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An energetic new translation of an ancient Roman masterpiece about
a failed coup led by a corrupt and charismatic politician In 63 BC,
frustrated by his failure to be elected leader of the Roman
Republic, the aristocrat Catiline tried to topple its elected
government. Backed by corrupt elites and poor, alienated Romans, he
fled Rome while his associates plotted to burn the city and murder
its leading politicians. The attempted coup culminated with the
unmasking of the conspirators in the Senate, a stormy debate that
led to their execution, and the defeat of Catiline and his legions
in battle. In How to Stop a Conspiracy, Josiah Osgood presents a
brisk, modern new translation of the definitive account of these
events, Sallust's The War with Catiline-a brief, powerful book that
has influenced how generations of readers, including America's
founders, have thought about coups and political conspiracies. In a
taut, jaw-dropping narrative, Sallust pleasurably combines juicy
details about Catiline and his louche associates with highly
quotable moral judgments and a wrenching description of the
widespread social misery they exploited. Along the way, we get
unforgettable portraits of the bitter and haunted Catiline, who was
sympathetic to the plight of Romans yet willing to destroy Rome;
his archenemy Cicero, who thwarts the conspiracy; and Julius
Caesar, who defends the conspirators and is accused of being one of
them. Complete with an introduction that discusses how The War with
Catiline has shaped and continues to shape our understanding of how
republics live and die, and featuring the original Latin on facing
pages, this volume makes Sallust's gripping history more accessible
than ever before.
What would Caligula do? What the worst Roman emperors can teach us
about how not to lead If recent history has taught us anything,
it's that sometimes the best guide to leadership is the negative
example. But that insight is hardly new. Nearly 2,000 years ago,
Suetonius wrote Lives of the Caesars, perhaps the greatest negative
leadership book of all time. He was ideally suited to write about
terrible political leaders; after all, he was also the author of
Famous Prostitutes and Words of Insult, both sadly lost. In How to
Be a Bad Emperor, Josiah Osgood provides crisp new translations of
Suetonius's briskly paced, darkly comic biographies of the Roman
emperors Julius Caesar, Tiberius, Caligula, and Nero. Entertaining
and shocking, the stories of these ancient anti-role models show
how power inflames leaders' worst tendencies, causing almost
incalculable damage. Complete with an introduction and the original
Latin on facing pages, How to Be a Bad Emperor is both a gleeful
romp through some of the nastiest bits of Roman history and a
perceptive account of leadership gone monstrously awry. We meet
Caesar, using his aunt's funeral to brag about his descent from
gods and kings-and hiding his bald head with a comb-over and a
laurel crown; Tiberius, neglecting public affairs in favor of wine,
perverse sex, tortures, and executions; the insomniac sadist
Caligula, flaunting his skill at cruel put-downs; and the matricide
Nero, indulging his mania for public performance. In a world
bristling with strongmen eager to cast themselves as the Caesars of
our day, How to Be a Bad Emperor is a delightfully enlightening
guide to the dangers of power without character.
A dual biography of Julius Caesar and Cato the Younger that offers
a dire warning: republics collapse when personal pride overrides
the common good. In Uncommon Wrath, historian Josiah Osgood tells
the story of how the political rivalry between Julius Caesar and
Marcus Cato precipitated the end of the Roman Republic. As the
champions of two dominant but distinct visions for Rome, Caesar and
Cato each represented qualities that had made the Republic strong,
but their ideological differences entrenched into enmity and mutual
fear. The intensity of their collective factions became a tribal
divide, hampering their ability to make good decisions and
undermining democratic government. The men’s toxic polarity meant
that despite their shared devotion to the Republic, they pushed it
into civil war. Deeply researched and compellingly told, Uncommon
Wrath is a groundbreaking biography of two men whose hatred for
each other destroyed the world they loved.
The story of Claudius has often been told before. Ancient writers
saw the emperor as the dupe of his wives and palace insiders;
Robert Graves tried to rehabilitate him as a far shrewder, if still
frustrated, politician. In this book, Josiah Osgood shifts the
focus off the personality of Claudius and on to what his tumultuous
years in power reveal about the developing political culture of the
early Roman Empire. What precedents set by Augustus were followed?
What had to be abandoned? How could a new emperor win the support
of key elements of Roman society? This richly illustrated
discussion draws on a range of newly discovered documents,
exploring events that move far beyond the city of Rome and Italy to
Egypt and Judea, Morocco and Britain. Claudius Caesar provides a
new perspective not just on Claudius himself, but on all Roman
emperors, the Roman Empire, and the nature of empires more
generally.
In the century following 150 BCE, the Romans developed a coherent
vision of empire and a more systematic provincial administration.
