In Roman Africa, Apuleius defended himself against accusations of magic. His Apologia reveals how philosophical learning could...
Roman History
From Rome’s founding myths and the political struggles of the Republic to imperial expansion and the empire’s long afterlife, discover how Romans governed, worshiped, fought, worked, built, and understood their world.
Recovering Carthage in 468 could have restored Western Rome’s access to African tax revenues. Turning that wealth...
After Cannae, Hannibal needed more than another victory. Stronger support from Carthage might have helped him unravel...
Surviving the Ides of March could have given Julius Caesar years to consolidate his rule. But defeating...
Painted election notices in Pompeii reveal how candidates sought support from women and tradespeople, and how much...
Roman collectors prized Greek masterpieces, creating opportunities for deception. Debate over art forgery turns on how ancient...
In 238 CE, Rome’s Senate defied Maximinus Thrax, recognized the Gordians, and elected Pupienus and Balbinus. Victory...
At Dura-Europos on the Euphrates, Roman soldiers lived among diverse communities. Their doomed defenses preserved religious wall...
Ordered by Emperor Hadrian in 122 CE, the wall stretched across northern Britain to control movement. Its...
Decades of excavation along the Thames uncovered Londinium’s timber quays, warehouses, vessels, and imported cargoes, revealing how...
The Flavians inherited the monumental language of Julio-Claudian Rome but redirected it toward public use and dynastic...
When people think of Ancient Rome, they often picture gladiators, emperors, or monumental landmarks like the Colosseum....
Warfare arising from distrust on one side and fear on the other. From about 230 to 266...
Scholars held a fixed reading of a room in the Roman villa of Fuente Álamo for decades,...
Ancient Athens and Rome recognized no universal right to remain silent. The power to resist compelled testimony...
At Aquae Sulis, sacred hot springs drew worshippers, bathers, and petitioners, while Roman architecture joined healing, ritual,...
After the Catilinarian executions, Cicero’s sharp reply to Metellus Celer turned a private quarrel into a public...
Roman slaves ate grain, beans, oil, olives, weak wine, and scraps, but every meal was shaped by...
A Roman dice cup was an object with a noisy social life. It did not decide the...
Ancient Rome’s idea of family shifted across law, household authority, marriage, adoption, inheritance, and social practice, resisting...
Augustus’s Res Gestae turned civil war, coercion, and autocracy into a polished public memory of peace, restraint,...
Rome imagined Britain as both imperial possession and unsettling frontier, a familiar province made strange by distance,...
A literary saint elevated by imperial ambition, Apollonius of Tyana reveals why constructed religious authority could not...
In Roman-era Greece, teletai preserved the secrecy and power of ancient mystery cults, offering initiates transformation, belonging,...
Ancient Greece and Rome lacked copyright law, yet fiercely defended authorship, exposing plagiarism and forgery through reputation,...
Diocletian’s price edict sought to tame inflation through control, yet exposed the limits of authority when economic...
Pay close attention to this image (or a wall painting, to be more precise), where two men...
In the second century BCE, Seleucid attempts to suppress Jewish religious practices transformed cultural identity into political...
In Roman Judaea, the Sicarii used assassination against officials and collaborators. Their violence reveals how empire and...
Roman warfare reshaped its economy, driving inflation through supply disruption, military pay pressures, and currency debasement that...