Books on ancient history

[Mausolos of Caria]

It's time for me to open a new thread on the RTR forum! Having found out about the decent German knowledge of some members on here I want to use the opportunity for a thread about ancient history books (or monographs, as you say at university). Thus someone can also post about non-English publications he or she would recommend on here and maybe there will be other users who are both interested and able to read in that language. Of course English books should be mentioned as well

The idea of the thread is to introduce books you have read yourself and considered to be well written (or maybe some you didn't like but which are commonly used, that might offer an interesting base for a debate as well). Please state shortly what the books are about, who the author is and why you think they are worth a read instead of just dropping names

Hopefully this will be a success and a help for everyone willing to read modern publications about ancient history

[Mausolos of Caria]

I will start myself to lead by example

Bleicken, Jochen, Augustus, Eine Biographie , Berlin 1998/2000. (Augustus, a biography, in German)

In this 799- pages strong volume ancient history lecturer Jochen Bleicken took on the life of the first Roman emperor, Octavianus ''Augustus''. Bleicken, a Historian and Archaelogist from Northern Germany, who died in 2005, wrote this biography as his last publication and brings all of his experience from a historian's career into it. Starting with the Ides of March Bleicken describes the history of the events leading from Caesar's murder to the establishment of Augustus as emperor.
The big advantage of Bleicken's monography is his wide knowledge of less known facts and the complete description he gives of the time period, Augustus' character and the structure and constitution of the empire as well as it's every day life after the terrors of civil war. The engaging style of Bleicken keeps the reader stuck to the book throughout the 650 pages of description, followed by a vast appendix including Augustus' family tree and his wide range of sources. All in all it is a very pleasing biography that gives you a lot of information about all areas, be it social history, military, economic or political history. Bleicken knows how to connect the story he presents throughout the book and seems to include everything important that happened in the age of Augustus.
But one has to have the patience for 650 pages +, so it's not the right book for someone who only needs short information. Although the well ordered chapters will bring you to special informations you are searching for as well, such as the Battle of Actium, the role of the Senate in the Empire, the Military reforms under Augustus or his campaigns in Germania.


Holland, Tom, Persian Fire. The First World Empire and the Battle for the West, London 2006.

Award- winning English historian writes about the rise of the Achaemenid Empire and the Greco-Persian wars in which is probably his best book so far. Near East expert Holland, who got under fire in Britain last month for his very own interpretation of the Koran. Having studied at both Oxford and Cambrigde Holland, who won his award for Persian Fire, got also known for writing novels. In this volume, however, he gives an insight about the early history of the Persian Empire and its rise.
Introducing all important factions in different chapters (The Persian and Medes, Sparta, Babylon and Athens), the author immediately wins the interest of the reader. His fascinating style shows you why he's a succesful novel author as well and will keep you nailed at the book until the very last of the 418 pages. Especially the first part is impressing with his knowledge about early Persian history and the reasons for the rise of the Achaemenid empire. To this he adds general information about the early history and distinctive nature of Athens, Sparta and Babylon.
The reader quickly notes that Holland is not exactly contained with his interpretations and uses the primary sources well to tell the tale like a novel while keeping the scientific seriousness. Not everyone will like this style, but who does, will love it. In the second part one gets to the well known part about the Greco-Persian wars themselves, but Holland masters both drama and information as well so both historians and 300- fans will find their own favourite part in this tale. Having being advised by Robin Lane Fox Holland rounds his book of with a short, but convincing conclusion. The book is neither too long nor too short and I reckon most readers will add this to their favourite books after having read it- I certainly did! But as I said before Holland's style won't suit everyone, but it's worth to test it out yourself.

[Caligula Caesar]

Not exactly/exclusively ancient history, but worth reading any day...

J. Burrow, A History of Histories, London 2007 (I think - I can never work out what to take as the place name)

Basically tracks the art of writing history through the centuries, starting with Herodotus. The first 175 pages discuss the ancient secular authors, with chapters on Herodotus, Thucydides, Polybius, Sallust, Livy, Tacitus and Ammianus Marcellinus (plus some smaller chapters in between), raising many interesting points on what the authors were doing in writing, what their attitudes and styles (and quirks) were, and so on.

