
Dynasty
The Rise and Fall of the House of Caesar
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Narrated by:
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Derek Perkins
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By:
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Tom Holland
Author and historian Tom Holland returns to his roots in Roman history and the audience he cultivated with Rubicon—his masterful, witty, brilliantly researched popular history of the fall of the Roman republic—with Dynasty, a luridly fascinating history of the reign of the first five Roman emperors.
Dynasty continues Rubicon's story, opening where that book ended: with the murder of Julius Caesar. This is the period of the first and perhaps greatest Roman emperors. It's a colorful story of rule and ruination, from the rise of Augustus to the death of Nero. Holland's expansive history also has distinct shades of I, Claudius, with five wonderfully vivid (and, in three cases, thoroughly depraved) emperors—Augustus, Tiberius, Caligula, Claudius, and Nero—featured, along with numerous fascinating secondary characters.
Intrigue, murder, naked ambition and treachery, greed, gluttony, lust, incest, pageantry, decadence—the tale of these five Caesars continues to cast a mesmerizing spell across the millennia.
©2015 Tom Holland (P)2015 Blackstone Audio, Inc.Listeners also enjoyed...




















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I'd definitely recommend this book to those who enjoy ancient history.
Highly recommended
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so exciting. nero, the senate, everything. power snd people. timeless. glory days
do you like rome?
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Dynasty
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A Masterpiece Of Storytelling & History
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There was little new in this book to me fact-wise, however, I very much enjoyed how Mr. Holland sets the back-drop of the Empire. He explains Rome's history, its political climate, and how the Romans see themselves in relation to the rest of the world. This is a huge factor in why and how the House of Caesar rose to such prominence and why their mythology still has a hold on us today.
What I found even more fascinating are the digressions the author takes as he discusses the Roman world in the first century and the problems the Empire faced, especially in regards to immigration. It truly helped to parallel their world to ours.
Sadly, despite all his careful planning, Augustus was not able to force the rest of his family to adhere to his vision for it. In the end, despite being the blood of the "divine Julius", his family are only human after all. Greed, treachery, hubris, paranoia, and plain old bad luck wreak havoc on Augustus, Tiberius, Caligula, Claudius and their various family members, until the line is extinguished in the last scion of the Julio-Claudians, Nero.
I also appreciated that when he goes into some of the more scurrilous and scandalous stories about the family, the author often gives reasonable explanations as to why those stories may have arisen without treating them as either absolutely true or negating them completely.
The book reads very much like a novel and as such is quite an easy read. I would definitely read more by this author and would be very much interested in a book of his focussed on the women of the dynasty.
Unfortunately, I was not thrilled with the narrator. He had some peculiar pronunciations that irked me for some reason. He was serviceable but I couldn't shake the feeling that someone else could have/would have been a better choice. No idea who that someone would be though.
Accessible, enjoyable history
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Beyond fantastic.. Read it!
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great story great reading, what not to love?
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Fantastic book
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The story is beautifully done,
Also consider Persian Fire by Tom Holland.
Tom Holland never disappoints
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Each society, and perhaps each individual and institution in it, must walk a line between the elegance of enlightened self-interest, with a measure of healthy fellow-interactions, and the path which by increments becomes, potentially, an ugly hall of mirrors of self-absorbed vice and cruelty. This is all served up here with a brio that makes me queasy at moments (and I suppose, very un-Roman in displaying such weakness). A true history buff shouldn't shy from the details that actually happened, right? And should be edified and learn from them? Learn from this I did, a little heartbroken though. Maybe I'm getting old, or ate the wrong thing for lunch. But past a point, the graphic madness here (blighting the world and trashing countless lives), the nose-thumbing insouciance of these privileged brats curdling the ancient world into a sick and feeble parody of itself, finally got to me.
Thanks Tom I'm a huge fan (and will avidly re-listen to In The Shadow of the Sword and Rubicon), but this is enough of this. I can only hope we are preserved from our own system blundering into a train wreck steered by elite narcissists, anything like this tale depicts.
Now, I surely understand why Rome, culturally exhausted by excesses like this, turned to Christianity.
Lessons delivered luridly, at turns hard to watch
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