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Posted by marcus_scipio (U8500653) on Wednesday, 30th May 2007
Hi I'm new to this board and ancient history in general. Ive recently read some excellent books such as:
Rubicon
Persian Fire
Greece and Rome at War
Egypt, Greece and Rome
Ancient Rome, The Rise and Fall of an Empire
and was wondering if anyone recommended other books on ancient history written in a similar style.
I also wondered if anybody recommends the Penguin Encyclopedia of Ancient Civilizations for newbies?
Thanks Marcus
Hi Marcus_Scipio,
I'd definitely recommend getting hold of a good classical atlas - I found it helped make the events more real when I understood where they actually happened!
If you want to have a look at the original sources then from the Roman side you have Suetonius, Plutarch and Tacitus available in the Penguin Classics series. They're pretty readable too, and have the benefit of containing some nice gossip and scandal...
Cheers,
RF
I'm just coming to the end of Suetonius' 12 Caesars (again). It's a great read. Poor old Germanicus and Titus and as for that Domitian...grrr!
Have a look at Herodotus' Histories and Pausanias for some lovely Greek goodies.
Oh, and Robert Harris's 'Pompeii', although fiction, is well worth a peek.
And if you find you get a hankering for the more nonsensical stuff that Herodotus comes out with, then Pliny the Elder's "Natural Histories" will fill that need.
Xenophon's "Anabasis", or "The Persian Expedition" as it's sometimes called, is a fine read. If you've ever missed the last bus and had to walk home through the roughest neighbourhood, then you'll feel empathy for the guy! I also heard that it was a big influence on the film "The Warriors" - anyone shed light on this?
Thanks guys
I'll definitely try out some of these books.
try
George shipway "Imperial Governor" - a very accurate novel of the Boudiccan revolt
two place to look for free downloads of ancient texts and online coplies of many works are here:
Hi GrumpyNick-IOW,
I often use these myself as they're great for getting information quickly. The only problem I can really find with them, is that as a lot of the translations they have available are out of copyright, they can often be written in a dry or "old-fashioned" style.
Oh, and one other issue I have with on-line books - they're a bit hard to read in the bath...
Cheers,
RF
p.s. I enjoyed your post about torsion engines on the Longbow thread.
Hi RainbowFfolly
There is no lack of good online material, and its good to share it!.
I agree on the dryness of many older works, makeing them a tad hard work, but they do often contain insights that modern works lack, probably a change from chronological to compartive methods of teaching has a lot to do with that though, and a folder of print out dont seem the same as a proper book either!.
In truth I've not done much of a search but are the books I once knew as Loebb classics still in print? I could only get Caesar's 'Civil Wars' in that series from a library - a good read because of the detail.... and in passing ... Aristotle on animals and nature is absorbing. My copy comes from the E. Brittanica 60 great books series.
That's three postings in one day and enough from me.
Regards P.
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