Any books that match this masterpiece?

[Anonymous No.17906263]

Recently read the first volume of Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire.
It’s as good as it’s hyped up to be.
It’s incredibly rewarding watching an empire‘s institutions corrode to greed and short-sightedness, becoming shells of their former glory and resulting in the empire’s power slowly falling apart.

So I was wondering if anyone knows of any books that cover either a similar scope, are written as well, or are in-depth as those of this book?

[Anonymous No.17906272]

>>17906263
desu, my diary desu

[Anonymous No.17906278]

fuck communism but this sort of

[Anonymous No.17906282]

this ought to be more well regarded

[Anonymous No.17906286]

[Anonymous No.17906288]

>>17906263
Too bad it misses most of the important things that actually brought to the fall

[Anonymous No.17906291]

>>17906263
Something by Pat Buchanan

[Anonymous No.17906293]

>>17906286
Thank you!
I’m really uneducated on Europe in the post war years so will be adding this to my list

[Anonymous No.17906298]

>>17906263
Would I be lost if I tried to read it with little knowledge of Rome?

[Anonymous No.17906306]

>>17906263
shelby foote's civil war books

[Anonymous No.17906315]

>>17906263
Will Durant

[Anonymous No.17906319]

>>17906263
>something something the Christianity is the worst thing ever something
Anyone else takes this fedora tipper seriously?

[Anonymous No.17906320]

>>17906288
Yeah, however there’s never been a history book that painted such a vivid picture as I read it. If it’s read along with modern books then you’ll get a full image, but certainly isn’t definitive as history by itself.

[Anonymous No.17906330]

>>17906320
>top notch prose
that's just how english writers rolled in the 1700s bro, highly comfy century

[Anonymous No.17906341]

>>17906288
What did it miss?

[Anonymous No.17906344]

>>17906298
I first tried reading it years ago with little knowledge of Rome beyond Julius Caesar. It didn’t suck me in and left me confused.
If you want to try reading it with little prior knowledge, my recommendation is to treat it as it’s own beast, not as a novel. So I’d recommend reading Wikipedia articles on the Roman Empire so you get a bit better of a base to work from.
Then just go straight into it.
It does explain the relations of each emperor, the culture, the economics, the wars, and the motives of the Romans and their enemies in every period it covers. So you shouldn’t get too lost so long as you read slow.

[Anonymous No.17906369]

>>17906315
Durant is definitely good, I loved his book on the Napoleonic Era. Definitely worth reading if anyone wants to understand civilisation’s roots

[Anonymous No.17906379]

>>17906319
Have you actually read his critiques of Christianity? They aren’t baseless claims, the book got banned by the Catholic Church for uncovering truths they’d tried to conceal for hundreds of years.

[Anonymous No.17906380]

>>17906344
this is a good companion that includes context, commentary, and analysis. also, a good summary if you're lazy and don't actually want to following a long reading the whole shit. professor is great, has another series on the rise of the novel which is good too.

[Anonymous No.17906405]

>>17906380
Thank you! Will definitely get it. Became obsessed with Rome after going there on Holiday in late 2019, and really, the more on the period, the better.
Much appreciated!

[Anonymous No.17906430]

>>17906405
just to be clear that course is about the book "the decline and fall of the roman empire" by gibbon not the decline and fall of the roman empire the historical event

[Anonymous No.17906449]

>>17906430
Thanks for the heads up. It’ll add depth to what I’ve already deeply enjoyed reading, so worth getting for that alone I reckon

[Anonymous No.17906466]

>>17906379
What are these critiques?

[Anonymous No.17906474]

>>17906320
agreed. its a fucking sin that prose continued to slowly die in the 1800s till reaching its lowest in the 1900s

[Anonymous No.17906552]

>>17906263
>It’s as good as it’s hyped up to be.
I always found it very tedious and boring, when I read it as a child and again later in life. And it doesn't really mention anything fun or interesting, it's like the writer just lazily took the people who hated Roman culture and the Julio-Claudians and didn't bother to check for the holes in the things they'd written down.

A good book, which is fairly new, is "a funny thing happened on the way to the forum" which explores the use of majesty laws; hate speech and accusations, in the Julio-Claudian era.

Personally I'm a little sad nobody cares to imagine what Trajans Dacian War might've said, coming from the real high point of Roman society and stability, Domitian to Hadrian, etc.

