Roman History M.A. Reading List

READING LIST FOR M.A. COMPREHENSIVE EXAM - ROMAN HISTORY

The following list offers required readings and choices for the M.A. in Classical Antiquity, Special Field examination in Roman History. Students are expected to consult with the Chair of the Examination Committee and finalize a list which will form the basis of their special field examination.

Select three of the following areas of concentration. Your selections must include either I or II, but may also include both. All sources may be read in English.

I. Roman Republic: Political and Military History

A. Primary

Select two of the following in consultation with the Chair of the Examination Committee.
Livy Histories, Books 5, 6, 20, 21, 37, 39 Polybius Histories, Books 1-6

  • Caesar Civil Wars
  • Appian, Civil Wars
  • Cicero, Verrine Orations
  • Cicero, Catilinarian Orations
  • Sallust, Catiline and Iugurtha
  • Plutarch, Lives of Coriolanus, Fabius Maximus, Marcellus, Cato the Elder, Tiberius Gracchus, Gaius Gracchus, Sertorius, Brutus, Mark Antony

B. Texbook

Read chapters 1-8 from the following:

  • M.T. Boatwright, D. Gargola, R. Talbert The Romans: From Village to Empire (Oxford, 2004)

C. Secondary

Select two of the following in consultation with the Chair of the Examination Committee.

  • A.E. Astin et al. (eds.), The Cambridge Ancient History Vol. 8, 2nd ed. (Cambridge, 1989).
  • E. Badian, Foreign Clientelae (Oxford, 1958).
  • P. A. Brunt, The Fall of the Roman Republic (Oxford 1988).
  • J.A. Crook et al. eds. The Cambridge Ancient History Vol. 9, 2nd ed. (Cambridge, 1994).
  • H. Flower The Cambridge Companion to the Roman Republic (Cambridge, 2004)
  • E. Gruen The Hellenistic World and the Coming of Rome (Berkeley, 1984).
  • A. Lintott The Constitution of the Roman Republic (Oxford, 1999)
  • F. Millar The Crowd in Rome in the Late Republic (Berkeley, 1998)
  • T. Mommsen, The History of Rome, Vol. 1, trans. W. Dickson (Cambridge, 2010).
  • R. Syme The Roman Revolution (Oxford, 1939).

II. Roman Empire: Political and Military History

A. Primary

Select two of the following in consultation with the Chair of the Examination Committee.

  • Tacitus, Annals, Books 1-4
  • Suetonius, Lives of the Caesars
  • Historia Augusta
  • Dio Cassius, Roman History, Books 50-56
  • Herodian, History of the Roman Empire

B. Texbook

Read chapters 9-13 from the following.

  • M.T. Boatwright, D. Gargola, R. Talbert The Romans: From Village to Empire (Oxford, 2004)

C. Secondary

Select two of the following in consultation with the Chair of the Examination Committee.

  • C. Ando, Imperial Ideology and Provincial Loyalty in the Roman Empire (Berkeley, 2000)
  • A.K. Bowman et al. (eds.), The Cambridge Ancient History Vol. 10, 2nd ed. (Cambridge, 1995).
  • A.K. Bowman et al. (eds.), The Cambridge Ancient History Vol. 11, 2nd ed. (Cambridge, 2008).
  • A.K. Bowman et al. *eds.), The Cambridge Ancient History Vol. 12, 2nd ed. (Cambridge, 2008).
  • P.A. Brunt, Roman Imperial Themes (Oxford, 1990).
  • E. Gibbon, The Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire chapters 1-16.
  • F. Millar, The Emperor in the Roman World (Ithaca, 1977).
  • D. Potter, The Roman Empire at Bay, AD 180-395 (New York, 2004)
  • R. Syme, Tacitus (Oxford, 1958).

III. Social and Economic History

A. Primary

Select two of the following in consultation with the Chair of the Examination Committee.

  • Pliny the Younger, Letters, Books 1-9
  • Cato, On Agriculture and Varro, On Farming
  • P.G. Walsh, M. Tullius Cicero: Correspondence, English Selections (Oxford, 2008).
  • Petronius, Satyricon
  • Apuleius, The Golden Ass
  • Seneca, Letters
  • M. Fant and M. Lefkowitz, Women in Greece and Rome 2nd ed. (London, 1982).

B. Secondary

Select three of the following in consultation with the Chair of the Examination Committee.

  • R. Duncan Jones The Economy of the Roman Empire: Quantitative Studies (Cambridge, 1974).
  • K.R. Bradley Slavery and Society at Rome (Cambridge, 1994).
  • S. Dixon, Reading Roman Women: Sources, Genres and Real Life (London, 2001)
  • J. Gardner, Women in Roman Law and Society (London, 1986).
  • P. Garnsey and R. Saller The Roman Empire. Economy, Society and Culture (Berkeley, 1987).
  • K. Hopkins Conquerors and Slaves (Cambridge, 1977).
  • P. Horden and N. Purcell The Corrupting Sea, A Study of Mediterranean History (Oxford, 2000)
  • R. Saller Patriarchy, Property, and Death in the Roman Family (Cambridge, 1994).
  • W. Scheidel et al. eds. The Cambridge Economic History of the Greco Roman World (Cambridge, 2008)
  • S. Treggiari Roman Marriage (Oxford, 1991).
  • P. Veyne Bread and Circuses (London, 1990).

IV. Roman Law

A. Primary

  • Gaius Institutes or Justinian Institutes

B. Textbook

Read entire:

  • P. DuPlessi Borkowski鈥檚 Textbook on Roman Law, 4th ed. (Oxford, 2010).

C. Secondary

Select three of the following in consultation with the Chair of the Examination Committee.

  • E. J. Champlin Final Judgments: Duty and Emotion in Roman Wills, 200 B.C.-A.D. 250 (Princeton, 1989).
  • J.A. Crook Legal Advocacy in the Roman World (Ithaca, 1995).
  • J. A. Crook Law and Life in Republican Rome (Ithaca, 1967).
  • J.F. Gardner Family and Familia in Roman Law and Life (Oxford, 1998)
  • A. Riggsby Crime and Community in Ciceronian Rome (Austin, 1999).
  • A. Watson Roman Slave Law (Baltimore, 1987).
  • A. Watson International Law in Archaic Rome: War and Religion (Baltimore, 1993).

V. Provinces

A. Primary

Select two of the following in consultation with the Chair of the Examination Committee.

  • N. Lewis and M. Reinhold (eds.), Roman Civilization 3rd ed. (New York, 1990) Vol. II, ch. 4.
  • Josephus, Jewish Wars
  • Pliny the Younger, Letters, Book 10
  • Aelius Aristides, Oration to Rome
  • Dio Chrysostom, Orations
  • Apuleius, The Golden Ass
  • A. K. Bowman and J. D. Thomas, The Vindolanda Writing Tablets (Tabulae Vindolandenses II) (London 1994).
  • J. Reynolds Aphrodisias and Rome (London, 1989