The Roman Republic in Political Thought (The Menahem Stern Jerusalem…

An interesting survey of how the Roman Republic has inspired western political thought from antiquity to the Renaissance and the American revolution. As an accomplished historian of Rome, the author competently reviews perceptions and misperceptions of the Republic in the classic works of western political theory. He's understandably not equally well acquainted with the historical and political context of the works themselves, so the book becomes a bit repetitive at times. However, I did like his informative analysis of the American constitutional debate in particular. The one thing that the author emphasizes and that stuck to my mind was that Livy's semihistorical narrative of the early Republic has been by far the most influential Roman source for political thought. More historically accurate perspectives did not prevail until the 20th century.