The city of Rome itself became a cultural and intellectual center
that eclipsed other Mediterranean cities, while ideas and practices
of citizenship underwent radical change. In this book, Josiah
Osgood offers a new survey of this most vivid period of Roman
history, the Late Republic. While many discussions focus on
politics in the city of Rome itself, his account examines
developments throughout the Mediterranean and ties political events
more firmly to the growth of overseas empire. The volume includes a
broad overview of economic and cultural developments. By extending
the story well beyond the conventional stopping date of Julius
Caesar's assassination in 44 BCE, Osgood ultimately moves away from
the old paradigm of the fall of the Republic. The Romans of the
Late Republic emerge less as the disreputable gangsters of popular
imagination and more as inspired innovators.
The princeps Augustus (63 BCE - 14 CE), recognized as the first of
the Roman emperors, looms large in the teaching and writing of
Roman history. Major political, literary, and artistic developments
alike are attributed to him. This book deliberately and
provocatively shifts the focus off Augustus while still looking at
events of his time. Contributors uncover the perspectives and
contributions of a range of individuals other than the princeps.
Not all thought they were living in the "Augustan Age." Not all
took their cues from Augustus. In their self-display or ideas for
reform, some anticipated Augustus. Others found ways to oppose him
that also helped to shape the future of their community. The volume
challenges the very idea of an "Augustan Age" by breaking down
traditional turning points and showing the continuous
experimentation and development of these years to be in continuity
with earlier Roman culture. In showcasing absences of Augustus and
giving other figures their due, the papers here make a seemingly
familiar period startlingly new.
The story of Claudius has often been told before. Ancient writers
saw the emperor as the dupe of his wives and palace insiders;
Robert Graves tried to rehabilitate him as a far shrewder, if still
frustrated, politician. In this book, Josiah Osgood shifts the
focus off the personality of Claudius and on to what his tumultuous
years in power reveal about the developing political culture of the
early Roman Empire. What precedents set by Augustus were followed?
What had to be abandoned? How could a new emperor win the support
of key elements of Roman society? This richly illustrated
discussion draws on a range of newly discovered documents,
exploring events that move far beyond the city of Rome and Italy to
Egypt and Judea, Morocco and Britain. Claudius Caesar provides a
new perspective not just on Claudius himself, but on all Roman
emperors, the Roman Empire, and the nature of empires more
generally.
In April 44 BC the eighteen-year-old Gaius Octavius landed in Italy
and launched his take-over of the Roman world. Defeating first
Caesar's assassins, then the son of Pompey the Great, and finally
Antony and the Egyptian queen Cleopatra, he dismantled the old
Republic, took on the new name 'Augustus', and ruled forty years
more with his equally remarkable wife Livia. Caesar's Legacy
grippingly retells the story of Augustus' rise to power by focusing
on how the bloody civil wars which he and his soldiers fought
transformed the lives of men and women throughout the Mediterranean
world and beyond. During this violent period citizens of Rome and
provincials came to accept a new form of government and found ways
to celebrate it. Yet they also mourned, in literary masterpieces
and stories passed on to their children, the terrible losses they
endured throughout the long years of fighting.
In April 44 BC the eighteen-year-old Gaius Octavius landed in Italy
and launched his take-over of the Roman world. Defeating first
Caesar's assassins, then the son of Pompey the Great, and finally
Antony and the Egyptian queen Cleopatra, he dismantled the old
Republic, took on the new name 'Augustus', and ruled forty years
more with his equally remarkable wife Livia. Caesar's Legacy
grippingly retells the story of Augustus' rise to power by focusing
on how the bloody civil wars which he and his soldiers fought
transformed the lives of men and women throughout the Mediterranean
world and beyond. During this violent period citizens of Rome and
provincials came to accept a new form of government and found ways
to celebrate it. Yet they also mourned, in literary masterpieces
and stories passed on to their children, the terrible losses they
endured throughout the long years of fighting.
The civil wars that brought down the Roman Republic were fought on
more than battlefields. Armed gangs infested the Italian
countryside, in the city of Rome mansions were besieged, and
bounty-hunters searched the streets for "public enemies." Among the
astonishing stories to survive from these years is that of a young
woman whose parents were killed, on the eve of her wedding, in the
violence engulfing Italy. While her future husband fought overseas,
she staved off a run on her father's estate. Despite an acute
currency shortage, she raised money to help her fiance in exile.
And when several years later, her husband, back in Rome, was
declared an outlaw, she successfully hid him, worked for his
pardon, and joined other Roman women in staging a public protest.
The wife's tale is known only because her husband had inscribed on
large slabs of marble the elaborate eulogy he gave at her funeral.
