Ancient Rome: The Rise and Fall of an Empire

by Simon Baker, Mary Beard (Foreword)

This is the story of the greatest empire the world has ever known. Simon Baker charts the rise and fall of the world's first superpower, focusing on six momentous turning points that shaped Roman history. Welcome to Rome as you've never seen it before - awesome and splendid, gritty and squalid. From the conquest of the Mediterranean beginning in the third century BC to the destruction of the Roman Empire at the hands of barbarian invaders some seven centuries later, we discover the most critical episodes in Roman the spectacular collapse of the 'free' republic, the birth of the age of the 'Caesars', the violent suppression of the strongest rebellion against Roman power, and the bloody civil war that launched Christianity as a world religion. At the heart of this account are the dynamic, complex but flawed characters of some of the most powerful rulers in men such as Pompey the Great, Julius Caesar, Augustus, Nero and Constantine. Putting flesh on the bones of these distant, legendary figures, Simon Baker looks beyond the dusty, toga-clad caricatures and explores their real motivations and ambitions, intrigues and rivalries. The superb narrative, full of energy and imagination, is a brilliant distillation of the latest scholarship and a wonderfully evocative account of Ancient Rome.

Genres: History, Nonfiction, Ancient History, Italy, Historical, Roman History, Ancient

504 pages, Kindle Edition

First published October 24, 2006

Reviews

[John McDermott · Rating 5 out of 5]

Brilliant. Very well written and accessible. An essential introduction to Ancient Rome.

[Esteban del Mal · Rating 4 out of 5]

If you, like me, don't know much about the Roman Republic, the Roman Empire it spawned, or the impact of Roman culture on the subsequent millennia beyond what you saw on television when men in golden breastplates flogged and stapled history's most successful anarchist to a cross of wood between Paul and Jan Crouch's sobs and pleas for money, you could do worse than read this book. Though largely artless, it is not naively so and proves as unrelenting as any anonymous, sweaty, bloodthirsty beefcake in fish scale bikini briefs in its presentation of the epochal moments that gave form to that lodestar of classical civilization.

Rome, at least mythological Rome, was founded first on murder, and then as a sanctuary for the detritus of other societies -- criminals, exiles, refugees, their tired, their poor, their huddled masses. Then these castoffs invited their neighbors to the city, ostensibly in observance of a religious festival, only to steal their womenfolk so they could make babies. Babies that would grow up not to invite neighbors to do anything other than to submit to Rome or be put to the sword. With such violent origins, one is moved to wonder if their hymns would keep time with the Star Spangled Banner.

A popular history from BBC Books, I cannot help but think that author Simon Baker is, at times, addressing the United States in a roundabout fashion. Perhaps this is self-consciously nationalistic of me because the paranoid Puritanical founding of my own country casts such a long shadow. Maybe he has merely succeeded in touching upon the overarching themes native to all civilizations with the conceit to aspire to imperialism. It amounts to the same.

Romans, like Yankees, soon tired of their kings (Etruscan, by the bye, from whom we inherit the word fascism because they would carry a bundle of elm or birch branches bound together with an axe at its center called a fasces), ran them off and founded that most remarkable and fragile of things, a republic. A republic that gave lip service to the political freedom of its citizens, but nevertheless vested the power of the kingship in two elected consuls that would share power for a set period of time and that, in practice, came from the wealthiest two percent of adult Roman males. Yet even so, the memory of one man rule would stay with Romans and, in times of crisis, dictatorial powers would be ceded to that one happy man to do as he saw fit to restore order and preserve the republic.

But Rome would succumb to triumphalism despite its high-mindedness. Riding the wave of its economic and military successes -- made almost exclusively on the backs of the middle and lower classes and through the strategic application of pre-emptive wars of self-defense -- Baker notes:

In becoming a superpower, Rome, so it was said, abandoned the very values with which it had won its supremacy. At the pinnacle of its achievement, the virtues that had made the Roman republic so successful failed it and were lost forever.

