The time has finally come for me to tackle this beast.Where should I start?I want to learn the complete story from the rise to the fall.
>>23323346>>>/his/
With the rise, probably.
MommsenGibbon
>>23323346Asterix
>>23323346Start with the Greeks/Thread
This should be your progression>Hesiod - Theogony, works and days>Ovid - Metamorphoses>Homer - Iliad>Virgil - Aeneid>Ovid - Fasti>Dionysus of Halicarnassus - Roman Antiquities>Livy - History of Rome>Appian - Roman History, Civil Wars, Foreign Wars>Pliny the Elder - Natural Histories>Cassius Dio - Roman History>Plutarch - Life of Caesar, Pompey, Agustus, Brutus (as many of these as you can)>Gibbon - Decline and FallThat should bring you up to the early modern era with the most full, complete view of Western history possible.
>>23323346>The time has finally come for me to tackle this beast.What a reddit thing to say. Do you feel euphoric, too? Numbnuts.
>>23324012Great list if OP wants to quit from boredom before having read a single thing about the Romans
>>23324012>Gibbon >most full, complete view of Western history possiblekys
>>23323346Start with the Greek, funnily enough.
>>23323346>Titus livy>Mommsen mayhaps>Suetonius>Some plutarch biographies >Appian>Cassius Dio>Gibbon
I'll just tell you what I didLivy - covers everything up to ~200 BCThen Gibbon covers everything from ~150 AD to 1450The middle gaps I'm not entirely sure the best way to fill in. Julius Caesar's writings and Suetonius will take you pretty well from ~50 BC to where Gibbon picks upYou can read Plutarch's bios to fill in the missing era, such as the Gracchi, Marius and Sulla, etc.This is fairly complete but would be curious what others would suggest to add
>>23323366>>23324012>>23324069>>23324094>Gibbon
>>23324101>dumb frogposter
>>23324101Why?
>>23324094>read gibbon even though there are dozens of better written books and straight up primary sources on the period he covers
>>23325102Like what?
>>23324023>>23325102people dont seem to grasp that Gibbon was an enlightenment era liberal meme who was popularized because his retelling of history was done so with their agenda in mind. its crazy to see contemporary reactionaries suck him off when he pretty much represents everything they hate in academia. some of the claims he makes are fucking insane
What specifically makes Gibbon bad
>>23325242his work is an enlightenment hit piece against the catholic church where makes hilariously absurd and completely unsubstantiated claims like "Rome fell because the elite all left their posts to become monks in christian monastic orders and renounced all of their wealth and power" even though that obliviously never happened and there is no source for such claims
>>23325274He never said anything at all like that
>>23325278yes he did
>>23325320Did you actually read him?
>>23325327you obviously didn't
>>23325331I notice you didn't answer the question. So you didn't read him and are repeating what some youtuber said. I did read him and don't remember anything like that and if it was in there it was a very small part.Maybe post an actual quote where he said that.
>Edward Gibbon's central thesis in his explanation of how the Roman Empire fell, that it was due to embracing Christianity, is not widely accepted by scholars today. Gibbon argued that with the empire's new Christian character, large sums of wealth that would have otherwise been used in secular affairs in promoting the state were transferred to promoting the activities of the Church. However, the pre-Christian empire also spent large financial sums on religion and it is unclear whether or not the change of religion increased the amount of resources the empire spent on it. Gibbon further argued that new attitudes in Christianity caused many Christians of wealth to renounce their lifestyles and enter a monastic lifestyle, and so stop participating in the support of the empire. However, while many Christians of wealth did become monastics, this paled in comparison to the participants in the imperial bureaucracy. Although Gibbon further pointed out that the importance Christianity placed on peace caused a decline in the number of people serving the military, the decline was so small as to be negligible for the army's effectiveness
>>23325344by all means then enlighten us on what he actually said
>>23325350You are the one who made the assertion about what he said. You apparently can't find a quote for this because you didn't actually read him. Learn to just be quiet instead of continuing to dig.
>>23325378Youve read him anon, why dont you tell us, what was gibbons central thesis for why rome fell? what examples did he give to support his thesis? how did he substantiate his claims?
>>23325385No, I'm not going to write an essay for you. You are the one who came in saying Gibbon was bad and I asked why.
>>23325391you asked and and I explained why. I didn't ask you to write an essay. why are you so afraid?
>>23323346>steal Civilization from Greece >conquer the middle sea>do gay sex orgies>convert to Christianity (circa 310)>long process of decline already begun>"Officially" dissolved by 476>barbarians now control Europe>welcome to the middle ages There, saved you from reading hundreds of pages
>>23323346>Where should I start?Lingua Latina Per Se Illustrata.
