The Rise of Rome, Anthony Everitt
The Rise of Rome, Anthony Everitt
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The Rise of Rome
The Making of the World's Greatest Empire

Author: Anthony Everitt

Narrator: Clive Chafer

Unabridged: 14 hr 18 min

Format: Digital Audiobook Download

Publisher: Tantor Media

Published: 09/17/2012


Synopsis

Emerging as a market town from a cluster of hill villages in the eighth
and seventh centuries B.C., Rome grew to become the ancient world's
preeminent power. Everitt fashions the story of Rome's rise to glory
into an erudite book filled with lasting lessons for our time. He
chronicles the clash between patricians and plebeians that defined the
politics of the Republic. He shows how Rome's shrewd strategy of
offering citizenship to her defeated subjects was instrumental in
expanding the reach of her burgeoning empire. And he outlines the
corrosion of constitutional norms that accompanied Rome's imperial
expansion, as old habits of political compromise gave way, leading to
violence and civil war. In the end, unimaginable wealth and power
corrupted the traditional virtues of the Republic, and Rome was left
triumphant everywhere except within its own borders.
 
Everitt
paints indelible portraits of the great Romans—and non-Romans—who left
their mark on the world out of which the mighty empire grew:
Cincinnatus, Rome's George Washington, the very model of the patrician
warrior/aristocrat; the brilliant general Scipio Africanus, who turned
back a challenge from the Carthaginian legend Hannibal; and Alexander
the Great, the invincible Macedonian conqueror who became a role model
for generations of would-be Roman rulers. Here also are the intellectual
and philosophical leaders whose observations on the art of government
and "the good life" have inspired every Western power from antiquity to
the present: Cato the Elder, the famously incorruptible statesman who
spoke out against the decadence of his times, and Cicero, the consummate
orator whose championing of republican institutions put him on a
collision course with Julius Caesar and whose writings on justice and
liberty continue to inform our political discourse today.
 

Rome's decline and fall have long fascinated historians, but the story
of how the empire was won is every bit as compelling. With The Rise of Rome,
one of our most revered chroniclers of the ancient world tells that
tale in a way that will galvanize, inform, and enlighten modern listeners.

About Anthony Everitt

Anthony Everitt, former Visiting Professor in the visual and performing arts at Nottingham Trent University, has written extensively on European culture and is the author of Cicero, Augustus, and Hadrian and the Triumph of Rome. He has served as secretary general of the Arts Council of Great Britain. Anthony lives near Colchester, England's first recorded town, founded by the Romans.


Reviews

I am a nerd. And my love (bordering on obsession?) for Ancient Rome has even made me more of a nerd. Not many people my age (or any age for that matter) possess this kind of dedication to the memory of one of the greatest empires the world has ever known (this is a fact and not pure gushing on my pa......more

As a history major – and especially as one who enjoys classical Rome – finding a solid, yet easily readable, narrative on the early history of the Roman Republic has been a goal of mine. Adrian Goldsworthy’s “How Rome Fell” is an excellent source on the later Roman Empire, but the early phases of th......more

Goodreads review by Mimi

This book does an incredible extensive job covering the entire chronology of Ancient Rome. That being said, I do not recommend it for the curious average history reader like me. Anthony Everett did a genius job writing this book, he clearly is a genius when it comes to Ancient Rome. Although, I feel......more