This volume celebrates the career of Professor Simon James and his contributions to archaeological scholarship. Following Simon’s lead for innovative approaches to the study of Rome’s armies and their indigenous adversaries, Anna Walas and Andrew Birley have corralled an impressive…
Surveying an ancient town in Italy has presented fresh insights into a key moment for Roman urbanism. Matthew Symonds spoke to Martin Millett about what can be learnt from studying an entire townscape.
Tessa Dunlop uncovers the stories behind some of the UK’s most fascinating monuments to conflict, and reveals what they tell us about changing attitudes to war.
REVIEW BY PATRICK MERCER If, as a youngster, you enjoyed those wonderful films Khartoum, The Four Feathers and Young Winston, you were not alone. I sat as transfixed as the spear that skewered General Gordon, as the bayonets that shimmered…
MHM’s round-up of the latest military history releases.
Stephen Roberts analyses the engagement that helped launch Britain’s empire in India.
The use of ‘native levies’ has long been a feature of foreign wars – but their employment and their sacrifice reached a peak during the British colonial era. Stephen Roberts uncovers a forgotten story.
REVIEW BY JOHN REID The attraction of ancient Rome is as potent today as it has ever been – just turn on your TV or look at any popular history bookstand – and how can we resist such an alluring…
REVIEW BY ANDREW SELKIRK Edward J Watts, Professor of History at San Diego University, is not a fan of politicians who claim that society is rotten and only they can make it better. This claim, however, is nothing new: the…
The Germanic warlord who led the massacre of three Roman legions in the Teutoburg Forest would later provide inspiration for both the Kaiser and Adolf Hitler, as Tim Newark explains.
REVIEW BY MATTHEW SYMONDS Roman Scotland has long been a battleground. The remarkable remains of military works testify to the manpower that Rome committed to northern Britain, while the ancient literature reports fighting of varying intensity. An absence of any…
From Ahmose I to Horemheb, the depiction of kings in Egypt’s 18th Dynasty was a tale of tradition and innovation. Even as the image of the chariot-riding warrior pharaoh became entrenched, there were more radical changes to come with the Amarna style of Akhenaten, as Guy de la Bédoyère explains.
Ancient Rome’s enthusiasm for all things Greek is well known, and archaeological echoes of these influences can be found across the Empire. Looking in the other direction, though, what traces did the Romans leave in Athens, the city at the heart of their idealised view? Carly Hilts reports.
While many historians drill deeper into their sources and produce more detailed and specialist works, it is excellent to find one of Britain’s best Second World War historians doing the opposite. Blood and Ruins is a vast and encyclopaedic view…
Just over halfway through her excellent new book on Germany between the Franco-Prussian War and the First World War, Katja Hoyer tells the story of the ‘Captain of Köpenick’ incident. In 1906, an petty criminal called Wilhelm Voigt went around…
A huge, mountainous, landlocked Central Asian state, Afghanistan has defied invaders for 2,500 years. Jules Stewart takes a look at Afghanistan’s military longue durée.
Athens conjures up ancient Greece and the civilisation symbolized by the fastidious re-building of the Parthenon. Yet Athens boasts possibly the most extensive remains of any Roman city in Greece. Why should this matter? Well, for the imperial Romans, Greece…