The Romans' devotion to their past pervades almost every aspect of their culture. But the clearest image of how the Romans wished to interpret their past is found in their historical writings. This book examines in detail the major Roman historians:
* Sallust
* Livy
* Tacitus
* Ammianus
as well as the biographies written by:
* Nepos
* Tacitus
* Suetonius
* the Augustan History
* the autobiographies of Julius Caesar and the Emperor Augustus.

Ronald Mellor demonstrates that Roman historical writing was regarded by its authors as a literary not a scholarly exercise, and how it must be evaluated in that context. He shows that history writing reflected the political structures of ancient Rome under the different regimes.

Understanding Latin Literature is a highly accessible, user-friendly work that provides a fresh and illuminating introduction to the most important aspects of Latin prose and poetry. This second edition is heavily revised to reflect recent developments in scholarship, especially in the area of the later reception and reverberations of Latin literature. Chapters are dedicated to Latin writers such as Virgil and Livy and explore how literature related to Roman identity and society. Readers are stimulated and inspired to do their own further reading through engagement with a wide selection of translated extracts and through understanding the different ways in which they can be approached. Central throughout is the theme of the fundamental connections between Latin literature and issues of elite Roman culture. The versatile and accessible structure of Understanding Latin Literature makes it suitable for both individual and class use.

It has been one of those days. You've worked like a Trojan, displaying titanic strength and stoic endurance to overcome the Herculean labours that have faced you in order to meet that deadline. We regularly employ classically-derived expressions in our everyday language, yet many of us have little understanding of the origin of these common phrases. But an incomplete classical education need no longer be your Achilles heel. Opening Pandora's Box offers a light-hearted yet fascinating look at the stories behind the expressions. For example, did you know that the phrase 'the face that launched a thousand ships' originates from the story of the kidnapping of Helen of Troy, but the actual line comes from a poem by Christopher Marlowe? Opening Pandora's Box provides a useful introduction to classical mythology as well as giving an insight into our language.