"One of Rome's most powerful women, Clodia has been maligned over two thousand years as a promiscuous, husband-murdering harlot―thanks to her starring role in one of Cicero's most famous speeches in the Forum. But Cicero was lying, in defense of his own interests. Like so many women libeled or erased from history, Clodia had a life that was much more interesting, complex, and nuanced than the corrupted version passed down through generations.
Drawing on neglected sources and deep, empathetic study of Roman lives, classicist Douglas Boin reconstructs Clodia's eventful passage through her politically divided and tumultuous times, from her privileged childhood to her picking up a family baton of egalitarian activism. A widow and single mother, Clodia had a charisma and power that rivaled her male contemporaries and struck fear into the heart of Rome's political elite. That is, until a sensational murder trial, told here in riveting detail, brought about her fall from grace.
Freed from the caricature that Cicero painted of her, Clodia serves as a reminder of countless women whose stories have been erased from the historical record. In a Rome whose citizens were engaged in heated debates on imperialism, immigration, and enfranchisement, amidst rising anxieties about women's role in society, Clodia was an icon―one worth remembering today."
"Denied citizenship by the Roman Empire, a soldier named Alaric changed history by unleashing a surprise attack on the capital city of an unjust empire.
Stigmatized and relegated to the margins of Roman society, the Goths were violent 'barbarians' who destroyed 'civilization,' at least in the conventional story of Rome's collapse. But a slight shift of perspective brings their history, and ours, shockingly alive.
Alaric grew up near the river border that separated Gothic territory from Roman. He survived a border policy that separated migrant children from their parents, and he was denied benefits he likely expected from military service. In stark contrast to the rising bigotry, intolerance, and zealotry among Romans during Alaric's lifetime, the Goths, as practicing Christians, valued religious pluralism and tolerance. The marginalized Goths preserved virtues of the ancient world that we take for granted.
The three nights of riots Alaric and the Goths brought to the capital struck fear into the hearts of the powerful, but the riots were not without cause. Combining vivid storytelling and historical analysis, Douglas Boin reveals the Goths' complex and fascinating legacy in shaping our world."
