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Regular listeners to this podcast may conceivably have heard me mention that I have a book out

at the moment, Pax, which is about the heyday of the Roman Empire.

It came out in Britain and Australia a few months back, but very excited to announce that

it is coming out in America now, and I kind of wanted to tempt you, give you a little teaser.

So what you're about to hear, I'm afraid, does not feature Dominic, so that may immediately

put you off, but if it doesn't, this is the introduction to Pax.

It kind of spells out what the remit of the book is, gives a kind of brief sketch of the

Roman world, the themes that I'll be discussing, and I very much hope that you enjoy it.

Thank you.

In AD 122, the world's most powerful man arrived on the banks of the Tine.

The river, which flows through what today is the city of Newcastle, was the most

northily point that had ever been visited by a Roman Emperor.

Below it stretched Lolan Britain, the fertile southern half of the island, which over the

course of the previous 80 years had been conquered, pacified, and tamed by the legions.

Beyond it lay the wilds of the north, lands too savage and poverty-stricken to merit conquest.

Such at any rate was the judgment of the visiting Caesar.

Publius Ilius Hadrianus, Hadrian, was a man well-qualified to distinguish between civilization

and barbarism.

He had studied with philosophers, and written to war against headhunters, lived both in Athens,

...