Leo T. reviewed The Fate of Rome: Climate, Disease, and the End of an Empire (The Princeton History of the Ancient World) on + 1775 more book reviews
I have not yet read this book but Mitch Jeserich had the author on Letters & Politics today (KPFA 6/10/2019) flogging his book.
Dr. Harper has taken advantage of the information newly derived from ice core samples and the like to offer an argument on why Rome prospered so well from Marcus Aurelius (steady weather i.e. warm and ample rainfall) compared to the relatively problematic 3rd C. (especially because of North Africa not measuring up to its previous grain productivity). Rome was a pre-industrial society but historians still speculate on the reasons it fell and there is interest in applying Rome's circumstances to the 21st C. There is much, much more discussed in the interview....
Dr. Harper has taken advantage of the information newly derived from ice core samples and the like to offer an argument on why Rome prospered so well from Marcus Aurelius (steady weather i.e. warm and ample rainfall) compared to the relatively problematic 3rd C. (especially because of North Africa not measuring up to its previous grain productivity). Rome was a pre-industrial society but historians still speculate on the reasons it fell and there is interest in applying Rome's circumstances to the 21st C. There is much, much more discussed in the interview....
