Princeton History of the Ancient World

"Winner of the 2016 Douglass C. North Research Award, Society for Institutional and Organizational Economics (SIOE)" "One of Flavorwire's 10 Must-Read Academic Books for 2015" "Shortlisted for the 2016 Ralph Waldo Emerson Award, Phi Beta Kappa Society" "One of HistoryBuff.com's 10 Can't-Miss History Books of 2015" Josiah Ober is professor of political science and classics at Stanford University. His books include Democracy and Knowledge, Political Dissent in Democratic Athens, The Athenian Revolution, and Mass and Elite in Democratic Athens (all Princeton). A major new history of classical Greece-how it rose, how it fell, and what we can learn from it Lord Byron described Greece as great, fallen, and immortal, a characterization more apt than he knew. Through most of its long history, Greece was poor. But in the classical era, Greece was densely populated and highly urbanized. Many surprisingly healthy Greeks lived in remarkably big houses and worked for high wages at specialized occupations. Middle-class spending drove sustained economic growth and classical wealth produced a stunning cultural efflorescence lasting hundreds of years. Why did Greece reach such heights in the classical period-and why only then? And how, after "the Greek miracle" had endured for centuries, did the Macedonians defeat the Greeks, seemingly bringing an end to their glory? Drawing on a massive body of newly available data and employing novel approaches to evidence, Josiah Ober offers a major new history of classical Greece and an unprecedented account of its rise and fall. Ober argues that Greece's rise was no miracle but rather the result of political breakthroughs and economic development. The extraordinary emergence of citizen-centered city-states transformed Greece into a society that defeated the mighty Persian Empire. Yet Philip and Alexander of Macedon were able to beat the Greeks in the Battle of Chaeronea in 338 BCE, a victory made possible by the Macedonians' appropriation of Greek innovations. After Alexander's death, battle-hardened warlords fought ruthlessly over the remnants of his empire. But Greek cities remained populous and wealthy, their economy and culture surviving to be passed on to the Romans-and to us. A compelling narrative filled with uncanny modern parallels, this is a book for anyone interested in how great civilizations are born and die. This book is based on evidence available on a new interactive website. To learn more, please visit: http://polis.stanford.edu/. "Superb."---Armand Marie Leroi, New York Times "In the late fourth century B.C., Aristotle and his students collected the constitutions of more than 150 […] city-states. The scholar who would today follow in Aristotle's footsteps has to deal with a far more formidable mass of data. Few of today's scholars control more of this data, or write about it more insightfully, than Josiah Ober. [T]hose willing to put in the effort will learn much from the deep meditations of an expert historian and political philosopher."---James Romm, Wall Street Journal "[T]his could turn out to be Gibbon's Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire for classical Greece."---Jonathan Sturgeon, Flavorwire "Ober marshals a wealth of new data to make the case for a much different view of Greek history . . . there was something distinct about the Greek world, he argues. What set the Greeks apart, he says, was their choice of a particular kind of order--and the cultural attitudes that went with it. Citizen self-government. Equality of standing among persons. Fair and open institutions. These ideas, unusual in history, were well developed in the Greek world, Ober notes. If we care about them, he says, we should pay attention."---Marc Parry, Chronicle of Higher Education "[Ober¹s] central argument is that the achievements of Greek civilization were rooted in its prosperity, and that was the result of a rough economic and political equality. . . . [He] ranges over a half m

"One of Medium.com's Books of the Year 2017" "One of The Times Literary Supplement's Books of the Year 2017" "One of the Forbes.com "Great Anthropology and History Books of 2017" (chosen by Kristina Killgrove)" "One of The Federalist's Notable Books for 2017" "Honorable Mention for the 2018 PROSE Award in Classics, Association of American Publishers" "One of Strategy + Business's Best Business Books in Economics for 2018" "One of Choice Reviews' Outstanding Academic Titles of 2018" Kyle Harper is professor of classics and letters at the University of Oklahoma. He is the author of Slavery in the Late Roman World, AD 275–425 and From Shame to Sin: The Christian Transformation of Sexual Morality in Late Antiquity. He lives in Norman, Oklahoma. How devastating viruses, pandemics, and other natural catastrophes swept through the far-flung Roman Empire and helped to bring down one of the mightiest civilizations of the ancient world Here is the monumental retelling of one of the most consequential chapters of human history: the fall of the Roman Empire. The Fate of Rome is the first book to examine the catastrophic role that climate change and infectious diseases played in the collapse of Rome's power-a story of nature's triumph over human ambition. Interweaving a grand historical narrative with cutting-edge climate science and genetic discoveries, Kyle Harper traces how the fate of Rome was decided not just by emperors, soldiers, and barbarians but also by volcanic eruptions, solar cycles, climate instability, and devastating viruses and bacteria. He takes readers from Rome's pinnacle in the second century, when the empire seemed an invincible superpower, to its unraveling by the seventh century, when Rome was politically fragmented and materially depleted. Harper describes how the Romans were resilient in the face of enormous environmental stress, until the besieged empire could no longer withstand the combined challenges of a "little ice age" and recurrent outbreaks of bubonic plague. A poignant reflection on humanity's intimate relationship with the environment, The Fate of Rome provides a sweeping account of how one of history's greatest civilizations encountered and endured, yet ultimately succumbed to the cumulative burden of nature's violence. The example of Rome is a timely reminder that climate change and germ evolution have shaped the world we inhabit-in ways that are surprising and profound. "I read a lot of history in my spare time, and as best I can tell modern scholarship is telling us that Rome really was something special. What I learned from Peter Temin, and at greater length from Kyle Harper, was that Rome wasn't your ordinary pre-industrial economy. . . . Harper notes that Rome was held back in some ways by a heavy burden of disease, an unintentional byproduct of urbanization and trade that a society lacking the germ theory had no way to alleviate. But still, the Romans really did achieve remarkable things on the economic front."---Paul Krugman, New York Times "A work of remarkable erudition and synthesis, Harper's timely study offers a chilling warning from history of 'the awesome, uncanny power of nature'."---P. D. Smith, The Guardian "Original and ambitious. . . . [Harper] provide[s] a panoramic sweep of the late Roman Empire as interpreted by one historian's incisive, intriguing, inquiring mind."---James Romm, Wall Street Journal "Ingenious, persuasive. . . . Lucidly argued." "A view of the fall of Rome from a different angle, looking beyond military and social collapse to man's relationship to the environment. There is much to absorb in this significant scholarly achievement, which effectively integrates natural, social, and humanistic sciences." "An excellent new book. . . . [Harper] has managed a prodigious scholarly output that uses date-driven, twenty-first-century methods to solve enduring problems of ancient history."---Noel Lenski, Times Literary Supplement