Carcopino J. Daily Life in Ancient Rome: The People and the City at the Height of the Empire

Translated from the French by E.O. Lorimer. — Penguin Books, 1941. — 365 p.This classic book brings to life imperial Rome as it was during the second century A.D., the time of Trajan and Hadrian, Marcus Aurelius, and Commodus. It was a period marked by lavish displays of wealth, a dazzling cultural mix, and the advent of Christianity. The splendor and squalor of the city, the spectacles, and the day's routines are reconstructed from an immense fund of archaeological evidence and from vivid descriptions by ancient poets, satirists, letter-writers, and novelists--from Petronius to Pliny the Younger.