History: Western Civilization: Reading List - From Pharaohs to Popes

Cartledge is the rare academic historian who can write compellingly for both academic and popular audiences—another excellent Cartledgian contributiuon.

A brash, erudite, and brilliant biography by a great classicist.

This is not an easy collection of essays to read. Only students who have read several biographies of Alexander the Great should select this book.

A vibrant survey.

An even more straightforward history of Roman political and military institutions. Mackay’s account is plodding, unremarkable, but accurate.

Parenti’s book is much damned by classical scholars who find this account to be unhistorical and poorly researched, but student reviewers generally like this passionate but arguably flawed reassessment of Caesar.

Students who enjoy anthropology may find Well’s book interesting.

A heavily theoretical but fine biography of Caesar but students would be better off selecting Adrian Goldsworthy’s biography.

While a thick book, Goldsworthy’s biography is especially student friendly—a wonderful narrative biography!

An older but classic study that makes for relatively easy reading.

Grant tries to study Cleopatra by way of analyzing men like Antony and Caesar. Grant’s history is solid but student reviewers regularly contend that Grant spends too much time analyzing the men in Cleopatra’s life instead of Cleopatra herself.

A fine narrative history of Rome’s first war with Carthage.

An interesting but occasionally overemotional and anachronistic account of “the last days of Pompeii.”

Student reviewers have been routinely frustrated by Tyldesley’s unwillingness to construct arguments that do not contain the words “may have,” “might have,” and “possibly could.”

A tremendous survey by an eminent expert on the Byzantine Empire.

Barrett’s biography of Livia provides an assessment that challenges the popular myth that Augustus’s wife was a conniving and evil imperial hag.

A solid but occasionally plodding study.)

Student reviewers have been routinely frustrated by Tyldesley’s unwillingness to construct arguments that do not contain the words “may have,” “might have,” and “possibly could.” Please keep in mind that little is known about Nefertiti and student reviewers routinely object to Tyldesley’s examination of male historical figures.

An occasionally confusing account of late Republican Rome.

consider interlibrary loan

A thin but intensely scholarly study recommended for students who have some prior knowledge of Roman history.

An excellent and accessible survey written by a first-rate classicist.

An excellent account that may spend less time examining the actual battle than military history enthusiasts may want.

Like Seager’s account of Pompey, this biography of Tiberius is short but very scholarly.