Can anyone tell me what books to read on the Roman Empire? I know there are a lot so I figured I might narrow it down here.
My favorite is Gibbons History of the Decline of the Roman Empire, or Livy’s History of Rome Since Its Foundation.
Tacitus, Polybius, Sallust, and Livy.
Yep.
Suetonius’s The Twelve Caesars
Plutarch’s Parallel Lives
Tacitus’s Annals and Histories
Sallust’s Conspiracy of Catiline and The Jurgurthine War
Livy’s History of Rome
Those are the towering works.
Indeed! Also I would add Polybius’ The Histories which tracks the rise of the Rome in a more sophisticated way than does Livy.
What are you most interested in? Do you just want some modern all encompassing introductory history book that will show a somewhat well rounded snap shot of everything and serve as a good “springboard” to more in depth topics?
If so this is decent:
This guy’s scribd account has tons of books…
http://www.scribd.com/Solyaris
But my suggestion is to start with Augustus. And go forward from there. If you’ve already read an overview.
God of the Machine goes into Rome a bit. It’s available on this website.
I’m open to all of it. But particularly interested in the fall of Rome part. Thanks for all the answers.
Mommsen and Delbruck. They were the first to critically analyze the contemporary sources and to reject many of the obviously ridiculous facts far too many people uncritically accept to this day,