>>23325409Kys
You need to have a sound understanding of the primary sources before reading any secondary sources.I would suggest to start with the rise of the Roman Republic and to get a underatanding of how the Roman's thought about the world. Polybius is a great place to start. He was interested in understanding how the Republic came to dominate the Mederterrian. He also gives great insight into how the Roman Political system worked. Livy is an absolute snooze fest. There is a reason why none of it survived intact.Works of Appian and Sallust both complement this peroid aswell. You can also use Plutarch's Lives as supplementary material on different characters, however treat Plutarch is a degree of caution as he was writing about "morals and the ethics" of each character.For the early Principate Tacitus and Dio are both excellent companions. Tacitus imo is the greatest historian of the era. Seutonious also wrote about the early Emperors however he is a terribly unreliable source filled with rumour and hearsay. However, you can read him as to get a good idea on what the Roman upper class thought of the early Principate at the time.Pliny the Younger's dialogues with Trajan are also a great piece of history to understand how the Roman Provincial System workedOnce you move past that it gets a bit muddled. You have Joesphus and 2nd century mostly christian apologia historians like Origen who are a bore to read.Finally READ Gibbon but read him in context. His ideas are completely wrong about the decline of the empire and have been debunked many times in academic circles. I would suggest focusing on the decline of the republic as that I find is more interesting than a slow decline of an Empire over many years. A shift in politics away from an oligarchic structure to a monarchy was a radical change for Rome.I would suggest two books, Roman Revolution by Ronald Syme which you should read after Tacitus and Last Generation of the Roman Republic by Gruen. They will give you a balanced idea of what the debates are
>>23325792>Livy is an absolute snooze festYou are a child.
>>23323346The main Republican sources are >Livy>Polybius>Plutarch>Dionysius of Halicarnassus>Appian>Sallust>Caesar>Cassius DioImperial>Tacitus>Seutonius>More Cassius Dio until Herodian>Josephus>Herodian>Ammianus>ProcopiusI'd probably read them in this order. These are the easy to get major sources, besides the Middle Republic there are a lot more smaller sources, such as preserved fragments in Gregory of Tours, Offical works like Res Gestae Divi Augusti, smaller Epitome's such as Aurelius Victor, Eutropius, other writings like Cicero's letters and speeches, Pliny's letters and the like.>>23325219Routledge Ancient history>The Roman Empire at Bay, AD 180-395>The Mediterranean World in Late Antiquity: AD 395-700There you go, two competent, well written and academic works that don't have the worthless fluff of Gibbon
Why does no one talk about Theodor Mommsen?
>>23325102>better writtenYou may claim there to be superior books about Rome but you can not imply for them to also be better written.
>>23323346History of Rome podcast. You may not like it, but it is the best place to start a review of Roman history.
>>23325220what claims?
>>23326761>podcast
>>23326609Sorry but you're incorrect. Livy takes so much artistic license with his work its not funny. Hes incredibly biased towards the Caesarians and Octavian as he was a close friend to the man. Read any assessment on him, especially Syme and you will get an understanding of this.
>>23323346Start with Wheelock. To truly understand Rome you must learn Latin. It's not as hard as you might think.
>>23326761unironically this, supplement with books as you go. Duncan gives pretty solid recommendations as well, no shame in sticking with more modern "pop" histories as well. Just beware the ideological trappings of "Augustus was le ebil ackshually!" or similarly subversive commentary regarding Nero and Elagabalus, for example.
>>23326883He doesn't even touch on them in his work
>>23327443>similarly subversive commentary regarding NeroYes, forcing Seneca to kill himself is not evil at all. Even if 90 out of 100 other things attributed to him were false -assuming they actually are false- then the other 10 individual ones would still make him out to be evil.
>>23327765I was unclear, I meant people defending Nero. There's room for some discussion of his portrayal being unfair, but it's often taken too far and perverted to a complete exoneration."Subversive" was meant to say anything radically deviating from historical precedent, namely for the sake of dismantling the tradition.
>>23323346I have been reading the Romans meticulously for the last couple years. I suggest to start with secondary sources because primary sources aren't very reliable except Polybius and maybe Plutarch but they don't cover the entirety of Roman history. The Romans: An Introduction published by Routledge is a decent starting point and it can be found on Libgen. It will introduce you to the best Roman historians so that you know what to expect from them when you read their works. If you also check the bibliography, it will reference tons of other academic books that cover Roman history more in depth depending on what you wish to learn.
>>23324012>Gibbon
>>23328222Is there a single Gibbon critic who has actually read him?
>>23327443Is there anything good to be said about Nero though?