An idealistic man by the name of Tiberius Sempronius Gracchus, a military hero and the grandson of Scipio Africanus, himself famous for having saved the young republic from the wrathful genius of Carthage's Hannibal, would attempt to redistribute lands he perceived as unjustly taken from the citizen militia who, while fighting Rome's wars of conquest, would see their properties go untended, fall into arrears, and then bought up on the cheap by the aristocracy.

In the first politically motivated murder of the republic, Tiberius would be killed and his mangled body unceremoniously dumped in the Tiber River.

Then would come the Caesars, the obsolescence, the decline, and the monotheistic statism. As I write these last words, my eyes wander to a Roman coin that I purchased some months ago and which I have worked at cleaning nearly daily. The profile of some emperor or other adorns one side; the image of an entire man holding what appears to be a bow, or perhaps even a plow, the other. One day I will set to examining it more closely in the hopes of dating it. Maybe I'll even try to decipher the Latin that haphazardly rings it. However, I will only do these things in the vein of an antiquarian. Our history cannot be found on any coin or written in any book. It can only be found in us, and I sometimes despair that it will never be overcome.

[Elentarri · Rating 3 out of 5]

Rating: 3.5 stars

Ancient Roman history without the boring bits! In this overarching and accessible introduction to the subject, Simon Baker has chosen to focus on six turning points (usually revolutions of some sort) that shaped the rise and fall of the Roman Empire. He starts off with Rome's origin myths (Romulus and Remus, the kidnapping of the Sabine Women), and follows Roman history through the kingship, the republic (and it's demise with Caesar and Augustus) and various turbulent stages of empire building, maintaining and losing, along with some notable historical figures. Baker includes such events as the Pyrrhic War, the Punic Wars and destruction of Carthage, various civil wars, the Jewish wars, and the early rise of Christianity. The book stops at the fall of the Eastern Roman Empire. An extra chapter on the Eastern Roman Empire would have been a nice addition. I also felt the transitions between chapters could have been handled better, or at least a time line included in the book, to bridge the intervening history not covered in the book. The book does however, include six very useful and well drawn maps.


Other Recommended Books on the Roman Empire

~Ancient Rome: From Romulus to Justinian by Thomas R. Martin [very good introduction; includes maps, timelines, culture etc]
~Rubicon by Tom Holland [rise and fall of the Roman Republic]

~Lost to the West: The Forgotten Byzantine Empire That Rescued Western Civilization by Lars Brownworth [introductiory text]
~Byzantium by Judith Herrin [thematic overview of a medieval empire]
~Constantinople:The Last Great Siege, 1453 by Roger Crowley

~The Fate of Rome: Climate, Disease, and the End of an Empire by Kyle Harper

~The Fall of the Roman Empire by Peter Heather [more detailed than just an introductory text]
~Empires and Bararians by Peter Heather [more detailed than just an introductory text]
~The Restoration of Rome by Peter Heather [more detailed than just an introductory text]

~Carthage Must Be Destroyed by Richard Miles

[Nicky · Rating 3 out of 5]

Simon Baker's Ancient Rome: The Rise and Fall of an Empire is a good introduction to Roman history, covering various key points in the history of Rome. Probably not the same key points that someone else would choose, but he makes a decent case for the importance of each stop on the tour. Some people's reviews say that if you have the most basic grasp of Roman history, this is too simple: I wouldn't say so. I have a GCSE and an A Level in classical studies, but the effect was a very similar kind of 'tour' of Roman history that just picked out different stopping points. So there were some things I didn't know much about at all.

One thing that is a little disappointing is the transitions between each chapters. It isn't really made clear how the transitions between the different time periods were made -- it goes straight from Constantine, for example, to the attacks on Rome by Alaric, without covering the intervening time at all. Even a little timeline at the start of each chapter would've helped.

Still, Simon Baker's prose is pretty readable and accessible. If you're not especially interested in the topic, I still wouldn't recommend this, as despite the six turning points it uses, it's still a 400 page volume. A Very Brief Introduction it ain't.

