Rome The Biography of a City by Christopher Hibbert

This book attempts to cover 3000 years of history in 400 pages, so you can't blame this writer for suffering a sort-of history-whiplash.   Hundreds of years are compressed into a single page, over and over again.  Tidbits and trivia are sprinkled throughout to try to keep the reader's interest, and to differentiate the book from a Wikipedia entry on The History of Rome, Italy.  I'm not sure the trivia actually works.

The author works hard to focus his story on the city of Rome, but that is difficult since the city was once the capital of an empire, and is now the capital of a country, and it is the capital of a religious faith.  Take any name, date or event mentioned in this compressed history book, and you will find dozens of books in print about it.  The history of Rome and her citizens and invaders is so rich that this books sometimes feels more like an Index than a book.

The book boasts a detailed Notes and Index section.  In fact, the Notes section feels like a book in its own right.  Perhaps the book that the author should have written?  I don't know, but in the Preface the author states that the book is intended for those who may tour Rome.  The book hopes to offer some historical background to what visitors to modern Rome may see.  The Notes section points out just what bits and pieces are still to be seen, and includes some teasing information about them.

Sadly, modern Rome is like ancient and medieval Rome after they have been put through a blender and mashed with a potato masher and then buried in your back garden.  There is not much left where it originally stood, or in its original condition.  Tourists to Rome have to deal with traffic, pollution, filth and graffiti, lines and crowding, to see collections and buildings that are like jigsaw-puzzles made up of bits and pieces, or missing bits and pieces.

I cringed right at the beginning of this book when I read the author thank his wife solely for her Index-making skills.  Ouch.  Cold.  The male-of-a-certain age feeling remained throughout the reading of the book, especially when mentions of women resorting to prostitution in order to survive were treated as moments of amusement or curiosity. 

Wouldn't the readers find it so amusing to hear Samuel Johnson's Boswell's precise words about how he abused Roman women resulting in his infamous venereal disease?  No, this reader did not find it amusing, as I suspect no female readers found it amusing, and perhaps many men did not find it very nice either.  The diary quotes were not uninteresting per se, but they seemed too many and too much of another era to be entertaining.  Actually, some things about that other era provoked my envy:  Rome was open, inexpensive and often free for well-educated tourists.

The author has a fluid prose style and a command of his subject matter, although he his fond of historical gossip and probable invented innuendo.  He also has an academic's studied disdain for religion, which will annoy if not offend those of faith.  That was an odd thing to indulge when writing a book that would surely interest religious pilgrims to the home of Catholicism and the Christian faiths, and to the sites of so many religious martyrs, including two apostles of Jesus.  

The author keeps the 3000 years moving along at a quick pace.  We retrace Rome's long history of bloodshed and sadism, ruinous ambition, rampant misogyny, aristocratic destructive narcissism, invasion by thugs, looting by everyone and anyone.  It does become tiresome after a while.

The overall feeling from reading the book, for me, was this is too much history in too short a book.  3000 years in 400 pages; do the math and that is an average of 7.5 years per page.  That would be the history of Fascist Italy on one page.  You see what I mean?  Actually, the author allows a chapter to cover Royals and Fascists, but that means some pages cover hundreds of years of history.  All of post WWII Rome is summed up in the Epilogue.

The book chapters briefly cover:

• Romulus and Kings
• Roman Republic and Empire
• Christians
• Anarchy and the Fall of Rome
• Papal Rome, Charlemagne, Aristocrats
• Renaissance Excess
• Sack and Recovery
• Baroque and 1700s
• Napoleon
• Unification
• Royals and Fascists
• Today

From the book's description:

This beautifully written, informative study is a portrait, a history and a superb guide book, capturing fully the seductive beauty and the many layered past of the Eternal City.  It covers 3,000 years of history from the city's quasi-mythical origins, through the Etruscan kings, the opulent glory of classical Rome, the decadence and decay of the Middle Ages and the beauty and corruption of the Renaissance, to its time at the heart of Mussolini's fascist Italy.  Exploring the city's streets and buildings, peopled with popes, gladiators, emperors, noblemen and peasants, this volume details the turbulent and dramatic history of Rome in all its depravity and grandeur.

