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The Story of Greece and Rome
- Narrated by: Steven Crossley
- Length: 16 hrs and 7 mins
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Publisher's summary
The magnificent civilization created by the ancient Greeks and Romans is the greatest legacy of the classical world. However, narratives about the "civilized" Greek and Roman empires resisting the barbarians at the gate are far from accurate. Tony Spawforth, an esteemed scholar, author, and media contributor, follows the thread of civilization through more than six millennia of history. His story reveals that Greek and Roman civilization, to varying degrees, was supremely and surprisingly receptive to external influences, particularly from the East.
From the rise of the Mycenaean world of the 16th century BC, Spawforth traces a path through the ancient Aegean to the zenith of the Hellenic state and the rise of the Roman empire, the coming of Christianity, and the consequences of the first caliphate. Deeply informed, provocative, and entirely fresh, this is the first and only accessible work that tells the extraordinary story of the classical world in its entirety.
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- Mohad Cheridi
- 11-30-18
All is in the title....
A good book...but beware...as it is said in the intro mainly for neophyte..you won't learn anything if you are a bit familiar with the subject...Even so...no regrets
Not one of my favorite narrator but a solid performance...
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- Michelle Hyams Best Buddies
- 04-10-23
Tedious and pompous; but not wholly useless
Unsatisfying in the end. The author spends too much time in pompous asides that are about himself. Too much disorganized jumping in time and place that leaves the reader disconnected from the subject matter.
I learned a little, but not enough given the time commitment.
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- Adam T Kincaid
- 03-21-23
There are much better books on the subject
The summary pitch for this book described a tale of interweaving cultures and societies that remained influenced by each other and their surrounding neighbors for millenia. From that, you'd think from the title that you'd glean a better understanding of the impact that Ancient Greece had on Rome, which carries on with us into modern times. Sadly, this book is little more than a tired re-summarizing of a well known part of history and offers little new information or revelatory takes or insights into already deeply discussed topics.
There are thousands of books written about these two massively influential cultures. Dr. Spawforth tried to cram their complete, well documented, dozen-century+ histories into just under 400 pages which is simultaneously whirling and exhausting while remaining completely unsatisfying. Instead of well thought out and presented examples of the intent (influence from surrounding neighboring empires and polities) we're instead taken on a strange highlight reel of random well documented trials and tribulations of these two groups that offer little in details or exciting prose. If one is not already familiar with the plotline, you're left scratching your head.
History is the story of PEOPLE. And in this book there are hardly any stories and hardly anything to do with people. Indeed, there is more composition on pottery shards than individuals. This isn't surprising, given Dr. Spatworth's field (archaeology) but it belabors the point - his fascination with historical objects fails to translate into a captivating story worthy of 400 pages. It's as if one were to study my entire life and infer the influences from my travels and experiences, from a broken pottery shard discarded in my wastebin. It's one dimensional and difficult to care about.
My recommendation would be to focus on a few key examples taken throughout the periods and make the point. As one easy example: perhaps draw a line between Socrates to Zeno of Citium, and the founding of stoicism, through it's morphology and evolution into the primary philosophical school of Roman elites. Instead, there is a brief encounter with Socrates and Plato, some vague references to Greek philosophers being in Rome and Roman elites being in Athens, and then.... nothing. What was even the point of mentioning it?
There is no doubt that the author is a well regarded archaeologist and familiar with the societies discussed within, but the book does not contain his enthusiasm for the ancients and is quite a difficult slog. One is also beset on nearly every other page with his vague recollections of sitting in university studies with other boring historians and doctors, which seems pretentious and unrelatable to the masses. You're left wondering, who was this book written for?
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- Mr. Paul D. Balcombe
- 02-23-20
Good for social history
First I have to say the narrator's voice is excellent but it skips over macro politics and important conflicts . if you want to hear about the origins of these civilisations then this is a must but if you want to hear about Peloponnese wars or Rome's conflict with Carthage choose something else .
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Adrian Goldsworthy has received wide acclaim for his exceptional writing on the Roman Empire - including high praise from the acclaimed military historian and author John Keegan - and here he offers a new perspective on the empire by focusing on its greatest generals, including Scipio Africanus, Marius, Pompey, Caesar, and Titus.
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This pie was all crust, no filling
- By JLB on 04-11-17
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The Fate of Rome
- Climate, Disease, and the End of an Empire
- By: Kyle Harper
- Narrated by: Andrew Garman
- Length: 15 hrs and 20 mins
- Unabridged
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Interweaving a grand historical narrative with cutting-edge climate science and genetic discoveries, Kyle Harper traces how the fate of Rome was decided not just by emperors, soldiers, and barbarians but also by volcanic eruptions, solar cycles, climate instability, and devastating viruses and bacteria. He takes listeners from Rome's pinnacle in the second century, when the empire seemed an invincible superpower, to its unraveling by the seventh century, when Rome was politically fragmented and materially depleted.
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Interesting and worthwhile
- By B. Coleman on 06-15-19
By: Kyle Harper
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24 Hours in Ancient Rome: A Day in the Life of the People Who Lived There
- 24 Hours in Ancient History Series, Book 1
- By: Philip Matyszak
- Narrated by: Michael Page
- Length: 6 hrs and 36 mins
- Unabridged
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In this entertaining and enlightening guide, best-selling historian Philip Matyszak introduces us to the people who lived and worked there. In each hour of the day we meet a new character - from emperor to slave girl, gladiator to astrologer, medicine woman to water-clock maker - and discover the fascinating details of their daily lives.
