Volume 54, Number 4 · March 15, 2007
Et Tu, Cicero?
By Mary Beard
Imperium: A Novel of Ancient Rome
by Robert Harris
Simon and Schuster, 305 pp., $26.00
In 79 BCE, Pompey the Great—Republican Rome's home-grown answer to the Greek Alexander—was upstaged by some elephants. He was celebrating his military victories in Africa with a triumphal procession through the streets of Rome. This was the nearest thing to heaven for a Roman general. Almost literally; for the triumph involved not only a shameless parade of spoils, captured weapons, looted artworks, and exotic prisoners, it also allowed the general to dress up for the day in the costume of Jupiter Optimus Maximus ('Best and Greatest'), patron god of the city.
Review, 4121 words
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