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Peter Brown's Top Book Recommendations

Want to know what books Peter Brown recommends on their reading list? We've researched interviews, social media posts, podcasts, and articles to build a comprehensive list of Peter Brown's favorite book recommendations of all time.

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Recommended by Peter Brown, and 1 others.

Peter BrownTwo of Peter’s books are also recommended in our interview with historian Robin Lane Fox. (Source)

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2
Over the past century, exploration and serendipity have uncovered mosaic after mosaic in the Near East--maps, historical images, mythical figures, and religious scenes that constitute an immense treasure of new testimony from antiquity. The stories these mosaics tell unfold in this brief, richly informed book by a preeminent scholar of the classical world.

G. W. Bowersock considers these mosaics a critical part of the documentation of the region's ancient culture, as expressive as texts, inscriptions on stone, and architectural remains. In their complex language, often marred by...
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Recommended by Peter Brown, and 1 others.

Peter BrownFor example, the Roman aristocracy are a subject here; the early church and the church fathers is a subject there; the late Roman state and socio-economic conditions of the late Roman world and the Mediterranean are another subject over here. There was very little attempt to synthesise these different areas of enquiry, and to understand how one might inform the other. This is something he’s done:... (Source)

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3

A History of Education in Antiquity

H. I. Marrou’s A History of Education in Antiquity has been an invaluable contribution in the fields of classical studies and history ever since its original publication in French in 1948. French historian H. I. Marrou traces the roots of classical education, from the warrior cultures of Homer, to the increasing importance of rhetoric and philosophy, to the adaptation of Hellenistic ideals within the Roman education system, and ending with the rise of Christian schools and churches in the early medieval period. Marrou shows how education, once formed as a way to train young warriors,... more
Recommended by Peter Brown, and 1 others.

Peter BrownAbout Peter Brown: (Source)

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4
Recommended by Peter Brown, and 1 others.

Peter BrownNot everyone who has chosen books for our site has given an interview (yet). If you’re a historian based in the US and know Peter and would like to interview him about the books he’s chosen above, please let us know. In the meantime, we present a snippet about Peter from our interview with historian Simon Yarrow: (Source)

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5
This book presents a history of spiritual exercises from Socrates to early Christianity, an account of their decline in modern philosophy, and a discussion of the different conceptions of philosophy that have accompanied the trajectory and fate of the theory and practice of spiritual exercises. Hadot's book demonstrates the extent to which philosophy has been, and still is, above all else a way of seeing and of being in the world. less
Recommended by Peter Brown, Jules Evans, and 2 others.

Peter BrownOne of Peter Brown’s first books was a biography of Augustine in 1967. He then wrote a book about late antiquity in the early 1970s. He’s an example of someone who wears his learning very lightly. (Source)

Jules EvansPierre Hadot is not that well known, but the people who are aware of him really love and value his work. He was a French academic, a specialist in Neo-Platonist mysticism. One day he went into his local bakery, looked around at the people queuing for bread and thought: Neo-Platonist mysticism means nothing to these people and is not much use to them. So he started to become interested in the more... (Source)

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