Here is a direct link to the book at Amazon.com:

The author has several books in print about Italy.  Here are links his other books at Amazon.com:

This review is by Candida Martinelli, of Candida Martinelli's Italophile Site, and the author of the cozy-murder-mystery novel AN EXTRA VIRGIN PRESSING MURDER, and the young-adult/adult mystery novel series THE VIOLET STRANGE MYSTERIES the first book of which is VIOLET'S PROBLEM.

Pagan and Christian Rome by Rodolfo Lanciani

The archeologist-author of this fascinating free e-book (links below) is knowledgeable and confidently Christian in a way modern scholars try to avoid, in public at least.  Published toward the end of the 1800s, the book discusses for the amateur archeologist and for the visitor to Rome the new discoveries that were being unearthed ever year at that time.  The author unhesitatingly links the catacombs and cemeteries, temples and churches, tombs and mausoleums to Rome's history as the founding city of Catholicism.

After the fall of the Western Roman Empire, the monuments of the city of Rome were plundered, patched up, stripped, restored, then neglected for a long time before being plundered by Italians during the Renaissance for building materials and decorations for new palaces for the rich and powerful.  The author explains much of this history without losing sight of the present-day Rome visitors would see.

Frontispiece of the book showing Constantine defeating Maximus to take control of the Roman Empire, after which he protected the Christian faith from persecution

Sadly, many of the sites the author discusses are no longer available to the tourist, but that does not detract from the interest in this heavily illustrated book.  The author writes at length about how the ancient Romans viewed the new faith, the Christian faith, the foreign superstition, the nova superstitio.  We learn about the early conversions and persecutions, about the rich converts and the poor converts, who worshiped together in humble confraternity.

Showy, proud, licentious Roman pagans saw Christians as despicably lazy, refusing to join in the licentiousness, public honors, showiness.

Christians did not approve of slavery, torture, capital punishment, prostitution, the slaughter of humans and animals for sacrifice nor for entertainment.  They shunned the sin of gluttony, too, which was shocking in a society where rich families could have a room next to their dining room called a vomitorium where people could vomit up their food so they could return to the dining table to eat more without suffering a distended stomach.  Yes, Roman society encouraged bulimia.

Old St. Peter's Basilica, built by Constantine's order, and the courtyard in front of it, under which popes were buried, the site is where the apostle Peter was crucified, and is where is remains are buried

The author describes the wholesale conversion of Roman pagan temples and shrines into Catholic churches, monasteries, convents and shrines.  These conversions began after Roman Emperor Constantine converted to Christianity.  He allowed the other faiths to practice in the Empire, but he protected Christians and gave them places to worship and to bury their dead. 

There is mention made of efforts by some Emperors before Constantine to incorporate Jesus into the Roman pantheon of gods, but the conservative Roman Senate always denied those requests.

[Tiberius] is alleged to have sent a message to the Senate requesting that Christ should be included among the gods, on the strength of the official report written by Pontius Pilatus of the passion and death of our Lord.

While pogroms against the Christians flared up periodically, for political reasons, the author stresses that the growth of Christianity was gradual and inevitable, and it was not seen as being in conflict with military service or public service roles, much like today, in most places.  Pagan symbols and festivals were incorporated into the new faith.  Roman pantheistic traditions often blended with Christian/Jewish traditions, much as the temples blended into churches.

The New St. Peter's Basilica, built to replace the old basilica which was collapsing

At a certain point in Rome's turbulent history, after the fall of the Western Roman Empire, the popes fought with the aristocratic families and their thugs for control of the city.  Christian pilgrims became the city's only source of income, so churches and shrines were constructed over tombs of saints and martyrs.  Passion plays and other religious spectacles were staged in Rome's streets. 

A large section in the book is dedicated to the construction of the first and second Basilicas of St. Peter.  First Constantine's tribute to where St. Peter was crucified is described, and then the new basilica's construction is detailed.  I found this to be the most fascinating section of the book. 

The second most interesting section is about the churches built over the homes that were used by Saints Peter and Paul when preaching to the early Christians in Rome.

