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Books 2008: 117

117. Beate Dignas and Engelbert Winter, Rome and Persia in Late Antiquity: Neighbours and Rivals, Cambridge, 2007.

This book sets out to survey the relationship between the Roman and Persian empires between the third and eighth centuries CE. The authors make a point of, as much as possible, giving Persian sources and Persian perspectives as much space as Roman ones, which, sadly, scholarship can't always be counted upon to do.

It's divided into two parts. Part one is relatively brief, giving a chronological sketch of the development of relations between the two empires. Part two, "Sources and contexts", is significantly longer. It comprises nine chapters, covering such topics as warfare, diplomacy, Arabia between the great powers, information exchange, and the link between religion and kingship in each empire.

As an overview, it's clear, well-presented, and - usefully! - uses as many primary sources as possible. But it is an overview, spanning several centuries: necessarily there are a number of points and themes over which it passes but lightly.

I feel, also, it would have benefitted from a chapter dedicated to a discussion of the sources and their merits: many of these are sources that, as an undergraduate or someone familiar with the Roman writers during the Principate, but not a specialist focussed on Later Rome or Byzantium, I haven't necessarily come across before.

It also has an impressively extensive bibliography, a glossary of names, and a chronological table.

A version of this book was published in German in 2001. This edition, however, is, in the authors' own words, a 'revised and expanded translation'. Occasionally one notices a choice of words which may indicate that English was not the writer's first language, but such moments are rare.

It's a decent book, but not exactly riveting. Still, I know an awful lot more now about Rome and Persia than I did when I started.

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