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As I write this, my wife and I are awaiting the imminent arrival of our first child. A natural tendency to find reassurance in research has led me to read a series of modern takes on fatherhood, which have proved of varying value. Imagine my delight, then, when Infancy and Earliest Childhood in the Roman World arrived on my desk. What better source of information? Unsurprisingly, What to Expect When You're Expecting this is not, though I have noted Soranus’ sage advice not to indulge pregnant women's cravings for charcoal or earth (Gyn. 1.15.48; 50). What Maureen Carroll's major new work does offer is the first systematic study of the youngest Romans, those in their first year of life, a topic which – despite the raft of work on the Roman family and life course over the last few decades – still stands in need of a synthesis. As well as evidence-gathering, Carroll's work has a central thesis; that ‘the evidence from archaeology, funerary epigraphy, and material culture marshalled in this study dispels the long-held notion that the very youngest infants were insignificant beings without a social persona whose lives were treated with indifference’ (7). Instead, what Carroll paints is a picture of the first year of life marked by both regular milestones – ‘from the naming day at eight or nine days, the official registration of birth by the thirtieth day, the release from swaddling bands at forty to sixty days, and the beginning of teething at six months, to the achievement of the child's first birthday’ (12) – and ongoing and substantial parental investment.
1 Infancy and Earliest Childhood in the Roman World. ‘A Fragment of Time’. By Carroll, Maureen. Oxford, Oxford University Press, 2018. Pp. 336. 86 b/w illustrations, 8 tables, 2 maps. Hardback £75, ISBN: 978-0-19-968763-3CrossRefGoogle Scholar.
2 Perpetua. Athlete of Gold. By Gold, Barbara. Women in Antiquity. Oxford, Oxford University Press, 2018. Pp. viii + 261. 7 halftones, 3 b/w figures. Hardback £47.99, ISBN: 978-0-19-538545-8CrossRefGoogle Scholar; Zenobia. Shooting Star of Palmyra. By Andrade, Nathanael J.. Women in Antiquity. Oxford, Oxford University Press, 2018. Pp. xvii + 284. 33 illustrations. Hardback £22.99, ISBN: 978-0-19-063881-8Google Scholar.
3 Embracing the Provinces. Society and Material Culture of the Roman Frontier Regions. Essays in Honour of Dr Carol van Driel-Murray. Edited by Ivleva, Tatiana, de Bruin, Jasper, and Driessen, Mark. Oxford and Philadelphia, PA, Oxbow Books, 2018. Pp. xi + 202. 12 colour plates. Hardback £48, ISBN: 978-1-78925-015-2Google Scholar.
4 Insularity and Identity in the Roman Mediterranean. Edited by Kouremenos, Anna. Oxford and Philadelphia, PA, Oxbow Books, 2018. Pp. vi + 208. 59 figures, 4 tables. Paperback £38, ISBN: 978-1-78570-580-9Google Scholar.
5 The Fate of the Ninth. The Curious Disappearance of One of Rome's Legions. By Campbell, Duncan G.. Glasgow, Bocca della Verità Publishing, 2018. Pp. xii + 155. 11 illustrations. Paperback £11.99, ISBN: 978-1-791-76833-1Google Scholar.
6 Nero. Emperor and Court. By Drinkwater, John F.. Cambridge, Cambridge University Press, 2019. Pp. xviii + 449. 11 b/w illustrations, 5 maps, 4 tables. Hardback £32.99, ISBN: 978-1-108-47264-7Google Scholar.
7 The Cambridge Companion to the Age of Nero. Edited by Bartsch, Shadi, Freudenburg, Kirk, and Littlewood, Cedric. Cambridge, Cambridge University Press, 2017. Pp. xx + 402. 40 b/w illustrations, 2 maps. Hardback £78.99, ISBN: 978-1-107-05220-8; paperback £24.99, ISBN: 978-1-107-66923-9CrossRefGoogle Scholar.
8 Drinkwater, John, ‘Nero Caesar and the Half-Baked Principate’, in Gibson, A. (ed.), The Julio-Claudian Succession. Reality and Perception of the ‘Augustan Model’ (Leiden, 2013), 155–73Google Scholar, a prolegomenon for the now-published monograph.
9 Emperors and Usurpers in the Later Roman Empire. Civil War, Panegyric, and the Construction of Legitimacy. Oxford Studies in Byzantium. By Omissi, Adrastos. Oxford, Oxford University Press, 2018. Pp. xix + 348. 6 b/w figures. Hardback £80, ISBN: 978-0-19-882482-4CrossRefGoogle Scholar.