31 Quotes by Anthony Everitt

The Oracle at Delphi contained three maxims emblematic of Greek life. "Know yourself." "Nothing in excess." and, "Offer a guarantee and disaster threatens.

Rome became a republic in 509 B.C., after driving out its king and abolishing the monarchy. The next two centuries saw a long struggle for power between a group of noble families, patricians, and ordinary citizens, plebeians, who were excluded from public office. The outcome was a apparent victory for the people, but the old aristocracy, supplemented by rich pledeian nobles, still controlled the state. What looked in many ways like democracy was, in fact, an oligarcy modified by elections.

Rome was an evolutionary society, not a revolutionary one. Constitutional crises tended to lead not to the abolition of previous arrangements but to the accretion of new layers of governance.

The Forum was the city’s political, commercial, and legal heart, but it was also its spiritual center, a space more sacred than the city itself.

The Oracle at Delphi contained three maxims emblematic of Greek life. “Know yourself.” “Nothing in excess.” and, “Offer a guarantee and disaster threatens.

This found its classic expression in Homer’s Iliad, in which Glaucus says to Diomedes that he still hears his father’s urgings ringing in his ears: Always be the best, my boy, the bravest, and hold your head high above the others.

An incident occurred while Cato was speaking which caused much amusement at his expense. A letter was brought in for Caesar, and Cato immediately accused him of being in touch with the conspirators. He challenged him to read the note out loud. Caesar simply passed it across: it was a love letter from Servilia, Caesar’s mistress at the time and Cato’s half-sister. Cato threw it back angrily with the words: “Take it, you drunken idiot.

Perusian war proved that Antony and his supporters.

Men in public life did their best to avoid accidental events or actions from being seen as unlucky. On a famous occasion during the civil war, Caesar tripped when disembarking from a ship on the shores of Africa and fell flat on his face. With his talent for improvisation, he spread out his arms and embraced the earth as a symbol of conquest. By quick thinking he turned a terrible omen of failure into one of victory.