Though no name is given on the inscriptions, starting as early as
the seventeenth century, scholars saw saw similarities between the
contents of the inscription and the story, preserved in literary
sources, of one Turia, the wife of Quintus Lucretius. Although the
identification remains uncertain, and in spite of the other
substantial gaps in the text of the speech, the "Funeral Speech for
Turia" (Laudatio Turiae), as it is still conventionally called,
offers an extraordinary window into the life of a high-ranking
woman at a critical moment of Roman history. In this book Josiah
Osgood reconstructs the wife's life more fully than it has been
before by bringing in alongside the eulogy stories of other Roman
women who also contributed to their families' survival while
working to end civil war. He shows too how Turia's story sheds rare
light on the more hidden problems of everyday life for Romans,
including a high number of childless marriages. Written with a
general audience in mind, Turia: A Roman Woman's Civil War will
appeal to those interested in Roman history as well as war, and the
ways that war upsets society's power structures. Not only does the
study come to terms with the distinctive experience of a larger
group of Roman women, including the prudence they had to show to
succeed , but also introduces readers to an extraordinary tribute
to married love which, though from another world, speaks to us
today.
In the century following 150 BCE, the Romans developed a coherent
vision of empire and a more systematic provincial administration.
The city of Rome itself became a cultural and intellectual center
that eclipsed other Mediterranean cities, while ideas and practices
of citizenship underwent radical change. In this book, Josiah
Osgood offers a new survey of this most vivid period of Roman
history, the Late Republic. While many discussions focus on
politics in the city of Rome itself, his account examines
developments throughout the Mediterranean and ties political events
more firmly to the growth of overseas empire. The volume includes a
broad overview of economic and cultural developments. By extending
the story well beyond the conventional stopping date of Julius
Caesar's assassination in 44 BCE, Osgood ultimately moves away from
the old paradigm of the fall of the Republic. The Romans of the
Late Republic emerge less as the disreputable gangsters of popular
imagination and more as inspired innovators.
The princeps Augustus (63 BCE - 14 CE), recognized as the first of
the Roman emperors, looms large in the teaching and writing of
Roman history. Major political, literary, and artistic developments
alike are attributed to him. This book deliberately and
provocatively shifts the focus off Augustus while still looking at
events of his time. Contributors uncover the perspectives and
contributions of a range of individuals other than the princeps.
Not all thought they were living in the "Augustan Age." Not all
took their cues from Augustus. In their self-display or ideas for
reform, some anticipated Augustus. Others found ways to oppose him
that also helped to shape the future of their community. The volume
challenges the very idea of an "Augustan Age" by breaking down
traditional turning points and showing the continuous
experimentation and development of these years to be in continuity
with earlier Roman culture. In showcasing absences of Augustus and
giving other figures their due, the papers here make a seemingly
familiar period startlingly new.
The civil wars that brought down the Roman Republic were fought on
more than battlefields. Armed gangs infested the Italian
countryside, in the city of Rome mansions were besieged, and
bounty-hunters searched the streets for "public enemies." Among the
astonishing stories to survive from these years is that of a young
woman whose parents were killed, on the eve of her wedding, in the
violence engulfing Italy. While her future husband fought overseas,
she staved off a run on her father's estate. Despite an acute
currency shortage, she raised money to help her fiance in exile.
And when several years later, her husband, back in Rome, was
declared an outlaw, she successfully hid him, worked for his
pardon, and joined other Roman women in staging a public protest.
The wife's tale is known only because her husband had inscribed on
large slabs of marble the elaborate eulogy he gave at her funeral.
Though no name is given on the inscriptions, starting as early as
the seventeenth century, scholars saw saw similarities between the
contents of the inscription and the story, preserved in literary
sources, of one Turia, the wife of Quintus Lucretius. Although the
identification remains uncertain, and in spite of the other
substantial gaps in the text of the speech, the "Funeral Speech for
Turia" (Laudatio Turiae), as it is still conventionally called,
offers an extraordinary window into the life of a high-ranking
woman at a critical moment of Roman history. In this book Josiah
Osgood reconstructs the wife's life more fully than it has been
before by bringing in alongside the eulogy stories of other Roman
women who also contributed to their families' survival while
working to end civil war. He shows too how Turia's story sheds rare
light on the more hidden problems of everyday life for Romans,
including a high number of childless marriages. Written with a
general audience in mind, Turia: A Roman Woman's Civil War will
appeal to those interested in Roman history as well as war, and the
ways that war upsets society's power structures. Not only does the
study come to terms with the distinctive experience of a larger
group of Roman women, including the prudence they had to show to
succeed , but also introduces readers to an extraordinary tribute
to married love which, though from another world, speaks to us
today.
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Paperback
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R383
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Discovery Miles 3 180
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