Customer Reviews

The Roman World 44 BC-AD 180 (The Routledge History of the Ancient World)

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This book is an insightful summary of the Roman empire, and the way it worked. Professor Goodman's analysis of the underlying power structure of the empire and how the subjects persuaded themselves to accept what today we would call a military dictatorship is compelling, and contains insights for our own time. For example, a) just why did the Romans need such a large army anyway ? b) why would anyone want to be a senator, when it's the emperor who calls all the shots ?

If you want to know the answers, but this book.

I originally bought this book back in about 2000 or so, and decided this summer to finally read it - wow, am I glad I did. It is as some have commented, a work with many names, and references - but does come with a Notes section at the end, so you can look up all the information as you go along. I think that the book is well written, and gives a nice topographical view of the Roman world from 44BC - the death of J. Caesar to 180AD the advent of Commodus (if you saw Gladiator, you know who he is). It's coverage of the whole Roman Empire, into economical, religious, and society is quite riveting, and well thought out. It is not a difficult book to read, and has short chapters, with headings for each section - this will make it easier for you to read, and follow along.

He uses archaeological, and written sources, and does this quite well. I wholly recommend this book, and think most will find it good to read.

This book was easy to read and to follow, had a number of helpful illustration and provided an fair amount of information pertaining to the foundation of the Empire and the running of both Rome and the provinces. While this book would be excellent for novices in the field of Roman antiquity, it was not an adequate read for any student of the ancient world. The lives of emperors were summed up in a few pages (usually around 2-5, some as short as 1/2 of a page), the governing of the country was presented in a superficial manner, and the general history was bland and without depth. I would recommend this book to anyone wanting to learn the 'basics' of the Roman Empire, however, more serious scholars should look elsewhere.

The book is good if you are only looking for a summary of the Roman economy, military, religions, etc. To get a better overall view of Roman, or any other Western history, though, I highly recommend the various collaboration efforts of Professor John Reich.