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    The Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire - Volume I
    The Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire - Volume I
    The Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire - Volume I
    Audiobook22 hours

    The Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire - Volume I

    Written by Edward Gibbon

    Narrated by David Timson

    4.5/5

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    About this audiobook

    The Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire has always maintained its initial appeal to both the general public and scholars of subsequent ages. The sheer scale of the subject is daunting, encompassing a millennium and a half of history, covering not merely the Western Roman Empire from the days of the early emperors to its extinction in A.D. 476, but also the Eastern (Byzantine) Empire, which lasted for another thousand years until it was vanquished by the Turks in 1453. But Gibbon’s style, part historical scholar, part sensational story-teller, part historical fact and part literature, is enticing, and the sheer honesty of the man, who, writing in the age of reason, endeavours to be scrupulously impartial in his presentation, endears him to the reader. It is meticulously planned, and charts the fall and rise of Western mankind from the dust of the Empire into the modern nations of Europe.
    The work consists of 71 chapters, 2,136 paragraphs, some one million and a half words, and close to 8,000 footnotes: a magnum opus indeed by anyone’s standards.
    LanguageEnglish
    PublisherNaxos Audiobooks
    Release dateDec 1, 2013
    ISBN9781843797210
    The Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire - Volume I
    Author

    Edward Gibbon

    Nació en 1737, en Putney, hijo de un caballero de la gentry, y el único de ellos que sobreviviría a la infancia. Si bien su educación se vio interrumpida por su mala salud, llegó a poseer una amplia cultura. Un breve período como estudiante en el Magdalen College de Oxford finalizó cuando se convirtió al catolicismo y su padre lo envió a Suiza, concretamente a Lausana. Allí, mientras estudiaba griego y francés durante los siguientes cinco años, regresó a la Iglesia protestante. En 1761 publicó el Éssai sur l'etude de la Littérature, cuya versión inglesa apareció en 1764. Entretanto, sirvió como capitán en la milicia de Hampshire hasta 1763, fecha en que volvió al continente. En el año 1764, mientras se encontraba en Roma, cóncibió el proyecto de la obra que con los años se transformaría en la Historia de la decadencia y caída del Imperio Romano. Tras el fallecimiento de su padre, fijó su residencia en Londres y, en 1774, fue elegido diputado por ocho años, si bien nunca se le oyó hablar en el Parlamento. Al mismo tiempo, entró a formar parte de los círculos literarios de Londres. El primer volumen de su famosa Historia se publicó en 1776 y recibió numerosas alabanzas por su erudición y su estilo, si bien se le reprochó el enfoque dado a los primeros cristianos. Los volúmenes segundo y tercero aparecieron en 1781 y los tres últimos, escritos en Lausana, en 1788. Gibbon falleció mientras se encontraba visitando a su amigo lord Sheffield. En manos de este dejó seis borradores de sus memorias, redactados en diversos momentos de su vida. Después de un arduo trabajo de reconstrucción, en agosto de 1795, Sheffield envió a la imprenta dos volúmenes titulados Miscellaneous Works of Edward Gibbon, with Memoirs of His Life and Writings. Sin embargo, como se pudo constatar más adelante, llevado por la prudencia o delicadeza, lord Sheffield había omitido numerosos pasajes, que se restauraron a partir de 1894, conformando lo que ha llegado hasta nosotros con el título de Memorias de mi vida.

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    Reviews for The Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire - Volume I

    4.5/5

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    • 5/5
      It is easy to understand why these 6 books are the inspiration of so many in so many ways throughout the times. The author gives a vivid encounter of those times, of the people and their actions, but at the same time his interest is for the History and not the person. I’m going through with book 2!
    • 4/5
      A classic of historical literature, in two volumes. The author details the history to the fall in the first volume, and the byzantine period in the second volume.