The Basilica of St. Paul Outside the Walls (Fuori le mura), built by order of Constantine over the remains of the apostle Paul, and rebuilt through the ages

The author's enthusiasm for his subject is contagious.  A picture of Rome through the ages emerges from his text.  It is a living, breathing Rome, full of complex people from all around the Mediterranean Sea.  He treats us to appropriate quotes from classical writers, popes, saints and historians. 

The reader comes away with a better understanding of the ancient Romans and the early Christians, but to fully appreciate the book the reader should have a basic grounding in the history of ancient Rome and in the Catholic faith.  Only then can one really understand the links the author makes between Jerusalem and Rome, not least the recreation of the Via Dolorosa by Rome's town planners, to host the yearly Passion play.

Pagan and Christian Rome is free to download in various e-book formats, including Kindle mobi, from Project Gutenberg, the Internet's grand-daddy of free e-book sites.  You can also read the book on-line with the HTML format.

Direct link to the free e-book download page for P&C Rome

Victorian pilgrims to the Catacombs of St. Calixtus, one of the 60 underground cemeteries of ancient Rome

If you wish, you can download the free Kindle (mobi) edition directly from Amazon.com.

Direct link to the Amazon e-book page for free download of Pagan and Christian Rome

A depiction of early Christians attending a mass in the Catacombs of St. Calixtus

This review is by Candida Martinelli, of Candida Martinelli's Italophile Site, and the author of the cozy-murder-mystery novel AN EXTRA VIRGIN PRESSING MURDER, and the young-adult/adult mystery novel series THE VIOLET STRANGE MYSTERIES the first book of which is VIOLET'S PROBLEM.

The Greatest Empire, A Life of Seneca by Emily Wilson

The Greatest Empire is a biography of the philosopher, writer, politician Lucius Annaeus Seneca, who was born in Cordoba, Spain circa 4 B.C. and who died, by his own hand under political pressure, in 66 A.D. 

I should state right away that the "Greatest Empire" referred to in the title is not the Roman Empire, under which Seneca lived.  Seneca, a master of wordplay, believed that if one could conquer oneself, control one's own impulses, then one had conquered the greatest empire possible.  To be Emperor of oneself was Seneca's goal in life, but one that he could not always live up to, because he was, after all, human.

This scholarly work, which I received as a review-copy, includes a timeline, maps, notes, further reading suggestions, a bibliography, art credits and a full Index.  The writing style is convoluted, stilted, and dryly academic at times.  But the author's female perspective on a paternalistic and misogynistic society is refreshing to read.  And she provides parenthetical explanations for those readers who are not up to speed on Roman and Mediterranean history.

When attempting a biography of an ancient Roman citizen, one is limited to the ancient sources that have survived to our day.  Those sources have not changed for centuries.  Modern writers attempt to re-interpret these sources, provide lots of context for readers, and apply our modern thoughts and philosophies to the facts related in the sources.  In Seneca's case, there is the risk that the era was more interesting than the man, which was a thought I had at times while reading this book.

Seneca was a Socratic and Stoic philosopher, a writer of literature, plays and popular aphorisms, and a speechwriter for his former pupil, the Emperor Nero.  Seneca is 18 years old when Rome's first permanent Emperor dies, Augustus.  Then Seneca lives through the reigns of Tiberius, Caligula, and Claudius.  The Emperor Nero pressures Seneca to take his own life.  

The author refuses to accept the common picture that is painted of Seneca as an opportunistic, ass-kissing hypocrite.  Many hold up Seneca as a prime example of a worthy man who sold his soul to get power and wealth.  Seneca himself said he tried:

...to be engaged in the world without losing integrity.

The author believes this about Seneca:

He was neither a monster nor a saint; he was a talented, ambitious, deeply thoughtful man, who struggled to create an uneasy compromise between his ideals and the powers that were.

