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OverviewPliny the Younger (c. 60-112 C.E.)--senator and consul in the Rome of emperors Domitian and Trajan, eyewitness to the eruption of Vesuvius in 79, and early 'persecutor' of Christians on the Black Sea--remains Rome's best documented private individual between Cicero and Augustine. No Roman writer, not even Vergil, ties his identity to the regions of Italy more successfully than Pliny. His individuality can be captured by focusing on the range of locales in which he lived: from his hometown of Comum (Como) at the foot of the Italian Alps, down through the villa and farms he owned in Umbria, to the senate and courtrooms of Rome and the magnificent residence he owned on the coast near the capital.Organized geographically, Man of High Empire is the first full-scale biography devoted solely to the Younger Pliny. Reserved, punctilious, occasionally patronizing, and perhaps inclined to overvalue his achievements, Pliny has seemed to some the ancient equivalent of Mr. Collins, the unctuous vicar of Jane Austen's Pride and Prejudice. Roy K. Gibson reveals a man more complex than this unfair comparison suggests. An innovating landowner in Umbria and a deeply generous benefactor in Comum, Pliny is also a consul who plays with words in Rome and dispenses summary justice in the provinces. A solicitous, if rather traditional, husband in northern Italy, Pliny is also a literary modernist in Rome, and--more surprisingly--a secret pessimist about Trajan, the 'best' of emperors. Pliny's life is a window on to the Empire at its zenith. The book concludes with an archaeological tour guide of the sites associated with Pliny. Full Product DetailsAuthor: Roy K. GibsonPublisher: Oxford University Press Inc Imprint: Oxford University Press Inc Dimensions: Width: 23.70cm , Height: 1.90cm , Length: 15.50cm Weight: 0.481kg ISBN: 9780197654835ISBN 10: 0197654835 Pages: 320 Publication Date: 14 November 2022 Audience: Professional and scholarly , Professional & Vocational Format: Paperback Publisher's Status: Active Availability: To order  Stock availability from the supplier is unknown. We will order it for you and ship this item to you once it is received by us. Table of ContentsList of Maps and Figures References and Abbreviations Introduction Chapter 1: Pliny the Younger: Life and Letters Chapter 2: Writing a Modern Biography of an Ancient Roman Chapter 3: Comum Chapter 4: Campania Chapter 5: Rome Chapter 6: Umbria and the Laurentine Shore Chapter 7: Return to Comum Chapter 8: Pontus-Bithynia Envoi Appendix 1: Timeline Appendix 2: Guide to Pliny's Italy and Bithynia Bibliography IndexesReviewsMr. Gibson is a subtle reader of Latin and a master of using landscape to bring Pliny's pomposities and insecurities alive.... Few recent books on ancient Rome better communicate the joy of studying a society so connected to our own and yet so different from it. * Peter Stothard, Wall Street Journal * Author InformationRoy K. Gibson is Professor of Classics at Durham University. His publications include Reading the Letters of Pliny the Younger: An Introduction, with Ruth Morello, and, as editor with Tristan Power, Suetonius the Biographer: Studies in Roman Lives. Tab Content 6Author Website:Countries AvailableAll regions |
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