History of Rome, volume 2

Livy's monumental history enters its second volume at a moment of raw, early Republican drama. The monarchy has fallen. Rome is learning to govern itself, and the struggle between patrician and plebeian, between tradition and reform, burns at the heart of everything. Here are the legendary figures who built an empire: the aristocratic generals warring with neighboring peoples, the tribunes demanding rights for the common people, the great battles against the Gauls that nearly ended Rome before it began. Livy writes with the breathless urgency of a man who watched his world transform, who chronicled the founding myths while they were still living memory. His prose swings between set-piece battle scenes and the quiet political machinations of the Forum. This is where Rome becomes Rome, told by a writer whose very task was to preserve what might otherwise be lost. What we have from Livy is roughly a quarter of what he wrote; each surviving book feels like a gift from antiquity.