Augustus: The Biography - Hardcover

Bleicken, Jochen

Hardcover

ISBN 10: 0713994770 ISBN 13: 9780713994773

Publisher: Allen Lane, 2015

Synopsis

The great modern biography of Augustus, founder of the Roman Empire

Born to a plebeian family in 63 BC, Octavian was a young solder training abroad when he heard news of Julius Caesar's brutal assassination - and discovered that he was the dictator's sole political heir. With the opportunism and instinct for propaganda that were to characterize his rule, Octavian rallied huge financial, military and political backing to eliminate his opponents, end the bloody turmoil that had so long wracked Rome and, finally, take autocratic control of a state devoted to republicanism. He became Augustus - Rome's first Emperor, and the founder of the greatest empire the world had ever seen.

In this monumental biography, translated into English for the first time by Anthea Bell, Jochen Bleicken tells the story of a man who found himself a demi-god in his own lifetime and paints a portrait of one of the most dramatic periods of Roman history.

About this title

About the Author

Jochen Bleicken was born in 1926 on the island of Sylt in Germany. He studied History and Classical Philology at the universities of Kiel and Frankfurt from 1948 to 1954 before going on to work as a Professor of History at Hamburg, Frankfurt and Gottingen. In 1978, he was made a member of the Gottingen Academy of Sciences. He retired in 1991, but continued to give lectures for years thereafter, finally stopping in 1999. He died in 2005.

From the Back Cover

In this monumental biography, translated into English for the first time by Anthea Bell, Jochen Bleicken tells the story of a man who found himself a demi-god in his own lifetime and paints a portrait of one of the most dramatic periods of Roman history.

Edition details

• Publisher: Allen Lane
• Publication date: 2015
• Language: English
• ISBN 10: 0713994770
• ISBN 13: 9780713994773
• Binding: Hardcover
• Edition number: 1
• Number of pages: 784