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Real Roman History

Hugo Prudentius

Real Roman History is a comprehensive, chronological account of Rome from its origins to its end—told with the depth the subject deserves. This is not a highlight reel. Every major figure, every turning point, and every war gets the full treatment: the stories as the Romans told them, the ancient sources and what they got right and wrong, and the historical arguments that scholars are still having today. Hugo Prudentius takes listeners from the kings of the early city through the Republic, the civil wars, the empire, and beyond—episode by episode, in sequence, without skipping the parts that made Rome what it was. If other Roman history podcasts have left you wanting more, you've found the right one.

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  • 27 episodes
  • Avg 43 min
  • English

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Episodes 27

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  • #82
    August 27 · 55 min

    Episode 82. A Tour of the Empire, c. 68 CE

    Works Cited Primary Sources Cassius Dio. Roman History, particularly the books covering the Julio-Claudian period, with substantial geographic-administrative material throughout. The inscriptional record. The legionary establishment data is principally from the dedicatory inscriptions, military diplomas, and other epigraphic sources that preserve the locations and identities of the legionary units of the early imperial period. Pliny the Elder. Natural History, especially Books 3 through 6. Composed in the 70s CE and preserving the most detailed contemporary geographic survey of the imperial system. Strabo. Geography, in seventeen books. Composed in the early imperial period and preserving substantial material on the geography of the empire as it existed under Augustus and Tiberius. Tacitus. Annals and Histories. Preserving substantial material on the provincial administration of the Julio-Claudian and early Flavian periods. Secondary Sources Campbell, Brian. The Roman Army, 31 BC to AD 337. Routledge, 1994. Substantial material on the geographic distribution and political role of the imperial legions. Garnsey, Peter, and Richard Saller. The Roman Empire: Economy, Society and Culture. Second edition, Bloomsbury, 2014. The standard scholarly textbook on the imperial system, with substantial material on provincial economies and administrative structures. Jones, A. H. M. The Cities of the Eastern Roman Provinces. Second edition, Oxford University Press, 1971. The classic detailed treatment of the urban network of the eastern provinces. Mattern, Susan. Rome and the Enemy: Imperial Strategy in the Principate. University of California Press, 1999. The standard scholarly treatment of the military-geographic structure of the empire. Millar, Fergus. The Roman Empire and its Neighbours. Weidenfeld and Nicolson, 1967. Standard older treatment with substantial geographic-administrative material. Woolf, Greg. Becoming Roman. Cambridge University Press, 1998. Major work on the Romanisation of Gaul and the western provinces. Support this podcast at — https://redcircle.com/real-roman-history/donations

  • #77
    August 14 · 52 min

    Episode 77. The Origins of Christianity

    Works Cited Primary Sources The book of Acts. Composed approximately 80 to 90 CE by the same author as the Gospel of Luke. The principal narrative source for the early Christian community in Jerusalem and the missionary work of Paul. The four canonical Gospels—Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John. Composed between approximately 70 and 110 CE. The principal sources for Jesus's life and teaching, with the substantial source-critical caveats this episode has discussed. Josephus. Antiquities of the Jews, especially 18.3.3, the Testimonium Flavianum on Jesus, with the source-critical caveats discussed in Part Six, and 20.9.1, the execution of James the brother of Jesus in 62 CE. The letters of Paul. Composed between approximately 50 and 60 CE. The seven authentic letters—Romans, First and Second Corinthians, Galatians, Philippians, First Thessalonians, and Philemon—are our most reliable evidence for the state of the Christian movement in the 50s. Suetonius. Life of Claudius, 25. The reference to the expulsion of the Jewish community from Rome in 49 CE for disturbances instigated by Chrestus. Tacitus. Annals, 15.44. The principal Roman reference to the Neronian persecution and to Christianity as a distinct religious movement. Secondary Sources Ehrman, Bart D. The New Testament: A Historical Introduction to the Early Christian Writings. Oxford University Press, multiple editions. Standard scholarly introduction to the early Christian texts and their composition. Koester, Helmut. Introduction to the New Testament. De Gruyter, multiple editions. Comprehensive scholarly treatment of the early Christian movement and its texts. Sanders, E. P. The Historical Figure of Jesus. Penguin, 1993. The standard scholarly biography of Jesus from a perspective grounded in Pauline-period Jewish religious context. The framework of this episode owes substantial debts to Sanders's analysis. Vermes, Geza. Jesus the Jew. Collins, 1973. The classic work establishing the Jewish religious context of Jesus's ministry. Continues to shape contemporary historical Jesus scholarship. Wright, N. T. The New Testament and the People of God. SPCK, 1992. The major contemporary treatment from a more theologically committed perspective, useful as a counterweight to the more skeptical scholarly traditions. Support this podcast at — https://redcircle.com/real-roman-history/donations

