Tom Holland in talks to Bettany Hughes

From the historian and co-presenter of The Rest is History podcast comes the story of antiquity’s ultimate superpower at the pinnacle of its greatness. The Roman Empire once stretched from Scotland to Arabia, the wealthiest and most formidable state the world had seen. Holland’s Pax: War and Peace in Rome’s Golden Age begins in 69 AD, a year that saw four Caesars in succession rule the empire, and ends some seven decades later with the death of Hadrian. Covering the destruction of Jerusalem and Pompeii, the building of the Colosseum and Hadrian’s Wall, and the conquests of Trajan, he vividly sketches the lives of Romans from slaves to emperors. This is the last of his trilogy that began with Rubicon and continued with Dynasty.