All in all, for me it was okay, but I'll be donating my copy to the local library rather than keeping it.

[Omar · Rating 5 out of 5]

Given the length of the Roman Empire (and as advertised this book covers the origins of the empire from a small city-state), its breadth, its complexity, and its historical importance it is impossible to go in depth in a book of this length. Roman specialists should find a lengthier, more detailed book but for those who are new to Rome (like me), or seeking to acquire just a general understanding of one of the most important--and arguably the most important--civilization in world history this book passes with flying colors.

[Mike Parka · Rating 5 out of 5]

After reading Mary Beard's S.P.Q.R., which was focused more on dispelling some of the myths surrounding Rome's history and shedding light upon the lives of ordinary people, I wanted to learn a bit more about the big, legendary characters and the huge events that shaped the ancient world. This book delivered big time.

Initially, I wasn't sure if the format will work for me. Each chapter is focusing on the life of one historical character and they picked a few most important ones from Rome's history. It actually works surprisingly well. You get plenty of background information, so it's not just simple biographies and the big events are explained really well.

So if you want to learn more about the Roman Empire with the focus on the most well known characters and events - this is your book. Very enjoyable read.

[Pierre Verwey · Rating 4 out of 5]

This book gives a condensed overview of the rise and fall of the Roman Empire in one sweep, using six key moments to tell the epic story of one of the greatest Empires the world has ever seen.

Considering this history spans over 700 eventful years, one needs to accept from the onset that even the best account of its history will, in some way or another, fall short to fully tell its sensational history. Though there must be countless books dealing with particular aspects of Rome's history, Id say Baker does a sterling job of writing something which is exciting to read, and simultaneously gives a decent overview of the core elements of Rome's spectacular rise and, 7 centuries later, whimpering decline, all in under 500 pages.

I simply could not put this book down, as each key-point becomes a thrilling exposition of the dilemmas, intrigues, crises, plots and subplots around the power struggle for control of an Empire, which, for its day, was perhaps at least a millennia ahead of its time. Just when I finished one section, thinking - it cant get more interesting than this, Baker would introduce the next part, (happily glossing over the duller bits), and launch straight into the following epic saga, weaving existing threads into an even more fascinating story, without allowing you to even catch your breath.

I was left with a great introduction to Ancient Rome, and though I read the book really as background to my true objective: The rise and fall of the Constantinople as the seat of the second Roman Empire, namely, Byzantium, leading up to the rise of Islam and the coming of the Crusades), I have to admit Baker gave such a brilliant account to the fascinating world of Ancient Rome, that I will no doubt return to retrace some of the intriguing stories touched upon, ones which I could never quite place in its proper historical context. ( Carthage, Masada, Queen Zenobia of Palmyra, the origins of the Catholic Church the similarities of Ancient Rome's political system and that of Modern America - Id better just stop before I get carried away by something not even touched upon by Baker - a short history of modern plumbing)

I highly recommend this book if you want to be introduced to Ancient Rome, and are looking for a decent armchair overview that is neither overly scholarly, nor a 500 page extension of a wikipedia entry. Baker will give you a thrilling ride that will allow you to contextualise Rome's 700 year history, and allow you to make wonderfully unexpected connections between things you've always wondered about.

[Yibbie · Rating 4 out of 5]

I highly recommend this book. It is an excellent way to get a firm outline of Roman history. Their amazing feats, spectacular failures, and long slow decline are chronicled around the lives of the most famous Roman leaders. It was full of facts, but arranged and smoothed out into an almost narrative form. Covering an empire of a thousand years it moves quickly. It kept my interest at every point.
It's not a Christian history, but the author sees and chronicles its impact as well. From the persecutions to the legalization of it. And because of the empire wide impact there is a long section of the Jewish wars. That also helped put many events in perspective for me.
If you are trying to understand the major events of the Roman empire, this is a great start.