I found the sections of the book that discuss the philosophies of the era the most interesting:  Cynicism, Hedonism, Platonism, Epicureanism, Stoicism, Skepticism, and the Peripatetics, the Pythagorians, and the Sextians!  Everybody wanted to find solace in life and to "overcome grief, pain and fear of death".  Judaism was the annoying old-timer of philosophies because the followers of the monotheistic Judaism refused to worship Roman Emperors.  And the relatively new Catholicism was just as troublesome.

The author aims to link Seneca's remaining writings, and writings we know existed, with the man's life.  That is a life that began in the province of Spain, moved to the capital Rome where he fell ill from his recurring Tuberculosis, moved to another province, Egypt, back to Rome, then into exile on Corsica due to a sex-scandal, then back to Rome where he became filthy rich and very powerful.  Then things went very badly for Seneca, sending him into a peripatetic life around Italy, which eventually lead to his death by suicide to escape execution by the Emperor Nero.

The author describes Seneca's childhood, family life and education.  That information comes mainly from Seneca the Elder's writings, another philosopher.  That is an interesting section that explains the Roman manner of teaching, which was based on the Greek manner of teaching:  debate, argument, declamation, rhetoric, memorization.  All fathers wanted their sons to become lawyers!

We also get snippets from Seneca's letters to his family.  These are wonderful for the details that are revealed about daily life in Ancient Rome.  The section of the book on Seneca's influence through the ages since the fall of Rome could be developed into a book in itself, it is so rich with references and potential material.  It comes across as feeling rushed in The Greatest Empire.

What was Seneca like, based on what the author tells us?  Well, he was pretty typical for his class, time, and place.  He was a macho jerk, self-righteous, self-important, ambitious, self-pitying, pompous, falsely modest, a narcissist, a slave owner, and a hypocrite. 

Seneca's insights into human nature still apply to us today, since human nature is the one true constant over time.  The author states Seneca's ever-true observation:

...psychological truth of his central insight that watching acts of pain and cruelty does real harm to our souls.

That harm is a fact.  Our moral compass is destroyed by watching real and simulated acts of pain and cruelty.  Children can be exposed to that harm without choice, but most people damage themselves by their choices of cultural consumption.  Perhaps that insight alone is reason for people to continue to read Seneca's philosophical works?

From the book's (very long!) description:

By any measure, Seneca (?4-65AD) is one of the most important figures in both Roman literature and ancient philosophy. He was the most popular writer of his day, and his writings are voluminous and diverse, ranging from satire to philosophical "consolations" against grief, from metaphysical theory to moral and political discussions of virtue and anger.

He was also the author of disturbing, violent tragedies, which present monstrous characters in a world gone wrong. But Seneca was also deeply engaged with the turbulent political events of his time. Exiled by the emperor Claudius for supposed involvement in a sex scandal, he was eventually brought back to Rome to become tutor and, later, speech-writer and advisor to Nero.

He was an important eyewitness to one of the most interesting periods of Roman history, living under the rule of five of the most famous--and infamous--emperors (Augustus, Tiberius, Caligula, Claudius, and Nero), through the Great Fire of Rome (64AD), and at a time of expansion and consolidation of Roman imperial power throughout the Mediterranean world, as well as various foreign and internal conflicts. Suspected of plotting against Nero, Seneca was condemned and ultimately took his own life in what became one of the most iconic suicides in Western history.

The life and works of Seneca pose a number of fascinating challenges. How can we reconcile his bloody, passionate tragedies with his prose works advocating a life of Stoic tranquility? Furthermore, how are we to reconcile Seneca the Stoic philosopher, the man of principle, who advocated a life of calm and simplicity, with Seneca the man of the moment, who amassed a vast personal fortune in the service of an emperor seen by many, at the time and afterwards, as an insane tyrant?

In this vivid biography, Emily Wilson presents Seneca as a man under enormous pressure, struggling for compromise in a world of absolutism. The Greatest Empire: A Life of Seneca thus offers us, in fascinating ways, the portrait of a man with all the fissures and cracks formed by the clash of the ideal and the real: the gulf between political hopes and fears, and philosophical ideals; the gap between what we want to be, and what we are.

Direct link to the Seneca Aphorisms Page at Aphorism4all.com

The Greatest Empire is published by Oxford University Press.

