Roman History. The History of Rome from Its Foundation. Book IV

Livy's History of Rome, sometimes referred to as Ab Urbe Condita, is a monumental history of ancient Rome, written in Latin, between 27 and 9 BC. by the historian Titus Livius, or Livy", as he is usually known in English. The work covers the period from the legends concerning the arrival of Aeneas and the refugees from the fall of Troy, to the city's founding in 753, the expulsion of the Kings in 509, and down to Livy's own time, during the reign of the emperor Augustus. The last event covered by Livy is the death of Drusus in 9 BC. About 25% of the work survives.

After the decisive defeat of Hannibal in the Second Punic War (218-201), Rome faced a series of challenges from the East - to emerge as master of the Mediterranean in 167 B.C. It is Livy who, by the sheer power of his historical imagination, creates from the bald and often inaccurate souces an enthralling narrative, full of drama and color, compelling personalities and magnificent oratory. With her triumphs over the heirs of Alexander the Great in the Macedonian Wars, world leadership passed forever from Greece to Rome; and Livy shows us the men, heroic but human, who took part in an epoch-making event.