Classics and Greco-Roman Archaeology

From the Bronze Age to the reign of Constantine, the Atlas of Classical History provides a comprehensive series of maps, diagrams, and commentary designed to meet the needs of classical scholars, as well as general readers. Over 135 maps of the Greek and Roman worlds clearly mark the political affiliations of the cities and states, major military events, trade routes, artistic, cultural and industrial centers, and colonization and exploration.

"Before Columbus there was Eratosthenes: 'inventor' of the discipline of geography as it is known today. There was Alexander the Great: the man who sought to reach the very ends of the known world and whose empire spanned three continents. And there was Strabo: author of the Geographica, a 17-volume encyclopedia of geographical knowledge which expounded the definition, history and mathematics of geography. Roller offers a comprehensive account of these, and the many other, ancient pioneers and the frontiers that defined their world.".

""This volume offers a detailed study of Ptolemy of Alexandria's Geographical Guide, whose eight books contain a wealth of geographical information unavailable elsewhere and represent the culmination of the Greco-Roman discipline of geography. Written near the middle of the second century AD, the Geographical Guide is the most anomalous of the surviving works of ancient geographical scholarship but offers a vivid record of the expansion of geographical knowledge in antiquity."

"This pioneering volume is the first full-length study to explore the emergence of classical geography and its role in both the geographical and classical traditions."

"Explores the beginnings and development of geographical ideas in Classical antiquity and demonstrates technical methods for describing landscape, topographies and ethnographies. The survey relies on a variety of sources: philosophical and scientific texts but also poems and travelogues; papyrological remains and visual monuments."

"Dilke follows the development of map-making skills, beginning in Babylonia and Egypt, through the contributions of Greek scientists and Roman administrators and surveyors, to the Age of Discovery. He provides examples of the full range of Greek and Roman maps, including town and building plans, itineraries and road maps, sea itineraries, and maps in art form."