This text aims to overturn the frequent dismissal of Roman art as 'mosaics and uninspiring copies of Greek sculpture'. In place of the usual historical outline approach, this book looks at the subject by genre and considers the attitudes of Romans themselves to art. Drawing on literary sources as well as illustrations from many parts of the Roman world, this survey of Roman art to the time of Constantine considers what Romans hoped to achieve and how far they were successful.

"Greek Vases" is a discussion of the painted vases which were an ever-present but understated feature of life in the Greek world between the end of the Bronze Age and the rise of Rome, and, in the modern world, an important component of museum collections since the eighteenth century. The book uses specific illustrated examples to explore the archaeological use of vases as chronological indicators, the use of the various shapes, their scenes of myth and everyday life and what these tell us, the way in which we think about their makers, and how they are treated today as museum objects and...