Pax: War and Peace in Rome’s Golden Age – THE SUNDAY TIMES BESTSELLER
£14.20
THE INSTANT SUNDAY TIMES BESTSELLER
‘Holland, who co-hosts the podcast The Rest Is History, is at his best when having fun with Rome’s bloody history’ The Times
‘A book for lovers of traditional, grand sweep narrative history’ Sunday Times
The definitive history of Rome’s golden age – antiquity’s ultimate superpower at the pinnacle of its greatness
The Pax Romana has long been revered as a golden age. At its peak, the Roman Empire stretched from Scotland to Arabia, and contained perhaps a quarter of humanity. It was the wealthiest and most formidable state the world had yet seen.
Beginning in 69AD, a year that saw four Caesars in succession rule the empire, and ending some seven decades later with the death of Hadrian, Pax presents a dazzling history of Rome at the height of its power. From the gilded capital to realms beyond the frontier, historian Tom Holland portrays the Roman Empire in all its predatory glory. Vivid scene follows vivid scene: the destruction of Jerusalem and Pompeii, the building of the Colosseum and Hadrian’s Wall, the conquests of Trajan. Vividly sketching the lives of Romans both ordinary and spectacular, from slaves to emperors, Holland demonstrates how Roman peace was the fruit of unprecedented military violence.
A stunning portrait of Rome’s glory days, this is the epic history of the pax Romana.
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Additional information
| Publisher | Abacus (6 July 2023) |
|---|---|
| Language | English |
| File size | 18905 KB |
| Text-to-Speech | Enabled |
| Enhanced typesetting | Enabled |
| X-Ray | Not Enabled |
| Word Wise | Enabled |
| Sticky notes | On Kindle Scribe |
| Print length | 464 pages |
| Page numbers source ISBN | 1408707004 |
by Simon
Well researched book but, to be honest, much prefered Dynasty.
by Kindle Customer
I have a number of Tom Holland’s book and though I have not yet read this one his books are well researched and written. They are well worth reading.
by timothy philip rogers
Another ‘Must Own’ book from this excellent author. A superb piece of literature.
by Amazon Customer
As ever with Holland’s work, the main virtue of the book lies in Holland’s appreciation of the fundamental differences between the Romans and we moderns in ways small and large, but his hypnotic ability to induce a sort of historical suspension of disbelief and place us in the cockpit of his chosen era remains unrivaled – and the key reason why his popular histories outsell so many joyless academic treatises that have lost sight of the bloody magic that makes the era so appealing. Holland also has a particular talent for stamping the nature of a man onto the reader, one I am pleased to report remains undimmed, to say nothing of his ability to ferret out details that change your view of figures entirely – not to go off topic, but in my view the single greatest example of this, occurring mainly in a prior book (Dynasty), was his coverage of Nero, who in Holland’s telling is transformed from a sort of Animal House-style Roman Roy of a Caesar to a figure fully deserving the epithet ‘Anti-Christ’: a man bent on bending reality to his will, and attaining apotheosis through divine cruelties. While Pax lacks such a radical redefinition of an emperor’s persona, I remain captivated by many of the imperial personas within, ranging from the brutally honest autocracy of Domitian to Otho’s potent mixture of grasping hedonism and tragic virtue to Hadrian’s drive to transform Rome into a Persian paradise (a walled garden). Overall, top class, up with Holland, dinosaurs and cricket, and here’s to many more like it to come, hopefully with blatant abuse of the word “sacral”. See you at Historical Love Island’s second season.
by markr
This, the third of the authors books about Ancient Rome, carries on from the most recent volume ‘Dynasty’ taking us from Nero through to the adoption of the future emperor and philosopher, Marcus Aurelius. This time was the pinnacle of Roman power – reaching from the barbarian lands of Britain to North Africa, encompassing the entire coastline of the Mediterranean.
This was a time of change – four emperors in one year as civil war raged, followed by relative peacefulness until under Antonius Pius, adopted father of Marcus Aurelius, peace reigned across the Empire.
All of this is related in a very readable and enjoyable manner. I learned a great deal about the period which featured Pliny the Elder and Younger, Suetonius, Tacitus, Josephus, rebellions in Judea and Britain, Pompeii, Hadrian’s wall, pan hellenism, and much more.
This for me is one of Tom Holland’s most enjoyable books and I heartily recommend it to anyone with an interest in Ancient Rome
by Angela
As ever, Tom Holland is an excellent writer
by Amazon Customer
Excellent, full description with an ease of style that made it a pleasure to read.
by Billy
Looks good