Review
This book will result in a significant re-evaluation of the way we view late and post-Roman Spain.
(Ralph Mathisen, University of Illinois, Urbana/Champaign 2005)
Late antiquity is emerging as a field in its own right, and an earlier review... noted three essential works. Kulikowski's is a fourth.
(
Choice 2005)
This book makes a valuable contribution with its vivid presentation and synthesis of recent Spanish archaeological research.
(Rachel L. Stocking
Speculum 2006)
Kulikowski has succeeded in laying the foundations for ever more detailed enquiries about the history of a period which scholars are less and less ready to characterize as 'of limited interest' and 'transitional.'
(Patrick Le Roux
Mediterranean Historical Review 2005)
Kulikowski's book is one of extraordinary sweep, vision, and scholarship... Provides a comprehensive picture of Roman urban institutions and society in Spain, as well as a detailed examination of their transformation into the Christian world of the early Middle Ages in a fashion that is at once accessible, informed, and illuminating.
(Evan W. Haley
American Historical Review 2007)
A valuable and fascinating contribution... which shows us how the history of this period should be written.
(John Richardson
Catholic Historical Review 2007)
This thought-provoking and stimulating study demands a fundamental reappraisal of some of the long-standing assumptions of social and urban transformation: not only in Spain, but in the western empire as a whole.
(A. H. Merrills
Early Medieval Europe 2009)
Well-produced and easy to use... Extremely useful.
(Gareth Sears
Journal of Roman Studies 2011)
A powerful and important contribution to debates about the nature of the peninsula at this time.
(A. T. Fear
Classical Review )
Has the merit of introducing the Anglophone reader reader to the most recent archaeological research from Spain and Portugal, a subject he knows very well.
(José Carlos Saquete
Ancient West and East )
A narrative history of Spain from AD 400 to 500, the establishment of a Gothickingdom in the early 6th century and what this meant for the mechanics and institutions of town and city life, complete the work.
(
Oxbow Book News )
From the Back Cover
Honorable Mention, Association of American Publishers’ Professional and Scholarly Publishing Awards in Classics and Archeology
The history of Spain in late antiquity offers important insights into the dissolution of the western Roman empire and the emergence of medieval Europe. Nonetheless, scholarship on Spain in this period has lagged behind that on other Roman provinces. Michael Kulikowski draws on the most recent archaeological and literary evidence to integrate late antique Spain into the broader history of the Roman empire, providing a definitive narrative and analytical account of the Iberian peninsula from AD 300 to 600.
"Kulikowski's book is one of extraordinary sweep, vision, and scholarship... Provides a comprehensive picture of Roman urban institutions and society in Spain, as well as a detailed examination of their transformation into the Christian world of the early Middle Ages in a fashion that is at once accessible, informed, and illuminating."— American Historical Review
"This book makes a valuable contribution with its vivid presentation and synthesis of recent Spanish archaeological research."— Speculum
"This thought-provoking and stimulating study demands a fundamental reappraisal of some of the long-standing assumptions of social and urban transformation: not only in Spain, but in the western empire as a whole."— Early Medieval Europe
"A powerful and important contribution to debates about the nature of the peninsula at this time."— Classical Review
Michael Kulikowski is a professor and head of the Department of History at Pennsylvania State University.