Oxford University Press is a department of the University of Oxford. It furthers the University's objective of excellence in research, scholarship, and education by publishing worldwide.

Here are direct links to the book at Amazon.com:

If you are interested in reading some of Seneca's works, for FREE, then here is a link to Seneca's page at Project Gutenberg, the grand-daddy of free e-book sites on the Internet.  Click on a work listed on that page, and you are brought to a download page, where you can choose your e-book format of choice.  You can also choose to read the book on-line in HTML format.

Direct link to the Seneca e-books page at PG

If you wish to read about Seneca in Ancient Roman texts, you could try Suetonius's life of Nero, in which Seneca plays a major role.

Direct link to Suetonius's FREE Life of Nero e-books at PG

How bonkers was Nero?  Well, this TV production gives a good idea, and shows the beginning of the end of the Roman Emperor Nero.

This review is by Candida Martinelli, of Candida Martinelli's Italophile Site, and the author of the cozy-murder-mystery novel AN EXTRA VIRGIN PRESSING MURDER, and the young-adult/adult mystery novel series THE VIOLET STRANGE MYSTERIES the first book of which is VIOLET'S PROBLEM.

Augustus, First Emperor of Rome by Adrian Goldsworthy

The 650 or so pages of this biography of Caesar Augustus (Octavius - Octavian) are a gift to Ancient Roman history fans and students.  The author has combed through all the ancient texts and collected together everything having to do with Augustus.  Then he has put them together chronologically.  He has evaluated the fact, fiction, and propaganda (spin-doctors are as old as politics) and presented the most likely truth.  Even modern conspiracies are evaluated, and discounted for the most part.

What remains is a detail-rich story of the life and times of Julius Caesar's heir, Rome's first permanent Emperor, the man who gave the ancient world the famous Pax Romana, Octavian, who became Caesar Augustus.   

Front view of the same statue as on the cover of the book, showing the depiction of Augustus recovering lost Roman military standards, a big PR coop for the politician.

Along with the details, the author includes in the last twenty percent of the book:

• Maps
• Appendices that include a description of the career stages of the typical Roman senator, and oddly on the date of birth of Jesus of Nazareth
• a list of Key Personalities
• Family Trees
• and a full and extensive Bibliography, Notes, Index, and a Glossary of Roman terms. 

The statue that was replicated many times and displayed all around the empire.

The book is divides the life of Octavian into five stages, related to his changing title.  A child of the civil wars that rocked the end of the Republic, the man grew into  its First Citizen, its Emperor, who held supreme power for forty-five years, and the honorary Father of his country.  The five titles correspond well to the phases in the man's life:

Part 1 - Birth Name, Caius Octavious/Octavianus/Octavian:  Childhood during the turbulent civil wars period of Rome's late Republic (from Res Publica - the public thing, the commonwealth)

Part 2 - Adopted name, Caius Julius Caesar:  Civil Wars to attain total power (warlords at war)

Part 3 - Imperator Caesar, Divi Filius:  Battles to expand and subdue the Empire (military dictator)

Part 4 - Imperator Ceasar Augustus, Divi Filius, Princeps/First Citizen:  Infrastructure building throughout the Empire and the capital, Rome (First Citizen of the Principate or Kingdom, the Prince), and keeping the peace

Part 5 - Imperator Caesar Augustus, Divi Filius, Pater Patriae/Father of the Country:  Efficient organization of the administration, communication and taxation needed to maintain the Empire, and keeping the peace.

A color depiction showing the light skin and hair of the Emperor.

Roman leaders were expected to be military men who were tested in military campaigns, but also politicians who were expert in the administration of Rome's vast territory.  So, necessarily, the story of a Roman leader is a story of battles and civil administration.  Anything other than that would "have baffled the Romans", as the author explains.

Once all the gossip is removed from the stories surrounding Octavian, what remains can be tedious reading:  battles, massacres, building, more battles, more massacres, more building, deaths, rivals, spoils, wealth, sickness...  You have to be a real fan of Ancient Roman history to enjoy this book.  It is not for dabblers in history.   

