The Best Book NEVER written???

[spittle]

Although Biographies are probably the easiest omissions to think of, due to powerful individuals capturing the imagination, it may be an event or series of events such as a war that you believe really deserves to have a full book dedicated to explaining it. Maybe even an aspect of Roman life/politics/religion....whatever, that you feel has been neglected.

 

I'll start the ball rolling by saying that I would love biographies of Sejanus and Tigellinus. Perhaps a volume dealing with leaders of the Praetorian Guard?

 

Gaius Octavian planted the seed of anotrher idea in another thread. The 'Post Roman' (Byzantine) experience of Islamic Expansion.... In fact anything to waken people up to the idea that the Romans did not 'end' with the Fall of Rome. Any works that demonstrate that for the following 8 centuries the Romans were alive and well but living further east, in Byzantium/Constantinople/Istanbul (upto 1458, I believe?).

 

 

Idea's welcome.

[M. Porcius Cato]

Strange to say, but there has never been an English biography of Cato the Younger. I'd like to see one.

 

Also, I've always thought that Roman intellectual history has been sorely neglected. There are works on individual philosophers and schools, but not that nexus of ideas and history that has been so often studied for the renaissance and enlightenment.

[spittle]

MPC. This is a bit of a tangent but, I hope, relevent with regard to intellectual/philosophical matters.

 

Many portrayals of the ancients show them as having an unbending faith in matters of religion, as though they had never even questioned the possibility that God/s did not exist. When looking into this area just a little closer I see that Greek 'thinkers' were questioning the existence of God centuries earlier. The characters at the center of Roman history were (for the most part) highly educated and familiar with these same Greek philosophies. This makes me think that individuals such as Caesar, Augustus....would have had a public persona (thanking God and being humble) but a private intellect that questioned the whole idea of religion/an afterlife...etc.

 

The differences are best witnessed in The Caesars (where Sejanus and Tiberius openly admit that they do not believe in Gods, whilst in private conversation) compared to I, Claudius (where Tiberius is seen making sacrifices to Augustus the God).

 

I would expect that mankind has changed little in some respects. The idea that a man would break a sacred vow in order to save his life is not surprising but, when talking of the ancients, we sometimes believe that a mans word was somehow more honest. That he was more likely to die for a cause or principle back then than he would be now.

Looking back to a golden age that never was?

[Gaius Octavius]

I hope that I haven't misunderstood your first post. This book my be helpful:

 

"History of the Byzantine State"; George Ostrogorsky; Rutgers Univ. Press, 1969

 

There are many books on the subject.

Edited February 1, 2007 by Gaius Octavius

[spittle]

Thanks, G O. You understood.

 

Ostrogosky's book is quite expensive (on Amazon) so I'll order it from my library.

[Gaius Octavius]

Thanks, G O. You understood.

 

Ostrogosky's book is quite expensive (on Amazon) so I'll order it from my library.

 

Don't forget used book stores; they might have piles of books on the subject.

[DecimusCaesar]

I would like to see some books published on the Scholae Palatine and Auxillia Palatine of the Dominate era. Perhaps an Osprey one would be good, seeing as they have already published an elites title on the Praetorian Guards. This could be a great follow up to that title, seeing as the Scholae Palatine were founded by Constantine I after he'd disbanded the Praetorians.

Another good book would be one about Roman Cataphracts and Clibanarii. There are quite a few books on the Roman Cavalry of the early empire but next nothing on the later period.

 

Another good one would be a book following the developments of fashion through the Roman era, starting with the Pre-Republican era and ending with the Age of Heraclius (600s AD). It could show the developments of fashion, from togas and sandals to trousers and boots, as well as the differing hairstyles from certain periods, such as the beards and curly hair of the Hadrianic era through to the Shaved head 'Hunnic' style of later ages. I'm sure that a book of that type (which should be well illustrated) would show Rome's past to be more exotic and strange than we could imagine. It would also help to illustrate the amount of change that occured through the centuries; and therefore remind us that Romans didn't always wear kilts, sandals and lorica segmentata.

If a book of that type was created it should be handed to future Hollywood directors, in the hope they'd create a factually correct representation of a certain era.

[Gaius Paulinus Maximus]

Does anybody know of any books written on the art of seige warfare?

 

It's something thats always interested me, a book describing the construction and use of seige warfare with plenty of illustrations and diagrams so you can actually see what they looked like and how they worked instead of trying to form a mental picture and it just not seeming right.

[DecimusCaesar]

This book might be useful. I think it's a number of Osprey books on ancient siege warfare (such as Greek and Roman Siege weaponry) being sold as one book:

 

Besieged: Ancient Siege Warfare

 

Hopefully that will be of some use to you.

[Gaius Paulinus Maximus]

This book might be useful. I think it's a number of Osprey books on ancient siege warfare (such as Greek and Roman Siege weaponry) being sold as one book:

 

Besieged: Ancient Siege Warfare

 

Hopefully that will be of some use to you.

 

That looks like just the ticket!

 

Cheers DC

[DecimusCaesar]

That looks like just the ticket!

 

Cheers DC

 

 

No problem!

 

Being an Osprey book it's bound to have plenty of illustrations of the artillery pieces. In one of the Osprey books I have, it contains tables and lists that shows the weights and sizes of projectiles that Catapults and Ballistae could fire. They are full of useful information, including graphs that detail the calculated trajectories of missiles fired by catapults as well as diagrams displaying the workings of trigger mechanisms on ballistae etc. They are very in-depth.

[Nephele]

Thanks, G O. You understood.

 

Ostrogosky's book is quite expensive (on Amazon) so I'll order it from my library.

 

Don't forget used book stores; they might have piles of books on the subject.

 

 

I don't know if you're familiar with AbeBooks.com but you can get a used copy of Ostrogosky's book in good condition for as little as $8.50. Check it out:

 

http://www.abebooks.com/servlet/SearchResu...p;y=10&x=42

 

I get a lot of bargains on used and out-of-print books from AbeBooks. I highly recommend them.

 

-- Nephele

[The Augusta]

Now I do not mean this is any frivolous way at all - but I would love to see some research done and a book produced on how the Romans interacted with the animal world. (If anyone knows of any good works that may already be in existence, please alert me.) I mean everything from pets - what creatures were kept as pets, how they were treated etc. - all the way through to cavalry horses and the vast amounts of animals used for sacrifice. How were the sacrificial victims treated, for instance, before the ceremony? Farm animals such as oxen etc. (I'm sure Cato's treatise may give a hint there, so I will reread that.) I should imagine such a study would make alarming reading to a person of our modern sensibilities and sentimentalities, but it would be interesting nonethless, and for me it is a whole area that has been neglected.

 

Just a thought.

[Philhellene]

I thought you`re talking about "Sasha's Story: The Life And Death Of A Russian spy".

[spittle]

Augusta (Gail), from the titbits I have picked up the Roman attitude to animals varied greatly with the species.

Every year a festival was held where Geese were seated on purple cussions and treated as the guests of honour whilst watching the crucifixion of dogs (bastards!). It dated back to a sack of Rome when the dogs failed to sound an alarm (bark) but the geese squarked (or whatever geese do) to warn the inhabitants.

 

Another thing that sticks in my mind is the sympathy the crowd showed for the first elephants to be sacrificed in the arena. A complete surprise to the organisers as the crowds normally enjoyed their cruelty to be excessive.

 

The parrot scenes on Rome are wrong as every bird shown is a new world species but maybe the attitude towards them as pets is correct? It would take a strange person not to enjoy a parrot BUT someone who enjoyed crucifying dogs is as strange as it gets in my book.