  • #76
    August 14 · 49 min

    Episode 76. Roman Judaea: From the Covenant to Direct Rule

    Works Cited Primary Sources The Hebrew Bible (the Tanakh). The principal source for the pre-Hellenistic period of the Jewish religious tradition. The five books of Torah preserve the foundational material on the covenant and the Israelite religious framework. The historical books—Joshua, Judges, Samuel, Kings—preserve the narrative of the Israelite kingdoms. The prophetic books preserve the religious and political commentary of the pre-exilic and exilic periods. The book of Ezra preserves the principal account of the return from Babylonian exile. The composition and dating of these texts is the subject of substantial modern scholarly debate. They are used here as the religious tradition's own self-understanding, with the caveat that the historical and archaeological evidence is treated with appropriate critical care. The First and Second Books of Maccabees, preserved in the Greek-language Septuagint translation. The principal sources for the Hasmonean revolt of 167 BCE and following. First Maccabees is a substantial historical narrative, probably composed in the late second or early first century BCE. Second Maccabees is a more theological treatment of the same events, with a more developed framework of divine intervention and martyrdom. Josephus. Antiquities of the Jews. Comprehensive Jewish history written in the late first century CE, drawing on biblical and post-biblical Jewish sources, Hellenistic historians, and Roman documentary materials. The principal source for the Hasmonean and Herodian periods, and for the procuratorial administration of Judaea up to the outbreak of the Jewish War. Josephus. The Jewish War. Focused narrative of the war of 66 to 73 CE, with substantial background on the immediate prewar period. Josephus served as a Jewish military commander in the early phase of the war before defecting to Rome, which gives the text both insider knowledge and the political bias of a defector. Both elements require careful source-criticism. Tacitus. Histories, Book 5. The fifth book of Tacitus's Histories preserves an extended Roman ethnographic and political account of the Jewish people and their religion, written from a hostile Roman perspective. The Pompey-in-the-Temple material is preserved at 5.9. To be used with appropriate source-criticism throughout. Secondary Sources Goodman, Martin. Rome and Jerusalem: The Clash of Ancient Civilizations. Allen Lane, 2007. The major recent treatment of the Roman-Jewish relationship across the entire imperial period. The structural framework of this episode owes substantial debts to Goodman's analysis. Grabbe, Lester L. A History of the Jews and Judaism in the Second Temple Period. T&T Clark, 2008. Detailed scholarly history of the period from the return from exile through the Bar Kokhba revolt. Sanders, E. P. Judaism: Practice and Belief 63 BCE to 66 CE. SCM Press, 1992. Focused study of Jewish religious practice during the late Hasmonean and early Roman periods, which is the immediate background for both the Jesus movement and the Pauline mission that will be the subject of the next episode. Schäfer, Peter. The History of the Jews in the Greco-Roman World. Routledge, revised edition, 2003. Standard scholarly history of the Jewish community across the relevant period. Support this podcast at — https://redcircle.com/real-roman-history/donations

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