The writer's style is clear, fluid, and concise when needed, but it is not especially interesting.  Dry, is the word I would use to best describe it.  But that seems to be what the author was aiming for.  His stated goal is:

...to write as if this were the biography of a modern statesman, asking the same questions even if our sources make it difficult to answer them, and trying as far as possible to understand the real man.

Augustus relied on two loyal friends during the first half of his reign:  Maecenas and Agrippa.

Like all politicians past and present, the man's story is clouded by personal reinvention, propaganda and a slippery, chameleon-like ability to pretend to be just what is necessary even as the times and situations change.  But, as much as possible, the author tells the story of the man's life, relating the details we know, and summarizing events that do not directly involve Augustus but which relate to him.

The major sources for the book are:  Appian, Dio, Paterculus, Cicero's letters, Suetonius, Plutarch.  I provide links below to free e-books of many of these works in translation.  The author quotes from Roman lawyer, writer and politician Cicero to explain why one would want to read history books:

For what is the life of a man, if it is not interwoven with the life of former generations by as  sense of history.

Agrippa, Augustus Caesar's right hand, a master general and administrator.  Yes, he was a tough as he looks.

Much time is spent setting the scene into which Augustus is born and into which he emerges as an ambitious player in the political struggles that are tearing apart the Republic.  And if you ever doubt that the past speaks to the present, then those doubts will disappear after reading about Roman politics in the first century b.c.:

"...it was better that a problem not e dealt with than to permit a rival to gain credit for solving it."

"a recipe for inertia"

"Personal hatreds and rivalry loomed larger in most senator's minds than the good of the Republic."

Cicero was killed on the order of Augustus and Marc Antony

Who was leader Augustus?  He was a warlord with loyal subordinates, who funded his command of armies through, at first, his inheritance of the wealth his uncle Julius Caesar stole from Gaul and Spain.  Later armies were paid for by the wealth of Egypt, which went into his pocket rather than to the State, and by theft-by-war of the riches of the east.  Eventually, taxation funded the armies that kept the military dictator in power.

Who was the man Augustus?  He was confident, with a serious sense of entitlement, lucky, politically skillful due to his ability to listen to advice from intelligent and honest subordinates, crude and vulgar, opportunistic, randy, prone to ill health until he stuck to a diet of moderation, vain, arrogant, self-centered, superstitious, a liar, devious, cruel, a mass-murderer, sadistic, hypocritical, power hungry, not so bright and poorly educated, a user, a gambler, greedy, callous, pompous, conceited, bigoted, full of blood-lust, conservative, and a megalomaniac.

Cleopatra killed herself rather than be taken by Augustus to Rome to parade through the town in his Triumph, the celebration of his military victory over Egypt.  Painting of her death scene, and her live children were paraded through Rome, instead.

The only point in the man's story where he is at all sympathetic is when his family members start to die, leaving him to live to very old age with few of his close relatives to comfort him.  He quickly does the Roman thing, which is to adopt the children of his relations and friends.  He marries them to each other to build a dynasty, in the usual in-bred way dynasties tend to favor, seeding their own demise through the weak progeny they produced.  On the whole, Augustus is about as loveable as any military dictator, past or present.

A few negatives, more me...   There were a few odd tangents to side players in the course of the biography, like to Herod, King of the Jews.  I didn't think we needed the author to interpret Augustus's character for us, as he does periodically throughout the book; we are well able to glean what the man was like through the bountiful details the author provides.  And more commas in the text would have aided readability, but perhaps they were added after my review-copy was prepared for print. 

And I felt the sadism, blood-lust and slavery of the era was glossed over, rather than studied for the insight it could offer on the sick and brutal nature of mankind, that modern, enlightened mankind fights to overcome with the help of philosophy, religious instruction, and international law.

A depiction of the death of Augustus, with Livia, his loyal wife by his side, and some of the parade of men he had visit him, including Tiberius, his successor, while he was dying.

