Claudius
Murder, incest and paedophilia in imperial Rome
Suetonius’s Lives of the Caesars appears in a vibrant new translation by Tom Holland, the current princeps of popular Roman history
Like Theresa May, Claudius struggled to know who to trust
After the sacking of Gavin Williamson, a former No. 10 insider said of Theresa May: ‘One of Theresa’s big faults is…
Foaming with much blood
According to Francis Bacon, the House of York was ‘a race often dipped in its own blood’. That being so,…
A Stoic among sadists
They lived in barrels, they camped on top of columns, or in caves: the lives of the sages are often…
Hadrian on the Somerset floods
Since the Somerset Levels are a flood plain, nature will flood it. Romans had no problems with that. Much of…
