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Roman citizenship - whatever that ultimately came to mean - did not become universal until well after the Republic's death.

While there is some truth in this, it's an old and all too easy cliché. He shares many authors' prejudices in portraying the Republic as a civil virtue on display while painting the Empire with shades of Oriental despotism. Through it all, though, there is a sense of wonder regarding those traits that made Rome noble and descent - qualities that were passed through a crucible in the warlords' quest for an imperial throne. Holland never shrinks from depicting the gritty side of the late Roman Republic and its chief statesmen.

The author imbues his work with a keen eye for cynical humor, and the quirks of Roman culture are paraded with dripping poignancy. His prose mercifully reads like a novel more than a historical lecture. Tom Holland manages to give a fresh new spin on a very old subject. Rubicon concludes with the peaceful death of Augustus after decades of turbulence. The book then surveys in turn the usual events: The Grachhi Brothers Marius and Sulla and the Mithradates War Cicero and Crassus, Pompei and Caesar, Antony and Octavian. We are then treated to the prophecies of the Sibyl and a looming threat of unrest through the Roman world. The first major event described is the Social War between Rome and its Italian client states. We are then treated to a general survey of the Roman Republic and its mores. The book begins with a short prologue of Julius Caesar's famous hesitation before the now infamous river. It traces the events and characters that sealed the fate of the five hundred year old Republican government. Rubicon surveys the dying decades of the Roman Republic, from the great civil war with Rome's Italian allies to the reign of August Caesar.