From the book's description:

Caesar Augustus’ story, one of the most riveting in western history, is filled with drama and contradiction, risky gambles and unexpected success.  He began as a teenage warlord, whose only claim to power was as the heir of the murdered Julius Caesar.  Mark Antony dubbed him “a boy who owes everything to a name,” but in the years to come the youth outmaneuvered all the older and more experienced politicians and was the last man standing in 30 BC.  Over the next half century he reinvented himself as a servant of the state who gave Rome peace and stability, and created a new system of government—the Principate or rule of an emperor.

In this highly anticipated biography Goldsworthy puts his deep knowledge of ancient sources to full use, recounting the events of Augustus’ long life in greater detail than ever before.  Goldsworthy pins down the man behind the myths:  a consummate manipulator, propagandist, and showman, both generous and ruthless.  Under Augustus’ rule the empire prospered, yet his success was never assured and the events of his life unfolded with exciting unpredictability.  Goldsworthy captures the passion and savagery, the public image and private struggles of the real man whose epic life continues to influence western history.

Virgil Reading Aeneid to Augustus, Octavia, and Livia.  Octavia faints when the poet reads the part of his epic poem that refers to Octavia's deceased son, Marcellus.  Livia is Augustus's wife.  Octavia is his sister.

Augustus, First Emperor of Rome is published by Yale University Press, which hosts an interesting blog.

By publishing serious works that contribute to a global understanding of human affairs, Yale University Press aids in the discovery and dissemination of light and truth, lux et veritas, which is a central purpose of Yale University.

Direct link to the book's page at YUP

Here are links to the book at Amazon.com:

 

Here are links to FREE e-books of translations of ancient texts dealing with the history of Rome, all via Project Gutenberg, the grand-daddy of free e-book sites on the Internet.

The links go to pages listing the texts available for that author.  When you click on a text, you are brought to a page with links to e-books in various formats of that text, for immediate download.

Cassius Dio Cocceianus

Marcus Tullius Cicero

Suetonius

Plutarch

This review is by Candida Martinelli, of Candida Martinelli's Italophile Site, and the author of the cozy-murder-mystery novel AN EXTRA VIRGIN PRESSING MURDER, and the young-adult/adult mystery novel series THE VIOLET STRANGE MYSTERIES the first book of which is VIOLET'S PROBLEM.

Hannibal Crosses the Alps by John Prevas

The subtitle of this books is The Invasion of Italy and the Punic Wars, but the book is not limited to only those subjects.  While the book concentrates at least half of the roughly 200 pages on Hannibal's Alp crossing from Gaul (France) to Italy, we also get a history of Hannibal's family and the city-state of Carthage, plus much history of Ancient Rome, mainly in relation to their arch rival, Carthage.

There were three Punic Wars.  Punic is the ethnic name for the people who settled the city and state of Carthage in North Africa, not far from Sicily.  The Punic people were originally Phoenicians from Tyre, in today's Lebanon.  Punic is also the name for their language, a Semitic tongue that was written with the pretty much the same alphabet we use today, and which I am using right now to write this review.

Table Comparing Hieroglyphic and Ancient Alphabet Characters - Chaldaic, Phoenician, and Sumerian

While they had a great alphabet, and a fantastic location to levy tolls on ships traversing the Mediterranean Sea, and a great fleet of ships, and a fantastic city, the Carthaginians were horribly sadistic to friend and foe, and lacking in loyalty to each other, and in honor in their word to others.  Treaty after treaty with Rome was broken, and military leader after military leader was crucified for failure in battle, battles that were little more than wholesale slaughter.

Hannibal Barca's family was involved in all of the Punic Wars, many asserting that Hannibal and his brothers orchestrated the second war to avenge their father's losses in the first war that was waged in Sicily.  When the third war was over, Carthage paid the ultimate price:  Roman forces tore down the city-state brick by brick, and spread salt on the fields surrounding the city, to prevent the growth of crops needed to support a new city. 

The Punic Wars were fought in North Africa, Spain, Sardinia, Sicily and on the Italian peninsula.  From 264 B.C. to 146 B.C. the wars between the two Mediterranean trading nations were fought to control trading outposts, trade routes, travel taxes, and markets for goods.  Carthage was the established trading and naval power.  Rome was the up and coming trading and land army power.

