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Volumes 4, 5, and 6 of the Bury Text, in a boxed set. Introduction by Hugh Trevor-Roper
Volumes 4, 5, and 6 of the Bury Text, in a boxed set. Introduction by Hugh Trevor-Roper
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Volumes 4, 5, and 6 of the Bury Text, in a boxed set. Introduction by Hugh Trevor-Roper
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17 of 19 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
A magistrally written sequel,
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This review is from: The Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire (Volumes 4-6) (Hardcover)
Edward Gibbon is the most talented British historian of all times and "The Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire" is his acclaimed masterwork, an opus which should be included in whatever list of the 100 most important literary works of all times. The first three books, elegantly featured on a velvet green cover and boxed together in picturally attractive white cardbox, cover the decline and fall of the so-called Western Empire, seated alternately in Rome or Verona in Italy in the end of the V century A.D., and I read it with respect and awe in no more than a month (see the pertinent review). The sequel, again presented with all the elegance the opus deserves, is composed of three voluminous books, totalling again some 2.000 pages and covering the period after the fall of Rome to the barbarians of the Visigoth Allaric and others, where the power and the Empire has moved its see to Constantinople (Byzantium) in the East. The Crusades and the likeness of the prophet Mohamed are there, although from the preconcept and biased view of a retrograde XVIII English colonizer who likened the Arabs to savages and women to a second class position in society. This second series of book is as good and lenghty as the first series, something which is in itself an almost unattainable goal to any sequel such as this, and Gibbon has once again the reader's attention suspended on a perpetual state of anxiety, always looking forward to read in the next sequence of words a point of view or a descriptive text magistrally written about human boldness and courage in the event of victory, or else the picture of the frailties of human soul when facing impending danger. His polemical portrait of Empress Theodora (according to him a former prostitute) is unequaled to anything written before or after him, specially the part where it was to her that the fleeing emperor Athanasius owe the maintenance of his wavering will and his imperial rule. The erudition of Edward Gibbon is unparalelled and he unassumedly cites many ancient writters in Greek, Latin, French and other languages, letting solely to the reader the not so easy task of translating it into English. His English is elegant and unexpected and the avail of a handy good English dictionary of archaic words will be a helpfull tool to the reader. His sources are profuse and diversified and whenever he has the opportunity, he traces the parallel of ancient history with contemporary and imperial England in the making. In my opinion, the misconcepts of some of his views notwithstanding, this is one of the most important works concerning the fall of Rome ever done and I hope you enjoy it as much as I did.
6 of 7 people found the following review helpful:
4.0 out of 5 stars
Should Have Stopped After the First Half,
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This review is from: The Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire (Volumes 4-6) (Hardcover)
This set is the second half of Gibbon's masterpiece. It contains some wonderfully witty lines and sarcastic asides as well as superb scholarship. It also shows Gibbon's failings as a historian more clearly than the last set. Having completed the story up until the fall of Rome in 476 he felt compelled to continue until the fall of Constantinople (the New Rome) in 1453. In doing so he was forced to make the facts fit his thesis and gave an extremely distorted view of the Byzantine (Eastern Roman) Empire. His basic thesis was that the Roman Empire reached its peak in the 2nd Century AD and that everything after that was a decline. Fine. For the West that thesis can fit with only minor tweaking (it's still too overstated) but for the East it does not fit at all. To believe Gibbon the Eastern Empire continued in a state of decline for over a thousand years. And this despite being surrounded by powerful barbarians and having to deal with migrating tribes and the newly established Muslim caliphate. Clearly an Empire cannot be in decline from the very beginning. His thesis must be wrong. Yet he persists in it. Byzantinologists have lamented these three books for ages since they prevented study on the Empire for so long due to its perceived effeminacy and weakness. Classicists may have less cause to hate it since it covers a period less dear to their hearts and does so with great aplomb. Despite Gibbon's historical prejudices these books are a good read. They present the information in an entertaining way and the narrative is broadly correct even if the interpretation is not. So by all means read this book but be prepared for flowery 18th Century language and do not accept his conclusions at face value.
This set is a very nice one incidentally with a nice box to store them in and an attractive binding with a bookmark sewn into each. The only problem is that the black lettering on the spine comes off rather easily.
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