Beyond the Empire: Rome and the Church from Constantine to Charlemagne

Rating:
Summary: An intriguing title: a tedious book
Review: This slim book attempts a history of Europe focused on the Western Church during the five centuries from the Emperor Constantine to Charlemagne. After reading the first five chapters I set the book aside. Those five chapters include a confusing array of names of emperors, popes, bishops, Latin poets, Greek philosophers, Roman senators and their dinner guests, often with little explanantion of their significance for the story. Political forces, military campaigns and theological disputes are all identified, but if the author has sorted out how they all worked together to shape the history of the period he has failed to convey any clarity to the reader. Social trivia seem to be given equal weight in his account with the succession of emperors and popes, disputes between secular and papal authority, and conciliar articulations of the nature of the Trinity. The author quotes extensively from contemporary sources without identifying the sources -- there are no footnotes -- nor, in most cases, are the sources listed in the scant bibliography of mainly secondary works. To add to these problems, the author's style is turgid: the book cries out for an editor. I found the first five chapters a tedious read without any profit and have decided to donate my copy to the trash collector.

Rating:
Summary: An intriguing title: a tedious book
Review: This slim book attempts a history of Europe focused on the Western Church during the five centuries from the Emperor Constantine to Charlemagne. After reading the first five chapters I set the book aside. Those five chapters include a confusing array of names of emperors, popes, bishops, Latin poets, Greek philosophers, Roman senators and their dinner guests, often with little explanantion of their significance for the story. Political forces, military campaigns and theological disputes are all identified, but if the author has sorted out how they all worked together to shape the history of the period he has failed to convey any clarity to the reader. Social trivia seem to be given equal weight in his account with the succession of emperors and popes, disputes between secular and papal authority, and conciliar articulations of the nature of the Trinity. The author quotes extensively from contemporary sources without identifying the sources -- there are no footnotes -- nor, in most cases, are the sources listed in the scant bibliography of mainly secondary works. To add to these problems, the author's style is turgid: the book cries out for an editor. I found the first five chapters a tedious read without any profit and have decided to donate my copy to the trash collector.