Heather Peter Book order

The era of the Emperor Justinian (527-68) intersects the fall of the western half of the Roman Empire in the fifth century and the collapse of the east in the face of rampant Arab invasions in the seventh. Determined to reverse the losses Rome suffered in the fifth century, Justinian's stubborn aggression in the face of all adversity, not least the plague, led the eastern Empire to overreach itself, making it vulnerable to the Islamic takeover of its richest territories in the seventh century, which turned the great East Roman Empire of late antiquity, into its pale Byzantine shadow of the Middle Ages. Rome Resurgent promises to introduce to a wide readership this fascinating but unjustly overlooked chapter in ancient warfare.

How modern Europe came to be-a new look at the powerful forces that transformed the continent by the end of the first millennium

Shows how Europe's barbarians, strengthened by centuries of contact with Rome on many levels, turned into an enemy capable of overturning and dismantling the mighty Empire.