Then it moves on to Christian histories and chronicles, starting with Eusebius and moving through various writers in a like manner, before moving back to the resurgence of secular history around the 12th-13th century (including Geoffrey of Monmouth's pseudo-history on Arthur, where he writes a very well-written history, it's just a complete fabrication!). Then various movements and themes are addressed (e.g. the Crusades, and Humanist history in Italy by Machiavelli and others), in doing so giving the reader a good overview of world history.

The final 200 odd pages of the book (which clocks in at 519 pages) is given the heading "Studying the Past", essentially talking about the transformation of the art of writing history to what it is today, beginning in the 17th century. I haven't read most of this part yet, so I can't comment on it, though.



For Alexander the Great, Robin Lane Fox and Peter Green have both written generally available and affordable books which, though long, are interesting reads. Peter Green is probably the better author, since Lane Fox has a habit of going off on wild tangents, but Lane Fox is wonderfully descriptive and has a more adventurous feel to it. Neither book is in the least impartial, but in a way that is a good thing, especially since they both utterly oppose each other (ironically, they were both first published in the same year, 1970 or so). Each offers a convincing picture of Alexander, until you read the other. They certainly make for interesting comparison. I wouldn't recommend reading one without the other, though, as it will probably give you a very unbalanced view of Alexander - especially if you read Green's book, since Green is very vocal in his damnation of Alexander, particularly in the last chapter.

[Antiokhos Euergetes]

A book I read recently I recommend Donald Kagan 'Thucydides' As the synopsis says one of the most respected classical historians writing about one of the first ever. And I also think that any devoted classical/ancient history fan should own a copy of The Oxford Classical Dictionary almost every reference you'll need is in there! Also for ancient sources I would recommend Michael Austin 'The Hellenistic World from Alexander to the Roman Conquest'
A large collection of ancient sources

[Typhon]

The Oxford Classical Dictionary is a great reference. Absolutely incredible for historical accuracies.

[Mausolos of Caria]

Thanks for those recommendations

Another book I really liked was Heather, Peter, The Fall of the Roman Empire. A new history, Oxford 2009. As the title says, Northern Irish historian Peter Heather speaks about one of the hottest optic of ancient history here, the fall of the (West) Roman Empire. The book begins with an overview of the relations between Romans and foreigners and then follows their development up to the Battle of Adrianople. By neatly combining primary sources and his own storytelling, Heather keeps the reader thrilled and leads him through the last 100 years of the West Roman Empire.

Although the author follows a chronological route, he always finds space to speak about special reasons that have been put forward to explain for the fall of the empire and then evaluates them himself. Heather, actually professor for Medieval history at London, is not shy to comment on important persons and their deeds or mistakes either. Thus the author creates a whole picture of Roman late antiquity with fascinating stories that still serve his argumentation and lead to a final conclusion about the reasons for the Fall of the Roman Empire. The volume contains about 600 pages, of which roughly 450 are the actual text, which gives it a good length.

Heather has written other books about this period and the emergence of ''Barbarian'' Europe after this crucial event which are worth a look as well probably.

[ahowl11]

Mayor, Adrienne, The Poison King: The Life and Legend of Mithradates, Rome's Deadliest Enemy. Great book if you are wanting a detailed story on Mithradates, a character that has not got a lot of publicity. It really strengthened my knowledge on Pontus and the Black Sea regions, as well as Rome's greediness. Super affordable too!

[Antiokhos Euergetes]

I had the pleasure of attending a lecture by Peter Heather on "The Conversion of Constantine" at Kings College last week. Yes his work is certainly worth a place in ones library, also see JSTOR for his articles

[Mausolos of Caria]

I had the pleasure of attending a lecture by Peter Heather on "The Conversion of Constantine" at Kings College last week. Yes his work is certainly worth a place in ones library, also see JSTOR for his articles

Nice! I envy you

@ahowl11

Thanks for your post, I had seen that book before and wondered if it was good. Btw has someone read Jacob Abbot's Pyrrhos biography, per chance?

