Background and links

This site does not attempt to explain all the terms used in the books nor to provide a summary of the political and military structure of ancient Rome. If you are unfamiliar with a particular term or concept, the best reference source is normally the excellent glossary provided in each volume. The only exceptions I have made are for an explanation of Roman names and dates, which have their own pages.

Many books have been written on Rome; one of my favourites (having acquired it second-hand many years ago) which has been used as a source for this site is:

"A History of Rome, down to the reign of Constantine", M. Cary and H. H. Scullard
Published by MacMillan, 1st edition 1935, often revised (1980 edition available at Amazon)

Exhaustive, but not for the casual reader. Good reference if you are already acquainted with the basics.

Web sites devoted to Roman history are many. Some I have visited myself include:

• LacusCurtius - on-line versions of reference works and RomanSites, a portal to over 2,000 websites
• Niester - German/English bilingual site with many useful links, e.g. to lists of consuls
• encyclopedia.com - best free on-line encyclopedia, with good short bios of many Romans
• Forum Romanum - an excellent site for an overview of Roman history
• roman-empire.net

You may find some broken links in the above sites, but given that they are maintained as hobbies or academic projects, this is not too surprising.