Melbourne’s State Library under lockdown. The wisdom of Seneca can help us through this difficult time.
James Ross/AAP
The Roman Stoic Seneca is the author of many letters and dialogues that can help us overcome adversity.
Musée d'Orsay
The oldest surviving novel in Latin literature, Satyricon follows three young men on their misadventures and homosexual love triangle.
Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell of Kentucky speaks to the media with members of the Senate Republican leadership, Oct. 29, 2019.
AP/Jacquelyn Martin
The Roman senate declined from a long-held position of authority under the Roman Republic to become almost wholly reliant on the whims of a given emperor, writes a classics scholar.
Jake Arditti (Nero) in Coronation of Poppea: the production is a haze of drug-fuelled violence, erotic drive, and dog eat dog power plays.
Brett Boardman
The Monteverdi opera exploring passion in ancient Rome has been transposed to a contemporary gangster setting in a new Sydney production.
Was persecution a consistent imperial policy, and what types of punishments were inflicted on Christians?
The Christian Martyrs' Last Prayer by Jean-Léon Gérôme (1883)/Wikimedia Commons
The image of cowering Christians being thrown to the lions by Roman emperors is a grisly staple of popular culture. But how accurate is it?
Nero: had a reputation as an arsonist even in antiquity.
Wikimedia Commons
The image of a crazed and capricious Emperor Nero is immortalised in popular culture: from fiddling while Rome burns to having a sexual relationship with his mother. The historical evidence, however, is rather different.
In a world where few believed in an afterlife, this-worldly glory mattered immensely.
Shutterstock
There’s plenty of evidence to suggest that attempts to manipulate the outcome of the competitions are as old as the Games themselves.