About to Resume with the Romans. Why isn't Polybius on the

De bello civili should be on as well, it's short but great

>>9921373
Read Polybius later; his subject matter is only the Punic wars, and he will assume that you're familiar with early Roman traditions and republican institutions, which is what Livy will tell you about.

Also as a heads up to everyone (advice that I shill every time the roman chart pops up): The Roman chart is not, will not ever be, and can not ever be complete in the sense that the Greek chart is (largely) complete. The amount of writing from the Roman era (writing in both Latin and Greek) is hilariously immense compared to classical Greece. So keep in mind that the Roman chart is sort of a highlight reel/crash course/general intro to major genres and the writers who dominated them. It assumes that you will be capable of branching out on your own based on your genre/language/topic preferences. That's why only one of penguin's four Livy volumes is listed; only one of Caesar's two histories, only one of Tacitus' four histories, only the most well-known works of Statius, Ovid, Cicero, etc.

Just for comparison, Cicero alone was more prolific than (what survives of) either Plato or Aristotle. If you've read the Greeks you'll know that's a mountain of writing.

Basically the training wheels are coming off. Go out on your own and discover Polybius, Appian, Sallust, Dionysius, Pliny, etc. If you want to, that is.

>>9924436
Thanks, I already looked around a few days ago and ordered the complete histories by Livy. Doing the same for other Roman authors since abridged versions are just shit.

What are some other Roman authors not listed you'd recommend?

>>9925335
>abridged versions are just shit.

Good for you man. There's a lot of content that gets forgotten, but is worth reading if you like the style and the time period. Pretty much once you depart from that list in your original pic, it'll start getting harder to find full editions. It's funny that you mentioned Polybius because he was the first writer I dealt with whose works were so chopped up by different publishers (Oxford published a volume of his 5-6 first/most complete books; Penguin published selections from nearly all of his I think 40 books) that I was forced to learn that I had to start referencing widely available editions against Loeb's offerings (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Loeb_Classical_Library) to see if the unabridged was even available from anyone besides Loeb.

But you will have to go Loeb if you go any deeper into Roman era stuff. The Roman era is just so prolific and just not very popular, so sometimes you just won't have any options from Penguin et al.

As for recs, definitely pursue Polybius; he's probably the greatest teacher of history that I've read from the ancient world, as he not only follows in the Thucydidean tradition but explains how and why he writes history the way he does; and how and why history should be read.

Sallust is also great, and very short. The oxford edition doesn't include his fragmented histories, but leave those until you've read a lot more complete sources. Very short, very cool writing about the decay of the Republic after the fall of Carthage.

Appian has the widest scale primary source history of the civil wars through the 1st century BC. Where Caesar only writes about the war with Pompey, Appian goes way further back to Marius, Sulla, etc., and forward to Octavian/Antony. Appian's civil wars are published by Penguin, but he also has an ethnographic history of the entire Mediterranean world that's only published by Loeb, which fills in some gaps in your reading but might not be worth your time.

The rest of Tacitus is very good, but tough because it's such a depressing time period.

Plutarch's Lives (only unabridged in Modern Library; don't get the Penguin or Oxford editions which are ALL selections) are great but deceptive: they're short bios but they're not good intros to history, because they largely presuppose your familiarity with not only the facts of the biography in question, but pretty much all Greek/Roman history to that point, as he'll jump around eras and regions for the sake of moral points, and will be hard to follow for a new reader. Leave him for the relative end of your histories.

There are a few others, but they're big works with relatively little to offer. Poke around the Loeb wiki list for stuff you might like; there's tons out there that goes unread.

Hope that helped; let me know if you have any more questions. Also I always look for Greek/Roman threads so I'll find anything you post with an obviously Greek/Roman OP pic.

Cheers!