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Took me back to Latin class and the origin of word
- By tony harris on 05-19-20
By: Philip Matyszak
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Domina
- The Women Who Made Imperial Rome
- By: Guy de la Bédoyère
- Narrated by: Julian Elfer
- Length: 12 hrs and 40 mins
- Unabridged
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Augustus, Tiberius, Caligula, Claudius, and Nero - these are the names history associates with the early Roman Empire. Yet, not a single one of these emperors was the blood son of his predecessor. In this captivating history, a prominent scholar of the era documents the Julio-Claudian women whose bloodline, ambition, and ruthlessness made it possible for the emperors' line to continue. Eminent scholar Guy de la Bedoyere, author of Praetorian, asserts that the women behind the scenes - including Livia, Octavia, and the elder and younger Agrippina - were the true backbone of the dynasty.
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Fills a Large Gap in Roman History!
- By John Allred on 12-01-19
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The Parthenon
- By: Mary Beard
- Narrated by: Joan Walker
- Length: 5 hrs and 16 mins
- Unabridged
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Twenty-five hundred years after it first rose above Athens, the Parthenon remains one of the wonders of the world, its beginnings and strange turns of fortune over millennia a perpetual source of curiosity, controversy, and intrigue. At once an entrancing cultural history and a congenial guide for tourists, armchair travelers, and amateur archaeologists alike, this audiobook conducts listeners through the storied past and towering presence of the most famous building in the world.
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Fascinating
- By EBD on 02-24-23
By: Mary Beard
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Thebes
- The Forgotten City of Ancient Greece
- By: Paul Cartledge
- Narrated by: David Timson
- Length: 11 hrs and 27 mins
- Unabridged
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Among the extensive writing available about the history of ancient Greece, there is precious little about the city-state of Thebes. At one point the most powerful city in ancient Greece, Thebes has been long overshadowed by its better-known rivals, Athens and Sparta. In Thebes: The Forgotten City of Ancient Greece, acclaimed classicist and historian Paul Cartledge brings the city vividly to life and argues that it is central to our understanding of the ancient Greeks' achievements - whether politically or culturally.
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Why is this author considered an expert scholar of Ancient Greece?
- By DaneDeer on 11-06-20
By: Paul Cartledge
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The Roman Way
- By: Edith Hamilton
- Narrated by: Nadia May
- Length: 6 hrs and 40 mins
- Unabridged
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Edith Hamilton shows us Rome through the eyes of the Romans. Plautus and Terence, Cicero and Caesar, Catullus, Horace, Virgil, and Augustus come to life in their ambitions, their work, their loves and hates. In them we see reflected a picture of Roman life very different from that fixed in our minds through schoolroom days, and far livelier.
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Not so bad
- By steve on 04-25-11
By: Edith Hamilton
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Ghost on the Throne
- The Death of Alexander the Great and the Bloody Fight for His Empire
- By: James S. Romm
- Narrated by: Michael Page
- Length: 10 hrs and 56 mins
- Unabridged
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When Alexander the Great died at the age of 32, his empire stretched from the Adriatic Sea in the west all the way to modern-day India in the east. In an unusual compromise, his two heirs - a mentally damaged half brother, Philip III, and an infant son, Alexander IV, born after his death - were jointly granted the kingship. But six of Alexander's Macedonian generals, spurred by their own thirst for power and the legend that Alexander bequeathed his rule "to the strongest," fought to gain supremacy.
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ends a bit short
- By RIR on 06-14-21
By: James S. Romm
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Introducing the Ancient Greeks
- From Bronze Age Seafarers to Navigators of the Western Mind
- By: Edith Hall
- Narrated by: Sian Thomas
- Length: 12 hrs and 24 mins
- Unabridged
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Acclaimed classics scholar Edith Hall's Introducing the Ancient Greeks is the first book to offer a synthesis of the entire ancient Greek experience, from the rise of the Mycenaean kingdoms of the sixteenth century BC to the final victory of Christianity over paganism in AD 391. Each of the ten chapters visits a different Greek community at a different moment during the twenty centuries of ancient Greek history.
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Surveying the Greeks
- By Jolene on 05-31-18
By: Edith Hall
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Cicero: The Life and Times of Rome's Greatest Politician
- By: Anthony Everitt
- Narrated by: John Curless
- Length: 15 hrs and 52 mins
- Unabridged
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In this dynamic and engaging biography, Anthony Everitt plunges us into the fascinating, scandal-ridden world of ancient Rome in its most glorious heyday. Accessible to us through his legendary speeches but also through an unrivaled collection of unguarded letters to his close friend Atticus, Cicero comes to life here as a witty and cunning political operator.
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An eloquent man, and a patriot
- By Darwin8u on 01-19-15
By: Anthony Everitt
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Alexander the Great
- The Hunt for a New Past
- By: Paul Cartledge
- Narrated by: John Lee
- Length: 9 hrs and 28 mins
- Unabridged
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Paul Cartledge, one of the world's foremost scholars of ancient Greece, illuminates the brief but iconic life of Alexander (356-323 B.C.), king of Macedon, conqueror of the Persian Empire, and founder of a new world order. Alexander's legacy has had a major impact on military tacticians, scholars, statesmen, adventurers, authors, and filmmakers.
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NOT a Chronology of Alexander’s Life
- By Blane Richoux on 12-30-20
By: Paul Cartledge
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The Men Who Lost America: British Leadership, the American Revolution and the Fate of the Empire
- The Lewis Walpole Series in Eighteenth-Century Culture and History
- By: Andrew Jackson O'Shaughnessy
- Narrated by: Gildart Jackson
- Length: 21 hrs and 5 mins
- Unabridged
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