This comprehensive general commentary on the nine books of the younger Pliny's private letters--which cover nearly aspect of Roman life except warfare--offers a self-contained discussion of each letter or group of associated letters and their rich array of information about the author's social, political, and legal life and times.

This classic text deals with the political development of the Roman citizenship from earliest times to the 4th century A.D. Sherwin-White examines such controversies of the Republican period as those on the limited franchise, the expansion of tribal districts, and the purpose of the Social War. He also looks at the evolution of Latin and Roman municipal status, dual communes, individual grants of citizenship, Italic rights, the status of freedmen, and the effect of the Constitutio Antoniniana.

Sherwin-White examines the literary evidence for racial tension during the Roman Imperial period.