Routledge Classical Translations provides scholars and students with accurate, modern translations of key texts that illuminate distinctive aspects of the classical world and come from a range of periods, from early Greece to the Byzantine empire. Volumes include thematic groupings of texts, texts from important authors as well as texts from the Byzantine period that are relevant for the study of the classical world but which remain inaccessible. Each volume has accompanying notes and commentary that provide a solid framework for deeper understanding of the material. As well as providing translations of significant texts, the series makes available material that is untranslated into English or difficult to access, and places these texts within new contexts to open-up areas of study and support research.
By Lionel Scott
September 25, 2023
Pytheas of Massalia (Marseille), mariner, explorer, geographer and astronomer, made a pioneering voyage into the then unknown Atlantic around 325 BC, reaching Britain and the Baltic; this book collects and translates the references to him and his book (which is lost), and discusses and explains ...
By Richard Stoneman
May 31, 2023
This book provides a new translation of all the surviving portions of the description of India written by Megasthenes in about 310 BCE, the fullest account of Indian geography, history and customs available to the classical world. The Indica was a pioneering work of ethnography that ...
By Stephen T. Newmyer
January 09, 2023
This volume offers a new translation of Plutarch’s three treatises on animals—On the Cleverness of Animals, Whether Beasts Are Rational, and On Eating Meat—accompanied by introductions and explanatory commentaries. The accompanying commentaries are designed not only to elucidate the meaning of the...
By Duane W. Roller
November 10, 2021
This volume is a translation and commentary on the works of three geographers from Greco-Roman antiquity: Hanno of Carthage, from around 500 BC; the author of the Periodos Dedicated to King Nikomedes, from the last half of the second century BC; and Avienus, from the fourth century AD. The modern ...
By Curtis Hutt
March 31, 2021
This volume offers a new translation of the Pseudo-Clementine family narrative here known as The Sorrows of Mattidia. It contains a full introduction which explores the obscured origins of the text, the plot, and main characters, and engages in a comparison of the portrayal of pagan, Jewish, and ...
By Silvia Montiglio
May 12, 2020
This book offers a new English translation of Musaeus' poem Hero and Leander, with the original Greek on the facing page, a substantial introduction and a detailed commentary. The tragic romance of Hero and Leander has had and still has a great appeal, inspiring countless writers, painters, ...
By Anthony Kaldellis
December 12, 2019
The survival of ancient Greek historiography is largely due to its preservation by Byzantine copyists and scholars. This process entailed selection, adaptation, and commentary, which shaped the corpus of Greek historiography in its transmission. By investigating those choices, Kaldellis enables a ...
By Thomas Banchich
December 12, 2019
The Lost History of Peter the Patrician is an annotated translation from the Greek of the fragments of Peter’s History, including additional fragments which are now more often considered the work of the Roman historian Cassius Dio's so-called Anonymous Continuer. Banchich’s annotation helps clarify...
By Lloyd Llewellyn-Jones, James Robson
August 28, 2012
Towards the end of the fifth century BC Ctesias of Cnidus wrote his 23 book History of Persia. Ctesias is a remarkable figure: he lived and worked in the Persian court and, as a doctor, tended to the world’s most powerful kings and queens. His position gave him special insight into the workings of ...
By Thomas Banchich, Eugene Lane
October 13, 2011
While an exile from Constantinople, the twelfth-century Byzantine functionary and canonist John Zonaras culled earlier chronicles and histories to compose an account of events from creation to the reign of Alexius Comnenus. For topics where his sources are lost or appear elsewhere in more ...
By Patricia A. Rosenmeyer
March 13, 2006
The first referenece to letter writing occurs in the first text of western literature, Homer's Iliad. From the very beginning, Greeks were enthusiastic letter writers, and letter writing became a distinct literary genre. Letters were included in the works of historians but they also formed the ...
By Brian Campbell
October 28, 2004
Brian Campbell has selected and translated a wide range of pieces from the ancient military writers who tell us about the technical aspects of military practice and the management of armies. The pieces cover a fascinating range of topics - battle formations and manoeuvres, different types of troops...