Why is that Gibbon is the only historian who causes people here to flip out Just admit that you want to seem like you know what you're talking about without actually knowing much and that dunking on Gibbon has been something academics have been doing for cred literally since his book was published, so you imitate them.
>>23328256im genuinely interested to here why you think every single critic is wrong for example, George Ostrogorsky, who complimented much of gibbons style and presentation, only did so "in spite of factual inadequacy". was he wrong? what makes you think h was wrong?
>>2332829795% of everything everyone says is midwit posturing based on shit they done heard
>>23328323I didn't say they were wrong I said 4chan zoomers who haven't read Gibbon and say things like 'he said Rome fell because the elite all became Christian monks' are wrong
pff, Gibbon, how pedestrian and quaint. I find that he insists on himself too much. As a higher caliber person, a modern day aristocrat and scholar I prefer youtube videos with video game graphics.
I loved Suetonius' Twelve CeasarsEspecially the Caligua part
>>23323346>Where should I start?bull = badthat's all you need to knowyou can take it from there and arrive to the 1500s comfortably and in safety... even fun, like surfing is fun
>>23323346
>>23328258not really, I just worded this in a retarded way, see here:>>23327818
>Gibbon, Edward. Dislike him. A cheap sensationalist, clumsy and vulgar. Decline and Fall. Dislike it intensely. Ghastly rigmarole
>>23325401insane how two people can debate over a book neither of them read
>>23330258
>>23330344I read the book, the zoomer didn't. I wasn't going to play his game of turning it around on me and asking me questions to hide the fact that he was talking out of his ass.
I think Gibbons writing sucks and that's why you shouldn't read him. You could probably remove half of what he writes and still keep everything he said in essence and evidence. It's like he just wrote for the sake of it.
>I think Gibbons writing sucks
>>23328297He was wrong, it's that simple.I don't understand why /lit/ puts him on a pedestal when he opposed Christianity. Isn't this board supposed to be mostly frequented by le heckin based trad Christians?
>Gibbon
>>23325102What if I don't care that much about historical accuracy and just want the best narrative with good prose, how does Gibbon stack up?
>>23331302Decline and Fall is historically accurate; it's six large fucking books and Christians pick one part of his personal interpretation of a question that is but one, though not insignificant, part of the work. Also, the dimwits totally misinterpret his point and then you have shite like >>23331272 that doesn't even understand that Gibbon doesn't dunk on Christians. He based his work largely on primary sources, the historians and experts that critique his work do too but either interpret something differently or question legitimacy of said original source. Or they have more knowledge now then Gibbon had back then because of better understanding and more information regarding a source. And yes, Gibbon's prose is superb and one of the primary reasons as to why Decline and Fall endures.
>>23331650Also, when modern historians operate on the level of "Nero couldn't have possibly been that evil! I mean, the populace liked him!" I think I'd take my chance with Gibbon. If I were you. Maybe read the introduction of Everyman's. It puts a number of things into perspective, though is also a bit biased but it really goes to show how utterly insane zealous christians were when Gibbon released his stuff. They hated the man from the get-go.
>>23328683so you are saying this critisism is incorrect then?>Edward Gibbon's central thesis in his explanation of how the Roman Empire fell, that it was due to embracing Christianity, is not widely accepted by scholars today. Gibbon argued that with the empire's new Christian character, large sums of wealth that would have otherwise been used in secular affairs in promoting the state were transferred to promoting the activities of the Church. However, the pre-Christian empire also spent large financial sums on religion and it is unclear whether or not the change of religion increased the amount of resources the empire spent on it. Gibbon further argued that new attitudes in Christianity caused many Christians of wealth to renounce their lifestyles and enter a monastic lifestyle, and so stop participating in the support of the empire. However, while many Christians of wealth did become monastics, this paled in comparison to the participants in the imperial bureaucracy. Although Gibbon further pointed out that the importance Christianity placed on peace caused a decline in the number of people serving the military, the decline was so small as to be negligible for the army's effectivenessthen what was is central thesis and how did he support it?
>>23332059>>Edward Gibbon's central thesis in his explanation of how the Roman Empire fell, that it was due to embracing Christianity,Yes, this is completely wrong. Gibbon lists his top reasons for why Rome fell at the end of his books and Christianity wasn't even mentioned. I wish I had a physical copy of the book so I could easily look it up. But broadly it is that the institutions became corrupt and the people lazy and decadent. All things that began well before Christianity became a serious influence.I don't know that he even mentions your idea in any significant way. It is a bizarre thesis delivered with such confidence. People are so strange.
Bump for Romano-Autism
>>23331682>Also, when modern historians operate on the level of "Nero couldn't have possibly been that evil! I mean, the populace liked him!"Literally no historian says that you fucking idiot
