(Part 2) Best products from r/ancientrome

Rubicon by Tom Holland is perhaps the most popular of recent histories. It's a very well written history of the fall of the Republic. Holland has a particularly modern style. I recommend it.

Swords Against the Senate covers roughly the same period, but focuses on the influence and actions of the Roman Army during the period. Slightly more "scholarly", but equally interesting, particularly if you have an interest in the Roman military.

Anthony Everritt's much lauded biographies of famous Romans includes the excellent Cicero and Augustus, both of also deal with the autumnal years of the Republic, but obviously in the context of these two great men and the events that they lived through. I think Cicero is perhaps one of the best biographies I've ever read. Everitt also wrote a bio of Hadrain, which I have yet to get to, and the fascinating sounding The Rise of Rome, to be published later this year.

On a more broad scale, there is Robin Lane Fox's best selling The Classical Age, which covers Greek and Roman history from the earliest times to the Fall of the Empire.

Finally, Emperors Don't Die in Bed sounds exactly like what you're looking for. It's not the cheapest book, but it does offer potted biographies of the the most famous Roman Emperors and their down-fall. Fascinating stuff!

More?

Hey :-)
It depends on what you mean by book (as in to purchase or if you have a University Library that you could grab from). I'll assume you want to purchase one (if not, let me know).

Here is a short list of works that contain some great information about Diocletian (but are not solely about him):

Gibbon's Decline and Fall - it has it's issues but they are easily moved to the side, this work has been probably the most influential with regards to this era of Roman History (This is not exactly the most fun read, being over 1000 pages, but it is too important for me not to mention)

http://www.amazon.co.uk/Decline-Empire-Wordsworth-Classics-Literature/dp/1853264997/ref=sr_1_1?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1409976827&sr=1-1&keywords=edward+gibbon

For a shorter read Averil Cameron's The Later Roman Empire is a great introductory work and has a good chapter on Diocletian (as well as the Tetrarchs in general), an advantage of this book is that is costs like £0.40 used so even if you hate it, you've not invested in it much!

http://www.amazon.co.uk/Later-Empire-Fontana-History-Ancient/dp/0006861725/ref=sr_1_1?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1409976976&sr=1-1&keywords=later+roman+empire

Otherwise any really good scholarly books I can think of are more of a University book and cost around £25+ each. I have a good list of books like this if you have a want for them :-)

If you're really an enthusiast and can afford to build yourself a nice collection, you could look into getting some Loeb Classical Library volumes which have the Latin original on one side and the English translation on the other. Others have already suggested Livy, Suetonius, Juvenal and Julius Caesar, though as I said, if you're an enthusiast, they will all be of value. I'd add Tacitus and Pliny also for good measure.

"From the Gracchi to Nero: A History of Rome 133 BC to AD 68" by H.H. Scullard has been recommended, though it doesn't (entirely) cover the period you're interested in, it's very good in explaining the lead-up to the Roman Empire. I'm not sure about other's views on Scullard, so best to ask them.

Edward Gibbon has already been mentioned, I'd probably also add Colin Wells' "The Roman Empire", A. Cameron's "The Later Roman Empire" and M. Goodman's "The Roman World 44 BC-AD 180".

Best of luck with everything and congratulations on your new house!

I haven't encountered any novels about that particular event, but I can recommend some pretty good nonfiction!

Steven Runciman's book, while old, is a pretty good summary.

This one's a bit hyperbolic in my mind, but it does the job, and it is pretty well-written.

If you really get into it, Nicolas Barbaro's eyewitness account is absolutely fascinating, though it is his diary and translated from medieval Italian, so it's a bit clunky if you're looking for something that reads well.

Glad to hear about another potential future classicist! Former Classics major here (BA). First thing in a Classics degree is to pick your major language, either Latin or Greek. I did three years of Latin; two of Greek. Different schools will have different requirements.

Depending on your background (from secondary school), you'll either start in an intro course or in perhaps a mid-level or intermediate course. Expect the intro course to walk you through a standard textbook to Latin/Greek (such as Wheelock or Alpha to Omega). Expect a decent amount of homework involving memorization and the translation of basic sentences.

As you progress into higher level language courses, courseload can differ dependent upon the difficulty of the school you're in. At my undergrad institution (a smaller but reputable college in New Jersey), at the intermediate level of each language I translated about 30 lines of the language from class to class; at the advanced level, about 50-60 lines. That can vary wildly depending on what you're translating, and with whom. If you're in a class of fellow geniuses, things will go quicker.

Finally, in your senior year, expect to take a senior seminar in which you'll probably have to write a major paper, or thesis, of a great length on a major classical topic. This is the culmination of everything, and can be a lot of fun.

Of course, along the way, expect to take a bunch of mythology, ancient history, and all the random requirements that random colleges tend to mandate.

I highly recommend the field of Classics. It's a wonderful, tight-knit community of a higher intellectual standard than many other fields. Of course, jobs are a bit tight, but that's a whole separate discussion!

I highly recommend downloading audible and using your free credit to download the great courses “classical archaeology of ancient greece and rome” its an excellent audio version of a university lecture. Its 18 hours 40 min long.

Edit: a link so you can find it easier. It’s free with your audible trial, if you already have an audible subscription then it costs 1 credit. Or you can buy it outright.

https://www.amazon.com/Classical-Archaeology-Ancient-Greece-Rome/dp/B00DTNWBG6

I highly recommend this, it’s what really kicked off my interest in Ancient Rome.