[Aurélien Thomas · Rating 4 out of 5]

Telling the history of a civilisation that lasted more than a thousand years is no easy feat, but Simon Baker brilliantly rose up to the challenge. His approach is, actually, quite simple: instead of offering a narrative from the beginning of Rome to its ultimate collapse, he focuses on a few of its major crisis (mostly revolts and revolutions) to demonstrate how Ancient Rome constantly morphed and evolved, through wars and conquests but, also, due to internal struggles.

He retells of the funding myths, the conquest of the Italian peninsula, the birth of the Republic and triumph of the Empire, and, up to the Tetrarchy and ultimate fall of the Western Empire. What's unfolding here is as much the biographies of major characters (Romulus and Remus, Sulla, Julius Caesar, Augustus, Nero, Constantine...) as it is of shattering events which came to define Roman history (the Pyrrhic War, the Punic Wars, Jewish wars, various civil wars, the early rise of Christianity...).

Of course, we may question why the author chose to deal with these specific events over others! We may also regret his particular emphasis on the Western Empire and not the Eastern one (here's the history of Rome, but an extra chapter on the fall of Constantinople would have, at least in my opinion, been welcome too...). Let's not be harsh, though, for in the end his angle is as good as any. Readers not knowing anything or so about Ancient Rome will learn a lot about major figures and events, while the more knowledgeable will appreciate how he manages, through such choices, to show not only the constant clashes of ideas within Rome itself (e.g. Optimates vs Populares, the different views of what was the republic supposed to be, and, even, that of liberties themselves...) but, also, how its later evolution will contributes to its downfall. All in all, Simon Baker's choices are everything but irrelevant.

Ancient Rome surely is a romp through a millennia, but easy to read and very informative. One of the best introduction to navigate your way through such a massive period.

[Gün · Rating 4 out of 5]

Roma cumhuriyet ve imparatorluk tarihine dair dokuz ana başlık altında toplanan olayların anlatıldığı güzel bir kitap.

Olayların anlatımı kronolojik bir sıra izliyor ancak her imparatordan bahsedilmiyor. Örneğin Caesar ve Augustus'un Cumhuriyet'i sona erdirmesinin detaylı bir şekilde anlatıldığı bölümden sonra, bir sonraki bölümde Nero devrine geçiliyor. Geriye dönük olarak bu bölümde Caligula ve Cladius dönemlerine de değiniliyor. Bu anlatım tarzı ile erken dönem cumhuriyetinin kuruluşu, geç cumhuriyet dönemi iç savaşları, Yahudi isyanları, Büyük Constantinus ve Roma'nın Hristiyanlaşması, Got ve Hun akınları ile Roma'nın yıkılışı gibi hayati konuların detaylı işlenmesi sağlanmış. Bu da ayrıca kolay bir okunabilirlik sağlıyor.

Kitabın çevirisine gelince, okunaklı olduğunu söylemek mümkün. Yine de göze batan bazı hatalar mevcut, keşke editör biraz daha özenli çalışsaymış.

Örneğin, bir yerde Büyük Constantinus'un Edirne Savaşı'ndan sonra, donanmasını Bizans'tan geçirdiğinden bahsediliyor. Burada yazar muhtemelen Bizans yerine Byzantion ifadesini kullanmıştır ancak bunun Bizans olarak çevrilmesi zaman-mekan algısını bükmüş. Yine aynı savaşın devamında Hellespont için parantez içinde İstanbul Boğazı denilmiş ki bu resmen fecaat olmuş. Bu gibi ufak hatalar çevirmenin gözünden kaçsa da editör daha dikkatli olmalıydı.

Genel olarak severek okudum, giriş seviyesinde Roma ilgili okuyacak bir şeyler arayan okuyuculara tavsiye ederim.

Son olarak, kitap aslında yazarın BBC için hazırladığı bir belgeselin (docudrama) ardından yazılıyor. Kitap ile aynı adı taşıyan “Ancient Rome: The Rise and Fall of an Empire” belgeselinin birinci bölümünü Türkçe altyazılı olarak aşağıdaki adresten izleyebilirsiniz. Kanalda ayrıca diğer bölümler de mevcut.

https://www.dailymotion.com/video/x1k...

