The Fires of Vesuvius: Pompeii Lost and Found

by Mary Beard

Pompeii is the most famous archaeological site in the world, visited by more than two million people each year. Yet it is also one of the most puzzling, with an intriguing and sometimes violent history, from the sixth century BCE to the present day.

Destroyed by Vesuvius in 79 CE, the ruins of Pompeii offer the best evidence we have of life in the Roman Empire. But the eruptions are only part of the story. In The Fires of Vesuvius, acclaimed historian Mary Beard makes sense of the remains. She explores what kind of town it was—more like Calcutta or the Costa del Sol?—and what it can tell us about “ordinary” life there.

From sex to politics, food to religion, slavery to literacy, Beard offers us the big picture even as she takes us close enough to the past to smell the bad breath and see the intestinal tapeworms of the inhabitants of the lost city. She resurrects the Temple of Isis as a testament to ancient multiculturalism. At the Suburban Baths we go from communal bathing to hygiene to erotica.

A New Archaeological Guidebook to Rome

by Prof. Filippo Coarelli

For scholars of ancient Rome, Prof. Filippo Coarelli, Professor of Greek and Roman Antiquities at the University of Perugia, has always been the go-to man when it comes to understanding the ancient city and its monuments.

Now, this superb guide at last brings Coarelli's work to a wide, English-language audience. Conveniently organized by walking tours and illustrated throughout with clear maps, drawings, and plans, Rome and Environs: An Archaeological Guide covers all of the city's ancient sites, and, unlike most other guides, now includes the major monuments in a large area outside Rome proper but within easy reach, such as Ostia Antica, Palestrina, Tivoli, and the many areas of interest along the ancient Roman roads. An essential resource for tourists interested in a deeper understanding of Rome's classical remains, it is also the ideal book for students and scholars approaching the ancient history of one of the world's most fascinating cities.

• Covers all the major sites including the Capitoline, the Roman Forum and the Imperial Fora, the Palatine Hill, the Valley of the Colosseum, the Esquiline, the Caelian, the Quirinal, and the Campus Martius.

• Two separate chapters discuss important clusters of sites-one on the area surrounding Circus Maximus and the other in the vicinity of the Trastevere, including the Aventine and the Vatican.

• Additional chapters cover the city walls and the aqueducts.

• Features 189 maps, drawings, and diagrams; an appendix on building materials and techniques; and an extensive bibliography.

Hadrian's Empire

Though at first glance this book seems as if it would provide history and analysis of Rome’s great emperor, Hadrian, that’s not the case at all. Rather, Danny Danzinger and Nicholas Purcell have teamed up to produce a book that provides a broad overview of the Roman Empire in the second century AD, under the rule of Hadrian.

Though Hadrian himself does receive a signficiant amount of attention in the book, the authors of Hadrian's Empire most often use aspects of Hadrian's life as stepping-off points for the exploration of broader themes. Thus, there are chapters that cover topics such as the workings of the Roman city, the administration of the Roman Empire, the military, politics, religion, social life, attitudes towards sex, houses and apartments, food, clothing, class differences, and women's role in society.

If you're the kind of person who spends your time in the Roman Forum wishing you knew more about how Romans lived, worked, and played, then this book will satisfy some of your longings, for it will leave you with a much-expanded idea of what life was like in the ancient Roman world.

The Colosseum

In the year 1999, the movie Gladiator reminded millions of people just how spectacular a place Rome’s Colosseum is. It had been decades since the last swords and sandals flick, but Russell Crowe, in the role of a fictional gladiator, Maximus, dramatically won our hearts.

Yet, one wonders. Did it really happen that way? Did the movie provide an accurate portrayal of the gladiatorial games? And was its computer-generated rendition of the Colosseum worth the time (and money) it took to produce it? Now you can judge for yourself.

Classical scholars Keith Hopkins and Mary Beard have just published a pocket-sized history of the Colosseum and the spectacles it hosted. This is a book that shouldn’t be missed by anyone who has found themselves standing in the Colosseum and trying to imagine what it was like to attend the gladiatorial games. Nor should the book be overlooked by those who have shivered with horror when thinking of the carnage and violence that took place in the largest amphitheater in the Roman world.

Beard and Hopkins write for a general audience and their book addresses many aspects of the gladiatorial games and the Colosseum itself. They have chapters that examine the staging of the games, the building of the Colosseum, the careers of gladiators, the social rituals of which the gladiatorial games were a part, and the uncanny attraction that generations of travelers have had to this monument.

Far from dry, this book is an enjoyable and quick read - the perfect length for the plane ride to Rome. “We who are about to die, salute this lovely little book!”