Anyway, tedious at best. A real 'History of the Decline and Fall' would've mentioned the German Menace, immigration, free-for-all citizenship, late stage capitalism, the bolshevik / Christian Menace, the massive stalinesque business that went on under Constantius II, the attempt to rebalance by Flavius Iulianus, the mismanagement of the provinces and the rise of Islam in the wake of Rome and it would've concluded with the establishment of the heresy of Catholicism against the Emperor in Constantinople.

The book reinforces the lie that it was 'corruption' by a few kings, against the noble hard-done-by senators, which destroyed things, which is the false narrative we hear all the time anyway.

[Anonymous No.17906588]

>>17906552
wait, but it does cover the rise of islam and fall of byzantium tho

[Anonymous No.17906622]

>>17906588
does it? oh, i must've forgotten what it says then, it left that great of an impression on me

[Anonymous No.17906633]

>>17906622
you probably read some lame abridgment or read the first volume and fooled yourself into thinking you read the whole thing

https://www.gutenberg.org/files/25717/25717-h/25717-h.htm#chap68.1

[Anonymous No.17906664]

>>17906263
Personally I found it boring as fuck until Commodus, at which point it got interesting.

If you have an interest in Rome and want to read an absolute gem try

https://www.amazon.co.uk/Emperor-Domitian-Brian-Jones/dp/0415101956

Diocletian was an absolute Chad and all the Flavians knocked it out of the park.

[Anonymous No.17906703]

>>17906288
Rise and Fall I think is just as valuable as a historical document of the time that it was written even while our knowledge of The Roman Empire has shifted and changed over the last ~250 years

[Anonymous No.17906729]

>>17906263

Gibbon is a shite writer and I felt like he was all over the place and just giving a random stream on information going from one topic to another. His prose is also very dry

[Anonymous No.17906770]

>>17906263
how archaic is the language? can an esl fag understand it?

[Anonymous No.17906814]

>>17906770

It's the same as modern American or British English, with a few goofy semi-archaic anglo words here and there

[Anonymous No.17906817]

>masterpiece
Gibbon openly admitted he got most of his information from John Pinkerton.

[Anonymous No.17906834]

>>17906282
i came here to post this and i salute your patrician taste. this is a great read because it treats the indians as the calculating political force they were rather than the usual sympathetic noble savage stereotype. a real eye-opener when you learn about how the reason the ohio valley was such a prime settlement site for anglos was because the iroquois had wiped out every tribe living there

[Anonymous No.17906861]

>>17906633
well I strongly doubt that in Gibbons era where Germans were considered 'Powerful' and Catholics considered a 'Russian Hacker Threat' that you're going to find critique of the kind I would've written.

>>17906552
>A real 'History of the Decline and Fall' would've mentioned the German Menace, immigration, free-for-all citizenship, late stage capitalism, the bolshevik / Christian Menace, the massive stalinesque business that went on under Constantius II, the attempt to rebalance by Flavius Iulianus, the mismanagement of the provinces and the rise of Islam in the wake of Rome and it would've concluded with the establishment of the heresy of Catholicism against the Emperor in Constantinople.

[Anonymous No.17906875]

>>17906379
the only reason gibbon was able to make his claims in the first place is the titanic effort the church made to preserve as much of it could from the ashes of the western empire. he's like a rich liberal who complains about police brutality

[Anonymous No.17906894]

>>17906552
this is the best decline and fall because it explains all the reasons for rome's collapse in the figure of single emperor

[Anonymous No.17907020]

>>17906894
which is a comfortable lie that people still let themselves be deluded by!

"(take care that you don't) go seeking monsters abroad"
General Washington

[Anonymous No.17907464]

>>17906263
In order for a non-fiction book to be considered a masterpiece, it must be right but that book has been debunked. So how can it be a masterpiece if it's wrong?

[Anonymous No.17907499]

>>17906875
>the Catholic church was retarded enough to preserve records of their past therefore you can’t criticize it

[Anonymous No.17907521]

>>17906263
>rewarding
How is that rewarding? The Fall of Rome was one of the biggest disasters in human history and one in which we are still recovering (unsuccessfully from). In my view, Rome was the first and last attempt at civilization, everything after Rome was a crude mockery of it or so foreign, alien, and hostile that it would be unlivable for those of us born outside of their traditions.

[Anonymous No.17907530]

>>17907464
"debunked" in todays lingo just means cancelled, and this book is cancelled because those same people who do the cancelling don't want you to look into the reasons why Rome fell because you can and will see parallels today.