[Olethros · Rating 3 out of 5]

-Más bien, repaso de momentos trascendentes.-

Género. Historia.

Lo que nos cuenta. Tras una brevísima introducción a los orígenes de Roma, relato de los eventos relacionados con Tiberio Sempronio Graco y su tiempo, Cayo Julio César y sus sucesores, Nerón y el espantoso interregno que le siguió, el final del mandato de Trajano y el mandato de Adriano, la época de Constantino y el desarrollo de las invasiones godas, tratando de construir con ello una imagen de la Historia de Roma.

¿Quiere saber más de este libro, sin spoilers? Visite:

http://librosdeolethros.blogspot.com/...

[Rowdy · Rating 5 out of 5]

I had an interest in learning about the general history of the Roman Empire, and I didn't want to read a textbook either. This book was definitely the answer becuase it read like a novel and made reading a history book entertaining. The drama of Roman war and politics was brought to life throughout. I definitely learned quite a bit about the Roman Empire and didn't feel bored while reading the book. Good read.

[AdamC · Rating 4 out of 5]

4.5

[Jacob Stelling · Rating 3 out of 5]

This book told a rather generic history of Rome from its mythic origin to its fall, and yet its redeeming feature was that amongst the obvious flashpoints - Caesar, Augustus etc - there were also some less obvious chapters discussing themes such as the Revolt of Judaea and barbarian migrations.

On the whole, a good book with some interesting chapters but often rather generic narrative history following some well-trodden paths.

[Mary Alice · Rating 3 out of 5]

Not bad considering I hate to read about battles. The book makes ancient history more accessible to the likes of me. Much better than reading Julius Caesar in Latin. I won't lie: the battle of the Judeans was more than I could stand, but the reigns of Nero and Constantine were almost page turners.

This book was written to accompany an already produced tv series so each chapter seems like an episode.

[Ben · Rating 5 out of 5]

I absolutely loved this book. Very engrossing storytelling about some of the key figures of the Roman empire. Some of the politics gets very complex, with lots of different twists and turns in the plot, but these are effortlessly negotiated. Would definitely recommend to someone who is new to Roman history for a fascinating introduction to the subject.

[Tony · Rating 3 out of 5]

This book focuses on six key periods in Roman history. A couple of the selections are surprising. Nevertheless, each is covered in sufficient depth and nuance to offer something of interest not just to novices, but also to those generally familiar with the covered events. Baker's fine writing rounds out the picture of this enjoyable read.

[Hao Nguyen · Rating 3 out of 5]

In the book Ancient Rome by Simon Baker, there are many different stories of many leaders of Rome. The book tells us of how the Roman Empire came to be and what happened to it. The book is made up of great tales about the leaders of Rome. It shows how some leaders led their empire to power and how some failed to do so. The book also shows how the Roman Empire fell from its great power.
I liked how the book told brief stories about every leader and their life times. It got me interested on how the leaders are different. Some leaders were also very similar. I liked that they explained how specific leaders successfully led the Roman Empire to victory and how the other leaders made it fall. My favorite part of the book is how the author talked about the economy of the Roman Empire. I liked comparing how different our economy is now from the Romans’ economy then.
I didn’t like how long the book was because that made it feel like a school history book. I would rather it be only one story. There book kept switching to different main characters because it was full of stories about different leaders. There are many things about the Roman Empire I have learned so the book wasn’t as interesting. The stories were many years apart from each other which made it less interesting because I would rather have one story in the same time period.
The book was interesting to read but it started out pretty boring in the beginning. I liked how the book didn’t skip around and how it was all in order by time periods. The book was still very much like a history book. I think it was also very educational. Although I enjoyed some parts of the book, it didn’t really make me want to keep on reading. It took me a long time to finish this book.

