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Cyril Robinson's history reviews the transformation of the Roman state from a minor kingdom in a remote part of the world into the most powerful empire of ancient times and the center of Western civilization. This process was the great achievement, for better or worse, of the republic which replaced the primitive Kingdom of Rome and created the machinery of the Roman Empire. It saw the expansion of the Roman character from that of the sturdy, disciplined, pragmatic, brutal, narrow-minded, agricultural, oligarchic nation that successfully passed it's trial-by-fire during the savage war against Hannibal. It emerged from that war as a world power open to the influences of other cultures, most notably that of the Hellenistic civilization that dominated the eastern Mediterranean. The players in this high drama were such towering personalities as Hannibal, Scipio Africanus, Sulla, Pompey, Caesar, Cleopatra, and Augustus, the founder of the new imperial state that formed Western civilization.