Hadrian’s Wall
Contributors
Formats and Prices
- On Sale
- Apr 10, 2018
- Page Count
- 192 pages
- Publisher
- Basic Books
- ISBN-13
- 9781541644427
Price
$25.00Price
$31.00 CADFormat
Format:
- Hardcover $25.00 $31.00 CAD
- ebook $14.99 $19.99 CAD
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“Hadrian’s Wall is a short and sparkling introduction to the great wall of the Roman Empire, written by a master historian. Adrian Goldsworthy cuts through the myth without losing the magic.” ―Barry Strauss, author of The Trojan War
Stretching eighty miles from coast to coast across northern England, Hadrian’s Wall is the world’s largest known Roman artifact. Commonly viewed as a defiant barrier, the end of the empire, a place where civilization stopped and barbarism began, the Wall remained shrouded in mystery until today. Was it intended to keep out the Picts, who inhabited the North? Or was it merely a symbol of Roman power and wealth? What was life like for soldiers stationed along its expanse? And how was the extraordinary structure built—what technology, skills, and materials? Generations of historians have been fascinated by this wondrous fortification, which has generated a great deal of speculation and relatively few answers.
In Hadrian’s Wall, the acclaimed ancient historian Adrian Goldsworthy embarks on a historical and archaeological exploration, sifting fact from legend while simultaneously situating the wall in the wider scene of Roman Britain. He describes the construction of the wall in the early 100s AD, when Roman legions had reached the far north of the land they called Britannia. Goldsworthy reveals that while the sheer scale of the Wall may suggest that its main function was to keep the tribes of the north out, its actual purpose may have been to slow down northern raiders returning home with their plunder. And though we assume that legionnaires stationed at the wall were there to serve it, the surviving evidence indicates that it was there to serve them.
A fascinating investigation into the depths of Roman Britain, Hadrian’s Wall is a concise and authoritative history of one of the great architectural marvels of the ancient world.
Genre:
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“Succinct and eminently sensible.”New Criterion
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“Excellent…. Since Goldsworthy is perhaps the leading military historian of ancient Rome in the English-speaking world, it is no surprise that his historical analysis of Hadrian’s Wall is first-rate…. Goldsworthy’s Hadrian’s Wall will provide the necessary historical background to the modern traveler, as well as an excellent introduction to life on the Roman frontiers.”Washington Independent Review of Books
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“Goldsworthy is an erudite guide…. As an introduction to the history of most impressive of ancient engineering achievements, Goldsworthy’s book is entirely successful… The perfect companion to exploring the remains of the wall today.”BBC History Magazine (UK)
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“A lucid, general introduction to the wall and its times…. Goldsworthy is especially good at recreating the lives lived in it.”Country Life (UK)
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“Goldsworthy provides a clear, concise guide to one of the favorite heritage sights of Britain and transports us back to the frontier life of the Roman Empire in another vital era of our history.”Minerva Magazine (UK)
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“Goldsworthy brings Hadrian’s Wall to life in this detailed and beautifully illustrated book.”Westmorland Gazette (UK)
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“For those touring the wall or armchair travelers, this book will be an excellent guide and entertaining read for Roman military history fans.”Library Journal
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“An appealing, detailed history of the largest monument left by the Roman Empire.”Kirkus Reviews
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“Hadrian’s Wall is a short and sparkling introduction to the great wall of the Roman Empire, written by a master historian. Adrian Goldsworthy cuts through the myth without losing the magic. This is a lucid account of the people, purpose and places of one of the world’s most famous military structures.”Barry Strauss, author of The Trojan War
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“Adrian Goldsworthy has done it again! He has taken a well-known topic in Roman history and breathed new life into it. Goldsworthy has given us an easily-accessible study that takes the best and most up-to-date scholarship on the subject and has put it into an eminently readable narrative for the general public. If you can only own one book on Hadrian’s Wall, this is it.”Col. Rose Mary Sheldon, Virginia Military Institute
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“They must have wondered, those rude Picts and Caledonians, when they looked up at Hadrian’s Wall, at what sort of a giant serpent had come into their land. And we still wonder at the Wall, as every generation of excavators digs up more puzzles than they solve, and our confident, modern, small question―How was it built? ―have monstrously transformed over the generations into those that the awed barbarians themselves might have asked: What did it intend? What was it for? And so, we are thankful for the guidance of Adrian Goldsworthy, for his clear thinking, his calm judgment, and his crystal prose. If anyone can explain the vast Roman Wall, if anyone can answer the barbarians’ questions, it is he.”J. E. Lendon, author of Soldiers and Ghosts
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“One of Adrian Goldsworthy’s greatest gifts is to clearly map out complex Roman history without losing an iota of detail, even while acknowledging ambiguity and gaps in our knowledge. Anyone who reads this superbly researched and peerlessly written Hadrian’s Wall will viscerally sense the real lives of Roman emperors, engineers, and soldiers planning and manning the fortifications across this fascinating landscape.”Patrick Hunt, author of Hannibal