[Wren Wadlington · Rating 4 out of 5]

Simon Baker describes Ancient Rome by providing accounts of some of Rome’s most important leaders. The book starts with the birth of Rome, and describes the story of Aeneas and his journey to found it. It then describes the first Roman revolutions and the assault on Carthage. Then, the story of Caesar, made famous by Shakespeare’s play, is told in great detail. The book then goes on to describe the stories of Augustus and Nero in a level of detail most would find in a history textbook.
My favorite character was Constantine, because he brought Christianity to Rome. My favorite part of the book was Caesar’s construction of a bridge over the Rhine, a huge engineering marvel at the time. So great in fact, that it caused his enemies to retreat in awe of the Roman symbol of power and wealth. I found the book particularly gripping, which surprised me quite a bit. It is a fantastic blend of history textbook and english literature.
However, there were a things I did not enjoy. The book is bland overall, with small sections here and there that are interesting enough to not put the book down. Some of the characters were a little hard to follow, as there is only so much historical information about them, and It took me a while to actually understand what I was reading.
Overall, I give the book 4 out of 5 stars. I enjoyed the book for the most part, but some parts were a little bland. For anyone that is looking for a more enjoyable way of learning about ancient Rome rather than a history textbook, this one’s for you.

[Sean · Rating 4 out of 5]

Baker has undertaken an ambitious challenge to document for a general audience the history of Ancient Rome in a single volume. To keep within this limit he therefore needed to make tough choices as to what to exclude and this has resulted in some gaps in the narrative. Overall this book improved my knowledge of the subject but I was left wanting more:

- Why didn’t Hannibal exploit his crushing defeat inflicted on the Roman army at the battle of Cannae and march on Rome itself?

- Limited information was presented about the early career of Julius Caesar. For example the book is missing what I think is one of the key episodes from this period in his life when he was ransomed by pirates. Only someone as arrogant as Caesar would negotiate their ransom up rather than down. Just as he predicted to the pirates, after he was released, and despite having no authority to do so, he raised a naval force to hunt them down.

- Only a passing reference is made to Brutus and his role in the assassination of Julius Caesar. In addition there is no mention of his co-conspirator Cassius who later commanded troops fighting against the Second Triumvirate post the assassination.

- Limited or no discussion about some of the key Roman enemies such as Spartacus, Boudecia, and Arminius.

- Baker refers to Crassus as a leading general which may have been true a decade before he died. However at the Battle of Carrhae that resulted in his death, he was responsible for one of the most crushing defeats in Roman history against a significantly numerically inferior enemy.

[Terrance Shaw · Rating 4 out of 5]

As one might expect from a companion book to a television series, the style here is extremely accessible--at times to the point of feeling elementary if not downright patronizing. Baker covers his material succinctly without going off on tangents, and, for the most part, the text is highly informative. The book comprises six long chapters, each dedicated to a different crisis or turning point in Roman history. Recommended to anyone looking for a broad-strokes introduction to this endlessly fascinating subject.

[Alejandro · Rating 5 out of 5]

Highly recommended history book. It reads like a drama, highlighting the most important events and rulers of ancient Rome. Rome wasn't built in a day and it didn't fall in one either. There are lessons to be learned from the mistakes of the Romans.

[Igor · Rating 4 out of 5]

Ця книжка супроводжувала документальний серіал від BBC, що зумовлює вибрану структуру і акценти: автор зосереджується на кількох ключових постатях і обмежується військово-політичною історією, не особливо згадуючи про економіку, суспільство чи культуру. Але з урахуванням цих обмежень, книжка досягає своєї мети, і читати її дуже цікаво, особливо якщо встиг багато забути про Рим.

[Joao · Rating 3 out of 5]

Uma narrativa simplificada, na esteira de uma série documental da BBC, da História do Império Romano. Uma leitura para quem mantém vivo o deslumbramento sobre o tema ou inicia a sua caminhada de descoberta sobre ele.

[oli ♥︎ · Rating 3 out of 5]

THANK FUCKING GOD IT’S OVER

[SpruceAlmighty2 · Rating 3 out of 5]

A good summary that ends in a slightly confusing manner.

