The Antonines: The Roman Empire in Transition

by Michael Grant

The Antonines - Antoninus Pius, Marcus Aurelius, Lucius Verus and Commodus - played a crucial part in the development of the Roman empire, controlling its huge machine for half a century of its most testing period. Edward Gibbon observed that the epoch of the Antonines, the 2nd century A.D., was the happiest period the world had ever known.
In this lucid, authoritative survey, Michael Grant re-examines Gibbon's statement, and gives his own magisterial account of how the lives of the emperors and the art, literature, architecture and overall social condition under the Antonines represented an `age of transition'. The Antonines is essential reading for anyone who is interested in ancient history, as well as for all students and teachers of the subject.

Genres: History, Biography, Nonfiction, Ancient History, Roman History, Classical Studies

248 pages, Hardcover

First published October 19, 1994

About the author

Michael Grant was an English classisist, numismatist, and author of numerous popular books on ancient history. His 1956 translation of Tacitus’s Annals of Imperial Rome remains a standard of the work. He once described himself as "one of the very few freelances in the field of ancient history: a rare phenomenon". As a popularizer, his hallmarks were his prolific output and his unwillingness to oversimplify or talk down to his readership.

Librarian Note: There is more than one author in the GoodReads database with this name. See this thread for more information.

Reviews

[John Isles · Rating 4 out of 5]

I finished reading this book in parallel with translating the lives of Roman emperors in the Historia Augusta together with colleagues in a group on the LatinStudy email list (see https://www.quasillum.com/study/latin...). The first part of the book relates historical events in the reigns of the three Antonine emperors, Antoninus Pius, Marcus Aurelius, and Commodus, based mainly on the ancient written sources but supplemented by what can be deduced from inscriptions and archaeology. The second part reviews the Antonine Age's literature, architecture, art, government, and economy. There are numerous black-and white illustrations, extensive notes at the back of the volume that would more conveniently have been presented as footnotes to the main text, and a full bibliography. This wasn't the lightest of my recent reading, but it's refreshing to find a book on imperial Rome that sticks to what is known and doesn't over-dramatize.

[Erik Graff · Rating 3 out of 5]

Grant's umpteenth book is primarily about Antoninus Pius and Marcus Aurelius, the emperors associated with what Gibbon estimated to be the most felicitous period of human history. In addition to the biographies of them (and Verus and Commodus), the book includes a review of the major writers of the period under three categories: Latin, Greek and Christian. Aurelius is included here as regards his unique 'Meditations'. Finally, the book concludes with a brief compare/contrast of the Roman Empire with the contemporary European Union.

[Jen · Rating 3 out of 5]

Like every other Michael Grant book, it was fine.

[R X · Rating 2 out of 5]

A book that has neither the passion born of an engaging historian nor the academic dryness of a personality-be-damned piece, but a weird combination of the two that would be thoroughly unsatisfying if the subject material wasn't so interesting.

[Phil · Rating 4 out of 5]

Good review of the reigns of Antoninius Pius, Marcus Aurelius, Lucius Verus and Commodus.

[Larry Van Bibber · Rating 5 out of 5]

Excellent history of the period after Hadrian