[Turno1971]

My suggested books to read are in italian - well i am too so why not? :p

"Castra - campi e fortezze dell'esercito romano", 262 pages, on the temporary and permanent roman military camps from the start to the end of empire: techniques, strategy locations;

"Tecnica della falange", 226 pages, on the greek phalanx and auxiliary greek troops tactics, plus the Asclepiodotus translated book on the matter;

"L'esercito romano : armamento e organizzazione" , Vol. 1-2-3, a non-plus ultra on the military organization, weaponry, recruitment, training and tactics of the greatest army in the ancient world;

"Pseudo-Mauritius' Strategikon: a commented edition", 176 pages, on the most famous of the early bizantynes strategic works.

The autor, Giuseppe Cascarino, exposes the matter in all of these books with plenty of competence, never getting you tired of it, in a fluid language, efficiently comparing the classical sources with plenty of evidence material extrapolated from archeological discoveries, plus diagrams, plates and maps. Without price the huge helmets' cataloguing work.
All of these books are available on "Il Cerchio Edizioni" catalogue.

Sadly i missed "Tecniche di combattimento dei Celti", but hey, i'll find it next time i hope.

[ahowl11]

You are welcome.

No I have not, but I have been looking for a book on Pyrrhus and Epirus for some time as I have always been interested in his life and that kingdom

Edit: Barnes and Noble has it as a nook book for $1.99!

Is it about 268 pages?

The hard cover book is around $26.00

[Mausolos of Caria]

You are welcome.

No I have not, but I have been looking for a book on Pyrrhus and Epirus for some time as I have always been interested in his life and that kingdom

Edit: Barnes and Noble has it as a nook book for $1.99!

Is it about 268 pages?

The hard cover book is around $26.00

On Amazon the paperback is avalaible for 12,20 € (roughly 15 Dollar), but it has only 144 pages. The hardback is out of store it seems, maybe that has 268 pages. On German amazon you can have a look in the book and it looks quite promising.

@Turno1971

Yeah why not, I posted a German book as well I had an Italian course for one year at uni, does one of the book has many pictures and rather simple language? I would try it then.

[Turno1971]

Well, sample language i don't believe so, it's pretty technical - Cascarino is the actual president of the Italian Association of Ancient Military Studies... But if you are interested, this is the link.

http://www.amazon.it/s?_encoding=UTF...pe%20Cascarino

I don't think it's possible to snap some photots and post them here, or it is not?

[Turno1971]

http://vincenzocalabrese.xoom.it/Lib...ges/A0002b.jpg

I've found a sample on the net. From the second volume, "L'esercito romano : armamento e organizzazione. Da Augusto ai Severi"

[Antiokhos Euergetes]

I think it's free on Kindle

[ahowl11]

I just downloaded a free version but it has a lot of errors due to scanning.

[Mausolos of Caria]

Okay, thanks anyway. The second link doesn't work for me somehow, but yes it is possible to attach pictures

[Caligula Caesar]

I think it would breach copyright to take a picture of stuff in a book, though

[Antiokhos Euergetes]

I forgot a book I am reading at the moment (not a course book) is 'The Greeks In Bactria And India' W, W, Tarn it's a fairly old book (1961)but still very valid scholarly work, very in-depth but easy to read a very accessible style. Starts by giving an overview of Seleukid settlements and relations between Greeks and Asiatics. Then analyses the reigns of Euthydemus I, Demetrios I, and Menander I

[Caligula Caesar]

A point of caution on Tarn: Tarn wrote a now infamous publication on Alexander the Great which was very favourable to him indeed. It included a very spurious theory which had Alexander the Great believing in the Brotherhood of Man. Peter Green displays top form in devoting special attention to lambasting this theory and Tarn's work in general

Of course, I haven't read Tarn myself, so I can't really judge, and the one you are reading is of a later date than the Alexander publication (which was before WW2 I believe). And Green was only so damning because Tarn disagreed with him... Actually I'd be interested of what you think of Green's verdict (which amounted to Tarn publishing idealist nonsense).