Guy S. für UNRV: Dr. Galassi, how did you become interested in the study of paleopathology (the study of ancient diseases in man and animals)? More specifically, what inspired you to reevaluate the health of Julius Caesar?

...continue to the interview with Francesco Galassi!

Thanks @guy and Francesco

...continue to the interview with Waller R. Newell

p.s. This is an amazing interview, i dont think we ever had an author that gave an interview with over 4.000 words. Thanks so much to caldrail for the fantastic questions and the author for the fantastic answers!

Ian Hughes for UNRV: Today we have the distinct pleasure to interview noted author and historian Professor Jonathan Harris about his latest book The Lost World of Byzantium.

UNRV: The first question to ask concerns your research interests. On the Royal Holloway website it states that these lie in “Byzantine History 900-1460; relations between Byzantium and the west, especially during the Crusades and the Italian Renaissance; the Greek diaspora after 1453”. What made you focus on the Byzantine Empire rather than on the Crusades which appear to have remained far more popular amongst Western historians?

...continue to the Interview with Jonathan Harris on The Lost World of Byzantium

...continue to the Interview with Philip Matyszak on The Servant of Aphrodite

Many thanks to Tom Holland and Philip Matyszak

UNRV: First of all congratulations on Dynasty - it is a great read. What inspired you to write the book?

Tom Holland: My first book on ancient history, Rubicon, covered the fall of the Roman Republic, and I was eager to take the story forward the moment I had finished it. My publishers, though, were keen to see me explore other areas of interest, and so it was only after I had written histories of the Persian Wars, Western Europe in the 10th and 11th centuries, and the rise of Islam, that I finally returned to the 1st century BC, and the mutation of the Roman Republic into an autocracy....

...continue to the Interview with Tom Holland on Dynasty

....this is the most epic interview we ever done, many thanks to all authors and Thomas A. Timmes for conducting the interview!

Today, we are extremely fortunate to present an interview with all seven distinguished authors of A Year of Ravens. Each of the authors answers the same seven questions, and, in the process, reveals their personality, wit, and knowledge. I think you will enjoy this!

...continue to the full interview of the authors of A Year of Ravens

UNRV: Hello Steven, why don’t you tell us a little bit about yourself and how you got interested in ancient history...

...continue to thehttp://www.unrv.com/book-review/interview-steven-saylor.php interview with Steven Saylor

UNRV Hello Nick, why don’t you tell us a little bit about yourself and how you got interested in Roman history?
Nick Brown : Hi, I’m a teacher by trade. I taught history and English for a decade before becoming a full-time writer. My degree is actually in modern history and it was only when I began to consider writing historical fiction that I focused on the Romans. I knew very little about the era and had to educate myself quickly – largely through reading a hell of a lot of textbooks....

....continue to the full interview with Nick Brown

Unrv.com: Thank you for joining us, Mr. Iggulden. Please tell us how your interest in writing developed. How and when did you decide to write your first book?

Conn Iggulden: I started writing novels at the age of thirteen, as far as I can remember. In potential publishing terms, they had the drawback of being rubbish, but I kept writing and became better at it.

Unrv.com: You have spent several years as an english teacher, correct? How did you come about to set your first novel in ancient Rome, had Shakespeare (Julius Caesar) anything to do with it?

Conn Iggulden: Not really. My mother was a history teacher, so I was brought up on all the good stories of history, like Charles I wearing two shirts on the morning of his execution, so no one would see him shiver and think he was afraid. For me, history is all about good stories, but there was an element of sheer luck in coming across Julius Caesar. I knew the Shakespeare play fairly well, but I didn't know much about his youth

UNRV Hello Alex, why don’t you tell us a little bit about yourself and how you got interested in Roman history?
Alex Johnston: I’ve worked in finance and technology most of my career, and have always been interested in history – ancient history primarily, and Roman history primarily primarily. Not sure how it happened, to be honest with you. It was just always the case for as long as I can remember. In Caesar’s Lictor, I have Pompey riding Crassus about how old he is. Well, I’m the same age, more or less, and thinking about retiring. So I thought it would be fun to do something with that interest as sort of a post-retirement gig. The extra $1.50 or so per month that I expect to earn should really come in handy...

...continue to the Interview with Alex Johnston

UNRV Hello Josho, why don’t you tell us a little bit about yourself and how you got interested in ancient history?
Josho Brouwers:Actually, I started with an interest in palaeontology, back when I was a child. We moved around a bit, and one of the houses we lived in (back in France), in the early 80s, had a driveway with loads of pebbles and other small stones, including fossils. I spent hours looking for fossils there and that probably started me down the path of exploring the past. My interest in invertebrates switched to dinosaurs and reptiles. At some point, though, I decided that humans were perhaps more interesting, and I actually arrived at the ancient world via medieval history and an interest during my earlier teenage years in Arthurian legend (with a heavy focus on medieval Dutch, French, and English literature). It wasn’t until late in high school that I really decided that I wanted to become an archaeologist and study the ancient past, and my first year at university was important in narrowing down my interest to ancient Greece in particular.

....continue to the full interview with Josho Brouwers

Philip Matyszak aka "Maty": Thank you for taking the time to do this interview with us. Antony and Cleopatra is a very substantial book, and perhaps the first question to ask is why you decided to tell the story in the first place. So, why Antony and Cleopatra?

Adrian Goldsworthy, aka "Adrian": Firstly because the history of Antony and Cleopatra continues the story which I finished in Caesar: Life of a Colossus. So in a way, this was a logical next step. What drew me to this story was the same thing as I found so interesting about Caesar. I wanted to see how much of the story stood up to close examination, and while I was doing that I could understand more about the two of them [Antony and Cleopatra] and the dramatic changes that were happening in their world....

....read the full interview with Adrian Goldsworthy

...continue to the Interview with Alan Cameron

...read the full interview with Russell Whitfield

Interviewed by Ursus

Dr. Philip Matyszak holds a degree from St. John's College, Oxford. He teaches an e-learning course on Ancient Rome at Cambridge University. "Maty" has authored numerous books, many of which have been reviewed at UNRV. He is a "patrician" on the UNRV forums and regularly interacts with its members.He graciously agreed to be interviewed in reference to his newest book, The Greek and Roman Myths. Jeremy Baer ("Ursus") conducted the interview for UNRV...

...to the interview with Dr. Philip Matyszak

Interviewed by Philip Matyszak

Adrienne Mayor is an independent folklorist/historian of science who investigates natural knowledge contained in pre-scientific myths and oral traditions. Adrienne Mayor is currently a visiting scholar in classics and history of science at Stanford University. She is the author of The First Fossil Hunters, Greek Fire, Poison Arrows, and Scorpion Bombs and The Poison King: The Life and Legend of Mithradates.

...to the Interview with Adrienne Mayor

...to the interview with Adrian Goldsworthy

Caroline Lawrence Interview