[Anonymous No.17907538]

On a side note, I am about to pick up A History of the Peloponnesian War but in my country the version I really want (Landmark Thucydides) is incredibly expensive. Is there any real difference between the Barnes and Noble version and the Penguin Classics Version? Barnes and Noble is the cheapest option.

[Anonymous No.17907548]

>>17906875
The Jewish church played a big role in exploiting the holes in the Empire, granted those holes were filling themselves with water and causing the ship to sink but the Jewish Christ was one of the biggest pushes that later doomed Europe to extinction (we are in late stage Judeo Christianity where suicide is the only option)

[Anonymous No.17907567]

>>17907464
>that book has been debunked.
Please explain how it has been """""""""""""debunked"""""""""""""".

[Anonymous No.17907580]

>>17907530
Why would woke academics want to "cancel" an anti-religious book?

[Anonymous No.17907597]

>>17907580
>anti-religious
The book is not anti-religious, but the book demonstrates the weak points in Christianity - those same weak points that are tediously exploited continually through the mainstream media. Look at the state of the Vatican today and tell me you don't see it.

[Anonymous No.17907700]

If I read this book, what else should I read (to correct his misinformation)?

[Anonymous No.17907764]

>>17907700
White Fragility, Das Kapital, and Rules for Radicals

[Anonymous No.17907770]

>>17907700
You can listen to the History of Rome podcast which covers the same period (And early) but uses multiple sources and mentions discrepancies in particular works.

Adrian Goldsworthy’s books are fantastic and cover many aspects of Roman history.

There’s also a book on Byzantium that’s worth reading that will give you a less biased view of the eastern empire. I’ll find it and post again

[Anonymous No.17907795]

>>17907770
The Inheritance of Rome by Chris Wickham was what I was thinking of. Covers the Roman territories after the Fall of the West Empire. Very, very good book.

[Anonymous No.17907823]

>>17906263
Haven’t gotten through much of it, but carlyle’s history of the french revolution has astounding prose

[Anonymous No.17907915]

>>17907770
>>17907795
Ty

[Anonymous No.17907933]

>>17906263
It won't be history because this book is basically 99% fiction nonsense

[Anonymous No.17907978]

>>17907823
Thank you!

[Anonymous No.17908081]

>>17907567
He thought the Roman Empire fell in the 5th century while it actually lasted 1000 years beyond that. Why? Because he didn't consider the Eastern Romans to be actually Romans but rather Byzantines who inherited the Roman empire. How could they have inherited it if they were the Roman Empire? The Eastern Romans never stopped calling themselves Romans so I wonder where he got that from. In any case, it was inconvenient for an atheist in the Enlightenment era to admit that Eastern Rome actually kept prospering despite being Christian. Their success pretty much debunks his thesis that the empire fell due to the corruption of Roman values by Christianity and it's also their success which is the answer to the fall of the western half.
The west was weak, less populous and mismanaged after so much internal strife due to the fact that ambitious generals appeased to their troops in order to achieve power. This practise can be dated back to at least the reign of Severus who started raising the army's pay as a way to gain their approval. If the army supported you, why would you care about the Senate after all?
The final nail in the coffin was the barbarian immigration set in motion by the Huns who distabilized everything. This put too much stress on the western borders and by that time, the Roman army was split into border forces and mobile forces that could be dispatched to assist border forces. Unfortunately mobile forces could only march so much to reach border forces on time and the army was already less numerous due to past civil wars. The reliance on barbarians to fight for them probably proved to be problematic as well and that's at least a point that Gibbon was actually right about.
I don't know if he chose to ignore all that or he simply didn't have access to sources to learn about it but his book is just a product of his time and relying solely on it will make you look like a fool.

[Anonymous No.17908083]

>>17906306
True
The only war worthy of study.

[Anonymous No.17908566]

>>17906282
Definitely reading this

[Anonymous No.17908597]

>>17906306
This

[Anonymous No.17908996]

>>17906263

You should look read Chris Wickham, A.D Lee, Averil Cameron, and Peter Brown. They are the best historians on Late Antiquity (~300-1066). Brown essentially invented the discipline and his books are still very approachable since they were written as pioneering texts and so take a very thorough introductory approach. Brown corrects much of what Gibbon got wrong.

Ferdinand Lot is good too. Specifically his book "The End of the Ancient World and the Beginnings of the Middle Ages". Sort of a proto form of Gibbon and Brown

[Anonymous No.17909020]

>>17906263
Look out the window and you can witness your post first hand.

[Anonymous No.17909040]

>>17906298
If you have a commute or can use headphones at work, I think the History of Rome podcast is a great starting point. It goes in depth but doesn't dwell too long on certain periods. A great intro to Roman history.

