A fascinating window into the history of the ancient world, told through thirty-five fascinating figures

The western ancient world stretched from the Pillars of Hercules between Spain and North Africa in the west to Mesopotamia in the east, and from southern Egypt in the south to Scotland in the north. In between all the places and across several thousand years came a succession of grand civilizations and cultures—including the Sumerians, ancient Egypt, Carthage, classical Greece, the Hellenistic kingdoms and the Roman Empire.

In this engaging account, Guy de la Bédoyère draws on decades of research to provide a history of the ancient world through a personal selection key figures. The story of any one of these lives is unique, from Egypt’s reforming pharaoh Horemheb or the public priestess Eumachia at Pompeii. These individuals serve as a portal into the experience of the ancient world in the days of despotic pharaohs and Roman emperors and make it possible for us to try and imagine what their lives were like.