It's not focused entirely on the Eastern Roman Empire (it deals heavily with the Sasanid Empire and Arabia as well), but Tom Holland's In the Shadow of the Sword: The Birth of Islam and the Rise of the Global Arab Empire is a great read that tries to explore the general religious and political themes of Late Antiquity. He spends over 200 pages detailing the developments that moulded Christianity, Judaism, and Zoroastrianism in this time, and the way those eventually fed into the evolution of Islam. He also discusses current events, like wars, legal reforms, and plague, all of which had wide-ranging effects. Due to the scope of the topics covered, it's necessarily a pretty broad and general overview of the centuries you're interested in; if you want to really delve into specifics, I'm sure other suggestions will have narrower subjects. But I can't recommend Holland enough; he's engaging and accessible, heavily focused on context without getting caught up in trying to sell his own narratives, and the pages are peppered with fascinating anecdotes about individuals and events that really give you a feel for an age that seems so remote but has had such a lasting impact on our world.

Well, regarding your question about why more men didn't die, Cavalry is the arm of the Army that would pursue and actually inflict the majority of casualties on a retreating Army. Caesar's Cavalry was totally blown out and tired, so they couldn't actually chase very far. When an Army is totally defeated, they tend to scatter. Especially in this case, because Pompeius literally left the battlefield when he saw his army start to falter, gathered some things up, and fled. Caesar ordered his men to continue to push until they seized the camp of the Pompeians by night, which meant that the retreating army had nowhere to hide and regroup. This wasn't always the case, and it all totally depends on circumstances. For instance, at Canae, the entire Roman forces save some people that were able to escape, were massacred in the Carthaginian double envelopment. It was the perfect battle, the one every commander dreams of, because trapping the entire enemy army on the inside of your own for a slaughter is incredibly difficult and rare. In the case of Pharsalus, the Pompeian Army had plenty of time to retreat before Caesar could cut them off, therefore they just ran and ran.


The only thing Caesar could do was to take the camp. You can't pursue thousands of stragglers or you will throw your own army into disarray when it comes to command and control. He didn't know Pompey had fled yet, and his troops needed to eat. Badly. Basically, once Caesar did that, Pompey's Army practically disintegrated or joined him. Politics plays a huge part in this, because Caesar wanted to shed as little Roman blood as possible, so he spared every last troop that he could, and spared every Roman senator he defeated the first time. So minimizing casualties was actually a political tool in that entire war, as well as in that battle. Even if the Cavalry could chase the retreating Pompeians down, I don't think Caesar would have let the dogs loose, unless it was for the purpose of capture. Propaganda was a tool that Caesar used daily, and what better way to sell yourself as the good guy in the conflict than to end it as bloodlessly as possible and spare everybody you defeated? He had to convince people that he was not going to be the next Sulla, or Marius.



As for reading, there are a ton of books. You can get some basic ones for general tactics, but if you want in-depth study, you basically need specialized books.



http://www.amazon.com/Ancient-Medieval-Warfare-Military-History/dp/0895292629
This is one of the first that I bought. It goes over the basic timeline, and outlines the battles. It also has maps of the battles that will help piece it together with the text.


For Caesar, Goldsworthy's book is the best I've read. http://www.amazon.com/Caesar-Life-Colossus-Adrian-Goldsworthy/dp/0300126891/ref=sr_1_3?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1427748435&sr=1-3&keywords=adrian+goldsworthy



I would honestly recommend just rolling over to Half Price Books and finding the Military History section. Or Ancient History. Look for books that are a bit more specialized, unless you just want a basic introduction to it all from a book that spans a long timeline. I would recommend more, but all my books are in storage at the moment because I'm in a bit of a weird living situation after moving states. If you find some good stuff, and burn through them, feel free to message me again a few months down the road and I should be able to access my books easily at that point and give you some recommendations.

Hope I'm not too late to the party. In this thread you'll find a lot of material on Rome, but I wouldn't go as far as calling them sources. HBO's Rome is a historical fiction TV series, and Dan Carlin's Hardcore History, of which I'm a fan, should never substitute genuine academic work or ancient literature. If you're looking for books, there's a plethora of works to choose from.

In the lighter end of literature, you'd do well reading Mary Beard, Adrian Goldsworthy or Tom Holland - all educated in Classicism from either Oxford or Cambridge. I'd categorise most of their work as popular history, so they're easy reads, yet made with authority on the subject.

If you want your information straight from the horse's mouth, you can also look into works written by the Romans themselves, such as Livy, Plutarch or Suetonius. Reading these can be a little challenging/dull at times though, as they don't conform to our modern ways of structuring a narrative.

As for fiction, which, if done right, does have something to offer, you'd benefit from checking out I, Claudius, Memoirs of Hadrian or Julian imo.

His letters to Atticus are awesome! He wrote them to his friend while on tour of his provincia Greece while he was grudgingly the governor. It's just so cool to imagine him riding in his little litter, dictating his letter, bouncing around on the rocky Greek terrain. Prim and proper city boy Cicero is certainly unamused, and it shows through. So cool!

Edit: here's a good place to start!

http://www.amazon.com/Cicero-Selected-Letters-Penguin-Classics/dp/0140444580

It leans more towards the 5th and 6th Centuries, but I highly enjoyed Viktoria Ukolova's The Last of the Romans and European Culture. Interesting portraits of the likes of Flavius Cassiodorus, Boethius, Augustine, et al—those whom, in Ukolova's assessment, were the vital constituent links in the transference of the foundations of Ancient Culture into the era that arose from the post-Imperial evolution...