      2 people found this helpful

    • 5/5
      Surprisingly good. I say surprising because of the age of the book and its length. I suspect it would have been a ponderous read but was a very good audio book. On to volume ii

      1 person found this helpful

    • 4/5
      Like a series of visits to an eccentric, garrulous and bigoted uncle who is a famous expert on Roman history (I think of him as being played by Sir Ralph Richardson). The structure of his sentences and the pattern of his sentence structures (e.g. backwards, inside-out, simple declarative), especially in relationship to their content and especially considering the length of the work, is incredible.
    • 3/5
      I feel decidedly ambivalent about this book. My rating reflects that ultimately I didn't want to stick with it; I didn't find its pleasures and degree of informativeness worth the slogging through. This is the slowest read I've ever encountered--slower reading than James Joyce's Ulysses. And yet it's not that the prose was difficult or rambling or the subject boring. In fact I found the prose rather elegant. Partly, it's that I felt as if it was going on forever. This is only the first volume of six covering from 180 to 395 AD--and it's 956 pages of very tiny print. Mind you, I've read history books about as dense with delight. And I did like the style and find much of what was related about the Romans fascinating. How could I not be fascinated by the real details about Commodus, the son of Marcus Aurelius and the subject of the film Gladiator? How could I not love reading about Emperor Severus, whose name lives on in Rowling's Severus Snape?

      Except it was hard to let go and let myself absorb this, because it was so obviously dated. A friend of mine who is fascinated by the Romans, who studied the classics, knows Greek and Latin and teaches it for a living, begged me not to read this. Gibbon, she told me, is a "relic." Go read the real thing she told me--Tacitus and Suetonius are riveting and much closer to being primary sources. Or pick up a contemporary history of Rome that incorporates the latest scholarship. Still, I was determined at first to plow onward, given this is a tremendously influential book, one of the first modern histories to use and cite primary sources. And there is value in reading old non-fiction works such as Darwin's Origin of Species and Frazer's The Golden Bough, even if their biology and anthropology are dated. As another friend put it--it's not so much what Gibbon tells us about Ancient Rome, as what he tells us about 1776 Britain in its own post-Augustan Age. And there's certainly a window on his times to be found here--particularly in the views on women and Asians and race in general. Gibbon lost me in Chapter IX: "State of Germany Until the Barbarians" with its ode to misogyny:

      The Germans treated their women with esteem and confidence, consulted them on every occasion of importance, and fondly believed, that in their breasts resided a sanctity and wisdom more than human.... The rest of the sex, without being adored as goddesses, were respected as the free and equal companions of soldiers; associated even by the marriage ceremony to a life of toil, of danger, and of glory.... Heroines of such a cast may claim our admiration; but they were most assuredly neither lovely, nor very susceptible of love. Whilst they affected to emulate the stern virtues of man, they must have resigned that attractive softness, in which principally consist the charm and weakness of woman. Conscious pride taught the German females to suppress every tender emotion that stood in competition with honor, and the first honor of the sex has ever been that of chastity. The sentiments and conduct of these high-spirited matrons may, at once, be considered as a cause, as an effect, and as a proof of the general character of the nation. Female courage, however it may be raised by fanaticism, or confirmed by habit, can be only a faint and imperfect imitation of the manly valor that distinguishes the age or country in which it may be found.

      The above isn't incidental--it's practically the keynote to Gibbon's theory. The Emperor Alexander Severus, who Gibbon overall admires, according to him had two key flaws--he was born in the "effeminate" East--and he listened to his mother too much. At least one-fourth into the first volume, Gibbon's theory seems to be Rome's decline came because Romans lost the manly men virtues. And yes, I know; it's the times in which Gibbon wrote to blame, and I should make allowances for that and take out of his history what good I can. But added to how slow a read this was and feeling fidgety wondering just how much of the facts are just plain wrong... Well.

      I may try an abridged edition someday. I noticed one shelved at Barnes and Noble that covers the material of the first volume in only 317 pages. I might find that more bearable. Or maybe just try a modern take on the late Western Roman empire such as Peter Heather's The Fall of the Roman Empire. Or just take my friend's advice and next time I'm in the mood to read about the Romans read Suetonius' The Twelve Caesars, which my friend swears is awesome.
    • 4/5
      A classic of historical literature, in two volumes. The author details the history to the fall in the first volume, and the byzantine period in the second volume.
    • 5/5
      Gibbon's wry sense of humor should be noted in addition to the many superlatives which he richly deserves.
    • 4/5
      My interest in this six volume history by Gibbons is NOT the Roman Empire, but the history of the rise of the Christian church. Unfortunately, he begins with circa 150 C. E. on page 504 of this volume, and many of his "pronouncements of fact" are qualified by annotator Milman. A nice set in need of minor repairs (mostly spine backing replacement).