The author begins the book with a brief summary of all three Punic Wars, then he describes the founding myths of Carthage and Rome, and then explains the hostility between them.  We learn of archeological and linguistic evidence about the rivals, and how both societies functioned, and how they grew from small settlements to trading superpowers. 

Punic Coin Bearing the Head of Hamilcar Barca (circa 270-228 BC) Minted at Carthage, circa 230 BC

Sadism is a running theme in the story of the two empires.  I won't get into all that sickness here, but be prepared for it if you want to study this history:  institutionalized sadism from slavery to crucifixions to torture to infanticide.  The 150+ years described in this book is connected by a string of barbarities committed by both sides of the conflict.

This is really a book for Hannibal historians to indulge in their fantasies of following along as Hannibal moved his military forces (including his famous elephants) from southern Spain, up the coast of Spain, passing into Gaul (France), traversing Gaul to the French Alps, and then maneuvering a difficult Alpine pass, past savage Celtic tribes, descending into Italy's Po Valley, and continuing on for nearly two decades through the rest of the Italian peninsula.

The author describes his sources as being mainly the surviving writings of Polybius and Livy, to which I provide links below, as free e-books.  The prose is not always smooth, and there is some repetition.  The painstaking detail of the Alpine trip might be tedious for some readers.  The events after the Alp crossing are condensed in the final sixth of the book.  But the author does make his central thesis clear:  the battles with Carthage forced/taught Rome to learn to become the world power that would dominate the Mediterranean and beyond for centuries to come.

For the diehards, here is a possible route through the Alps for Hannibal shown using GoogleEarth's images, some from varying times of the year, to show what the conditions might have been like for Hannibal.

From the book's description:

When he left his Spanish base one spring day in 218 B.C. with his 100,000-man army of mercenaries, officers, and elephants, Hannibal was launching not just the main offensive of the Second Punic War but also one of the great military journeys in ancient history. His masterful advance through rough terrain and fierce Celtic tribes proved his worth as a leader, but it was his extraordinary passage through the Alps—still considered treacherous even by modern climbers—that made him a legend. John Prevas combines rigorous research of ancient sources with his own excursions through the icy peaks to bring to life this awesome trek, solving the centuries-old question of Hannibal's exact route and shedding fresh light on the cultures of Rome and Carthage along the way. Here is the finest kind of history, sure to appeal to readers of Steven Pressfield's Gates of Fire: alive with grand strategy, the clash of empires, fabulous courage, and the towering figure of Hannibal Barca.

The Oath of Hannibal, to his father that he will see to the destruction of Rome, in exchange for following his father into battle in Spain

The book is published by Da Capo Press.

Founded in 1964 as a publisher of music books, Da Capo became a general trade publisher in the mid-1970s.  It joined the Perseus Books Group in 1999.  Today it has a wide-ranging list of mostly nonfiction titles, both hardcover and paperback, focusing on history, music, the performing arts, sports, and popular culture.

Direct link to the book at DaC

Direct link to the author's books at DaC

Here are direct links to the book at Amazon.com.

If you are interested in reading the original sources in translation, they are available from Project Gutenberg, the grand-daddy of free e-books sites on the Internet.

Direct link to the The Histories of Polybius Vol. 1 e-book listings

Direct link to the The Histories of Polybius Vol. 2 e-book listings

Direct link to the Livy's History of Rome in 5 Volumes

Here is the Engineering an Empire story of Carthage with some stunning computerized recreations, and the whole story of the city-state and Empire in just 44 minutes.

I noticed lots of visits to this page from Facebook and found that my review had been posted on Hannibal Barca's Facebook page.  Yes, Hannibal has a Facebook page, and he has nearly 5000 likes!  Not bad for a man who has been gone for centuries.  Here is the link to the Hannibal Barca the Tunisian's Facebook page.


This review is by Candida Martinelli, of Candida Martinelli's Italophile Site, and the author of the cozy-murder-mystery novel AN EXTRA VIRGIN PRESSING MURDER, and the young-adult/adult mystery novel series THE VIOLET STRANGE MYSTERIES the first book of which is VIOLET'S PROBLEM.