[Anonymous No.17909060]

>>17906263
/lit/ is for the discussion of literature, specifically books (fiction & non-fiction), short stories, poetry, creative writing, etc. If you want to discuss history, religion, or the humanities, go to /his/. If you want to discuss politics, go to /pol/.

[Anonymous No.17909109]

>>17909060
Fuck /his/. That board is low IQ. I don't blame anybody for coming here to discuss a history book. Not to mention that a knowledge of Greece and Rome is practically essential to fully appreciate the entire Western cannon.

[Anonymous No.17909138]

>>17909109
> Not to mention that a knowledge of Greece and Rome is practically essential to fully appreciate the entire Western cannon.

Lol

[Anonymous No.17909164]

What would be the reading path for someone to under stand early and middle Roman history? I read Caesar by goldworthy and am listening to history of Rome podcast.

Is Livy worth a dive? Maybe another source instead? More modern?

[Anonymous No.17909557]

>>17909138
>Lol

[Anonymous No.17910855]

>>17906282
nice pic.

Op, read that book

[Anonymous No.17911064]

>>17908081
>atheist
Gibbon was a deist.

[Anonymous No.17911182]

>>17909060
Also worth noting......this wasn’t a post about the historical events themselves, but book recommendations and is therefore relevant to this board.
Gibbon’s prose is famous for being some of the best writing ever, so by what logic is this an irrelevant post?

[Anonymous No.17911188]

>>17908996
Thank you! Have read some of Chris Wickham before but will get works by each of them

[Anonymous No.17911193]

>>17909020
You’re correct, but that doesn’t make it any less tragic

[Anonymous No.17911560]

>>17906282
Thanks anon, this looks really good

[Anonymous No.17911838]

>>17906263
Vanished Kingdoms by Davies
Citizens by Schama
The Black Jacobins by CLR James
The Peloponnesean War by Thucydides (Landmark)
The Campaigns of Alexander by Arrian (Landmark)
The Civil War by Shelby Foote
Marlborough and History of the English Speaking Peoples by Churchill
God’s War by Tyreman
A history of Japan by Sansom
The 30 Years War: Europe's Tragedy by Wilson
The Penguin history of Europe series

[Anonymous No.17911956]

>>17911838
Thank you!
Any favourites among those?

[Anonymous No.17912082]

>>17906552
What are you talking about? Decline and Fall basically starts with the Antonines, barely even mentions the previous emperors. You sound like you mistook Suetonius for Gibbon, an error so egregious that only someone who’s brain is filled with podcast mush could make it.

[Anonymous No.17913224]

>>17906315
>>17906320
>>17906369

Agreed.

I absolutely adore Gibbon (I am a PhD in Classics, and for some reason the new generation hasn't read him) and his writing is poetic and potent. It is better to approach this in the context of historiography of the Roman Empire and not as a definitive textbook, which I see people in this thread doing... It had the basis's of its time (anti-Christian, reflecting the potential of British Empire failing). All history is the history of present - read it in that lens.

Durant is genuinely charming though and I adore his works (on the Age of Voltaire). I like his more holistic approach.

[Anonymous No.17913423]

Bump

[Anonymous No.17914330]

>>17911838
>>17911956

If your doing ancient /lit/, then you should add Tacitus at least

I've also really enjoyed Ammianus Marcellinus

[Anonymous No.17914388]

>>17906263
Check out Shelby Foote’s 3 Colume history of the American civil war, it’s really amazing, beautifully written, sweeping history but doesn’t neglect to include many telling anecdotes about major figures of the era like Lincoln, Sherman, John Brown, Jefferson Davis, etc.

[Anonymous No.17914400]

>>17914330
Tacitus is a bore

[Anonymous No.17914813]

>>17909060
/his/ is /lit/ in the future.

[Anonymous No.17914947]

>>17914400
And Thucydides isn't? They both have solid sections in them.

I would say Herodotus and Suetonius are far more interesting to read, however these aren't master-pieces.

[Anonymous No.17914964]

>>17906263
My personal advice is to read Orlando Figes' Tragedy of a People, about the causes of the russian revolution. I read it multiple times, it's just fantastic
Also be ready: Gibbon becomes nigh unreadable (to me) after the third volume. He becomes too chaotic

[Anonymous No.17914985]

>>17914964
>Orlando Figes

I can't get over the fact this guy took the time to write negative Amazon reviews for other historians dealing with Russia