[John Cairns · Rating 5 out of 5]

In her foreword Mary Beard seems to think Rome was a democracy ended by Caesar. It wasn't, never was. I thought it was Tiro published Cicero's letters.

The first settlement was of shepherds' huts on the Palatine c 1000 BC. Romulus is about as historical as King Arthur or Moses. Only the last three kings may be. The primary loyalty of aristocrats was to their clans, not the state. The symbol of the authority to punish disobedience was fasces. The senate was advisory, like the Athenian council; in assemblies, the people made the laws and elected officials. The Romans destroyed Carthage in bad faith. The army was a militia of citizens. The widening gap between the poor with no property to fight for and the rich bred civil dissent, as today. The only effective part of the people was the mob in Rome who could be bribed. Caesar was motivated by a sense of his own dignity. To be treated as a criminal after winning Gaul was beneath it, as it would be beneath anybody's. Pompey had no choice on Caesar's advance but to make a tactical retreat from Rome.

Being the richest man ever, Augustus could afford to pay for the Games of the Ages which made-believe the republic was restored while establishing his autocracy. Not unlike our 1689 revolution, the senate let Octavian stand for consul, like a parliament without a king elected a king who legitimised it as a parliament. Any independent candidate for consul was executed, for sedition, as in China today. He regularised the army, costing over half the annual income from taxation, putting paid to the conquest of Germany after the loss of three legions there.

Egypt was the jewel in their imperial crown as India was in ours. Augustus condemned his own daughter to die of malnutrition. Aristocratic families intermarried to preserve power, as in my day the marriage of Catherine Wheatley was arranged to Tam Dalyell. Claudius was not descended from Augustus, so bumped off thirty-five senators and two hundred knights who were. A poisoned feather was inserted down his throat.

Nero had his twenty year old wife suffocated. Christians' crucified bodies were torched. Not a citizen, Jesus was crucified for seditiously stirring up a riot whereas Paul, who was. got off, unless Nero nailed him. Although quite without proof, the historian says David founded the so-called holy city where Jewish nationalists slaughtered a left-behind cohort. The aristocratic Josephus organised the rebellion. He prophesied Jotapata would fall on the forty-seventh day of siege, also that the future emperors were before him. Four thousand Jews were killed at Gamala. The Jews made believe the Romans would concede Judaea's independence. Starving Jews surrendering killed themselves eating food. British troops relieving concentration camps hadn't learnt from history. Looting the temple couldn't pollute disbelieving Romans! The historian’s prejudiced. Jerusalem was razed and sixty years later rebuilt as Aelia Capitolina from which Jews were banned. Trajan had 'an increasingly noble forehead', as Sartre would've put it. Executions of Xians were an accepted procedure, though Trajan advised against too close inquiry of their antecedents if they renounced. Constantius pragmatically decided persecution didn't help him govern the western empire, without of course consulting any other tetrarch, especially not Galerius, the Augustus of the eastern empire, who'd tried bumping off his son. Maxentius was hoist by his own petard at the Milvian Bridge and Constantine believed he owed his success to the Xian god. His courtiers quite rightly ignored his Xian lecturing. At the battle of Chrysopolis it is said one hundred thousand of Licinius’ men were killed. Arius argued god was eternal and indivisible, the son was subsequent, therefore not eternal and not god, a good argument if you accept he premiss. On the sack of Rome, Augustine fantasised only the city of god in heaven was eternal. The western empire fell because there were too many barbarians at once and too much land lost and rendered agriculturally unproductive for tax purposes in order to fund the army.

[Babak Fakhamzadeh · Rating 4 out of 5]

The book accompanies a BBC TV series with the same name, focussing on six major events in Roman history:

+ The revolution triggered by Tiberius Sempronius Gracchus, around 130BC, as the tribune of the people, starting the processes which led to power shifting away from the nobility to the people.

+ The civil war fought by Pompey and Caesar, resulting in the unification of the empire under one man.

