G. W. Bowersock

Oxford University Press as publisher was already a good hint that this wouldn't be an easy read, but I love to learn completely random facts about the world that are thoroughly reviewed and that I'll never need again, so I'm fine with that.

The topic itself is pretty obscure: A pre-islamic conflict between jewish Arabs in the territory of today's Yemen and christian Ethiopians at the other side of the Red Sea that is in the end not much more than a proxy war between the Byzantine and the show more Persian empires.

Bowerstock analyses and explains meticulously the body of source material, the power structure in the region, the influence of outside and historical powers like the Roman, Meroitic and Egyptian empires and the development of the conflict.

The lessons? Propaganda is everything, it's not about religion, and every aggressor always has good reasons. show less

The book is set out more or less as a chronological biography from Julian's birth to his accession to the throne as sole Augustus in 361. From there, it takes on a more thematic aspect as it describes his policies and movements throughout his time in Naissus, Constantinople and then on to Antioch, where the narrative picks up again and swiftly carries the emperor to his greatest triumph - against the Sassanid Persians at their own capital of Ctesiphon - and his final end on the return show more journey.

The major downside to this work is Bowersock's clear, at times vitriolic disdain for the Emperor Julian and many of his policies. In the early part of the book, he writes seemingly as an apologist for Constantius II, portraying him in a far more favourable light than most other historians of the period. He castes Julian in the mold of a zealot and a bigot, and eventually as a persecutor of Christians, something which most historians stop short of. This is not the book one should read first on Julian, as I can imagine it would colour one's views irrevocably against the man.

Despite this, however, Bowersock's writing is clear, his style engaging, and his research clearly meticulous. If one is able to see beyond the surface layer of strongly opinionated commentary, an incredible amount of knowledge in a short run of pages (only 119 for the main section) is revealed. For that reason, this is a must-read for anyone with a solid background knowledge of Julian, looking to learn more. show less

The Throne of Adulis centres around the eponymous, now lost, artefact: a white marble throne and accompanying black basalt stele which stood in an African port city during the sixth century. Transcriptions made of the throne's inscriptions during the sixth century allow G.W. Bowersock to reconstruct something of the history of the regions bordering the Red Sea during the Hellenistic period, the Roman Empire, and Late Antiquity. In particular, he focuses on the conflict between Christian show more Ethiopians and Jewish Arabs, which was something of a proxy war between the Christian Byzantine Empire and the Zoroastrian Sasanian Persian Empire. Bowersock argues that this environment of religious instabilty and political conflict is a key piece of context that helps to explain the rapid rise of Islam in subsequent years. Bowersock's work is an example of the kinds of insight which can be gleaned from even the sparsest evidence through the meticulous use of palaeography, epigraphy, archaeology, etc, though the methodology employed here means that this likely won't be the most accessible book for the neophyte. show less

Quick, easy to read biography of Julian. The author spends perhaps too much time explaining how he uses sources, but that's at least understandable in a work on such a polarized figure, and such an ancient one. The picture he paints is not one of a perfect idealized man, nor is it the monster that so many detractors depict. It is a nuanced picture of a man with good and bad points, who made some good reforms but in many cases for some less than noble reasons (although some people might think show more the goal to destroy Christianity was actually quite noble, it is notable that the brand of paganism he wanted to implement was not particularly wonderful, either). For anyone interested in the life of this so brief Roman emperor, this is a good resource to have on your shelves. show less