Greg Woolf - Rome: An Empire\'s Story

[Epictetus]

I have been seeing Woolf's Rome: An Empire's Story popping up in literary reviews with increasing regularity. It seems to be quite popular, as it looks like the first printing is already sold out. One review I saw mentioned that Woolf dates the empire's fall to 711, when Spain was invaded. I'm intrigued. Has anyone read it yet? It's on my list, but it might be a while before I get to it.

[Lyceum]

Ah I was hoping for a review. Honestly, I've no idea. My Romanist friends don't seem to like it much, but then its a grand narrative made for the interested general reader. I sort of need something like this to summarise all that stuff I've forgotten as an undergraduate since I can't find the time to go over all my notes and chase up the massive bibliographies etc.

This is slightly tangential but for the earlier period you might try Forsythes "Early Rome", I'm going through it paired with the first ten books of Livy, Ogilvies and Oakley's commentaries and the remnants of old Latin and its fun.

[Epictetus]

This is slightly tangential but for the earlier period you might try Forsythes "Early Rome", I'm going through it paired with the first ten books of Livy, Ogilvies and Oakley's commentaries and the remnants of old Latin and its fun.

Yes, I have Forsythe. What would be even more interesting (and time consuming) is to also throw in Cornell's The Beginnings of Rome to the mix, as Forsythe admits he was sort-of a rebuttal to Cornell.

[Epictetus]

This book is billed as “an empire’s story,” so I think Greg Woolf’s definition of “empire” is a good place to begin my review. To start, an empire is “a movement through historical time, not a fixed set of institutions.” Institutions evolve, and can’t be a standard for what is an empire. This is very relevant, as people often make the case for the Empire’s survival by citing institutions that survived the fall of Western authority. Also, an empire is not simply another type of state or governance, like a confederation or democracy.

Instead, Woolf goes back to the Latin word imperium, the right and power to command, and especially applies this to territory. So to have an empire, conquest and rule over subjects is explicit. In this definition, Rome was an empire long before Augustus. The definition is a bit vague, which annoyed me at first, but after some consideration I understand its elusiveness. History is not like mathematics.

The book goes through the history of Rome from its foundations up to the Arab conquests and Constantinople's loss of Italy. He alternates with what I guess I could call “traditional historical narrative” chapters with more introspective ones, looking at various aspects of Rome. Throughout, the focus is on empire, on conquest, on ruling subject peoples.

I get the feeling that the book was written with first-year university students in mind. Woolf dedicates it to his students, too. I could imagine that universities across the world will have it as required reading. He travels a lot of ground, and covers it well. It is difficult to compress so much information and keep it interesting and relevant.

So: why did the Roman Empire fall? Woolf shows that through a series of crises the empire reinvented itself in various ways, but each new incarnation was weaker than its previous one. I was especially interested in the fall of urbanism and its consequences. But if you want a one word response: religion.

A clear sign that the emperors were not themselves to blame for the contraction, and that Roman institutions were not the central problem, is that no other empires were created in the gap left by Rome… Unless the case for some general and long-lasting environmental disaster can be substantiated, the most likely factor making the world less receptive to imperial projects must be the emergence of the new universal religions of late antiquity. Christianity and Islam did not destroy the Roman Empire, but the world they introduced was one less friendly to the great political empires of antiquity.

So: when did the Roman Empire fall? Woolf argues that the empire collapsed in the eighth century, and what remained “was in some ways a hugely successful city-state.” (However, he does admit that sometimes the differences between a small empire and large city-state were slight.) With the loss of Egypt, Syria, parts of Anatolia, Africa, Spain, and re-conquered Italy, Rome as an empire was done.

I don’t doubt some people will argue with his definitions, and why the “Roman Empire” was something different than how he described. I did it too, at times.

But what bothered me most about this book is a quality that others have praised: its brevity. Woolf could easily have made this twice as long, and delved deeper into various issues. Again and again I found myself excited about something he mentioned, thinking he was going to have a deep and insightful exploration, only to find he was done in a few sentences. But he has an excellent bibliography, so there is much more exploring to do.

I recommend this book.

[Robert Vermaat]

A clear sign that the emperors were not themselves to blame for the contraction, and that Roman institutions were not the central problem, is that no other empires were created in the gap left by Rome… Unless the case for some general and long-lasting environmental disaster can be substantiated, the most likely factor making the world less receptive to imperial projects must be the emergence of the new universal religions of late antiquity. Christianity and Islam did not destroy the Roman Empire, but the world they introduced was one less friendly to the great political empires of antiquity.

So: when did the Roman Empire fall? Woolf argues that the empire collapsed in the eighth century, and what remained “was in some ways a hugely successful city-state.” (However, he does admit that sometimes the differences between a small empire and large city-state were slight.) With the loss of Egypt, Syria, parts of Anatolia, Africa, Spain, and re-conquered Italy, Rome as an empire was done.

I don’t doubt some people will argue with his definitions, and why the “Roman Empire” was something different than how he described. I did it too, at times.

Perhaps not for this thread, but a small obervation. The Roman Empire may have declined in size to a point where it would not be deserving of the name 'Empire', but as far as the inhabitants as well as institutions went, size did not matter. And of course, there have been smaller empires. Also, the collapse during the 8th century does not take into account that the Empire grew again afterwards, and that other Empires did take its place in the lost territories: I would certainly refer to the early Islamis state as well as the Ottoman states as ‘empires’. Therefore, I would not point to the new religions as ‘single causes’ either. My best guess is a very complex development of society and economics.

[Virilis]

Postman delivered the book today, just have to find the time to read it!

[Epictetus]

The Roman Empire may have declined in size to a point where it would not be deserving of the name 'Empire', but as far as the inhabitants as well as institutions went, size did not matter.

Yes, I agree with you, in that what the inhabitants themselves thought about their state is relevant in how we think about it. However, perhaps thinking of this, Woolf mentions the short-lived "Central African Empire" of the late 1970s as an entity calling itself an empire that really wasn't.