+ The last Julio-Claudian emperor and paranoid Nero, being more interested in the (Greek) arts than administering an empire.

+ The crushing of the Jewish rebelling in 70AD by the later emperor Titus.

+ Constantine's rule as emperor which eventually saw the introduction of Christianity as the state religion.

+ The sack and fall of Rome, under the influence of Romanized Goths, under Alaric, and, later, the Huns, under Attila.

Here are a few interesting tidbits I picked up from the book, partially in relation to Jesus Was Caesar: On the Julian Origin of Christianity:

+ Policy changes installed by Augustus during his reign, related to sexual mores in general and adultery in particular, appear very Christian. Indeed, sexual chastity was already one of the defining classifications of Christians when Constantine introduced it to the empire at large.

+ Augustus' mausoleum is still partly standing, in Rome.

+ There is no surviving account of where the Rubicon was, the river which separated Italy from Gaul and across which military leaders were not allowed to take their armies. This is the river Caesar crossed when he lamented that the die had been cast.

+ When Octavianus considered his nickname, he entertained the possibility of having himself called Romulus, after Rome's founding father. However, rejecting the association that might conjure up of fratricide, he went for 'Augustus', which derives from the art of augury, the ability to read divine signs, for example from the innards of sacrificed animals.

+ Augustus was treated as a god, particularly in the eastern provinces.

+ The date of Christmas was moved to coincide with pagan religious holidays, that is, the winter solstice. Augustus birthday was on 23 September. There doesn't seem to be an accepted original date for the celebration of the birth of Jesus, though the general consensus seems to be this was in September or October.

+ Early images of Jesus depict him beardless. Hadrian, of the wall, as emperor, made the position of emperor much more accessible to the common man, through his extended travels and the relative ease with which his audience could be sought. Therefore, not only did he make the position of Emperor more accessible, but also the religious role of all emperors since Caesar, that of Pontifex Maximus, the exact same title which later became attached to the popes.
Hadrian, as opposed to the emperors before him, was also the first to sport a, neatly cropped, beard. And this around 125AD. Particularly the outer provinces benefited from his presence.

The book's very well written, giving a riveting account and very much bringing to life events which shaped Roman times. My only gripe is that the existence of Jesus is taken as a fact, a sad shortcoming as there are no historical sources with any validity from which this can be deduced. For a book which claims to be grounded in historically verifiable sources, this is an unnecessary, slip up.

[Alcibiades · Rating 5 out of 5]

Never thought by focusing on a handful key persons in the history of Ancient Rome one could actually get a better picture of the empire than any other accounts.

[Matthew · Rating 2 out of 5]

This is the single worst account of Roman History I've ever read; I almost give it a single star. The reason for the additional star is the epilogue of the book. At the end of book, Mr. Baker gives an excellent summary of the events leading up to removal of the last Roman Emperor, Romulus Augustus. Here he makes sense of a very confusing era of history. It may be ironic that the way he does this is for the same reasons that make rest of the book so bad.

The problems of the book are many but the biggest error seems to be that this is not a critical history of Rome but a compilation and summary of the early histories of Rome. It is an interesting way to present the history but ultimately fails because there is no critical examination of these authors' biases or accuracy. This results in the book being very biased against the Emperors, reporting of events in ways that modern scholars no longer believe, and Christianity's importance in the early empire being vastly overstated.

The problem of bias actually makes the book difficult to read. There are so many adjectives that indicate dislike or negative feelings about the topic that the sentences and paragraphs seem to go on forever. This problem is compounded by the author's frequent speculation about how people perceived the events around them or may have acted when details are not in the historical record. Too many events and thoughts are described as "may have" or "probably" occurring.

The failure to critically examine the ancient historical accounts, as noted above, leads to numerous inaccuracies and omissions. The author reports on Nero's torture of Christians which is no longer believed to have happened and the reporting of Constantine having converted to Christianity, at least in his mind, when this is very unlikely. These are just two examples of many.