SPQR: A HISTORY OF ANCIENT ROME by Mary Beard ⭐⭐⭐⭐

As far as I can tell after forgetting most everything I learned as a Classics major in college and finding this book eight years later in preparation for a trip to Italy, this has to be one of (if not the) definitive book about ancient Rome. If you only have time for one, it should be this one.

I wanted the most detailed yet abbreviated crash course on Rome’s founding and the many centuries thereafter, and spent longer than I should’ve researching recommended lists to curate my own. SPQR was on every single one.

What amazes me is the fact that in order to understand the world under Roman rule in that first millennium, we have to go off of the accounts of later Roman historians, who themselves were trying to piece together the origins of a city and a way of life still another hundred to a thousand years removed from them. Much of it is impossible to confirm, often times blended with myth and consistently biased by the victors and the powerful. It’s a mind-blowing amount of detail to sift through and retell in comprehensible fashion. As the author notes, no one person could possibly read every document about ancient Rome, let alone regurgitate it. But after fifty years of trying, she accomplishes something impressive with the ones she did.

It’s a little daunting and dense at times, and while I felt like I lost much of what I learned by the beginning of the next chapter due to sheer volume, I knew there would be more gracefully brutal and enlightening anecdotes waiting for me ahead. As a general read on the subject, it’s a must. As one before my real-life Roman adventure, it’s a much appreciated guide.