we arrive at the last gasps of the Roman Empire under Constantine, Cary puts forth a nuanced view of why Rome fell. Although there were many, many factors that contributed, the political chaos of the Empire undoubtedly corroded its military might, economic security, and political control over its far-flung provinces. Simply put, Rome, particularly the Western half, could not staunch the flow of so-called Barbarians descending upon Germany, Gaul and eventually Rome itself.
What makes this book so valuable is its sheer sweep. Roman history may indeed be hard to grasp, but it's incredibly tragic and prescient for our own times of struggling between democratic norms and authoritarian impulses from some quarters.
Part of what makes Cary's book, and most every book that seeks to span Roman history, imperfect is the sheer volume of characters and controversies to cover. Names are tossed on one page, never to return, while a whole new cast of senators, consuls, tribunes or emperors pop up on the next one. Cary's prose is easy, though quite matter-of-fact, allowing the flow of Roman history to set the stage itself.
When we arrive at the last gasps of the Roman Empire under Constantine, Cary puts forth a nuanced view of why Rome fell. Although there were many, many factors that contributed, the political chaos of the Empire undoubtedly corroded its military might, economic security, and political control over its far-flung provinces. Simply put, Rome, particularly the Western half, could not staunch the flow of so-called Barbarians descending upon Germany, Gaul and eventually Rome itself.
What makes this book so valuable is its sheer sweep. Roman history may indeed be hard to grasp, but it's incredibly tragic and prescient for our own times of struggling between democratic norms and authoritarian impulses from some quarters.
March 27, 2018
A dry book with a lot of information can be interesting in itself. Although I only finished about 2/3 of this book, I still received the essentials of a history of Rome. A small Iron age settlement along the Tiber river grows to be the biggest and longest lasting empire in the Western world. Internally struggling and external invasions is the net reason Rome's great Empire fell. If you are a young adult I wouldn't recommend this book however if you are interested in the once great empire of Rome, this book is for you.
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July 14, 2014Dense, concise, but weak on 3rd & 4th century, esp. the Crisis of the 3rd Century, though the subtitle does say "... Down to the Reign of Constantine" so there is a trailing off at the end. However, how to explan the last chapter (44) which reviews Decline/Fall theories and attempts a summation of the legacy of the Rome. Problem is the 4th century material is very weak and 5th non-existent.
August 15, 2013
If you major in the classics, this is likely the survey text used for the introductory history of Rome class. Though published in the mid-thirties, it has been constantly revised and kept up to date.
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June 21, 2013cool
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September 25, 2015A general introductory book on Rome, though somewhat dated.
January 4, 2015
Absolutely essential reference book for any enthusiast of the period. Magnificent!
Displaying 1 - 10 of 10 reviews