What Was a Roman Emperor’s Daily Life Like? | With Mary Beard 

I love hearing Mary Beard - she is so knowledgeable and puts things across in such an enthusiastic and easy to understand manner. No pretensions nor pomposity. Wish she’d been one of my lecturers.

I can never get enough of listening to Mary Beard. My knowledge of ancient Rome has increased exponentially thanks to her.

Do I feel like a history video about Roman emperors? Meh. Do I feel like listening to Mary Beard talk about Roman emperors? ALWAYS.

I absolutely love Mary Beard. She's so passionate when she talks about ancient Rome and I've learned so much. Mary Beard is a treasure.

Simply a BRILLIANT discussion. I’m no expert, but I love history. Mary Beard has made me think about this era of history in new ways. We cannot relate to the average Roman or subject of the Empire in some far-flung region. We forget… There was no television. There was no mass media. Not even newspapers. The change in emperors could have barely registered a blip on the lives of most people. We get to size up our leaders on a daily basis. But ancient citizens of this empire barely knew more than what they saw on coins.

I could listen to Mary Beard talk about the Romans all day. Thanks HH for presenting this interesting talk.

Mary Beard is AMAZING!!!! I just purchased my 1st Mary Beard book. Her fund of knowledge is wide and deep. She's a national treasure.

Having seen Mary Beard's documentaries on the Roman world, her lectures and discussions on RU-vid throughout the years, it has been such a pleasure to see her again talking about the Empire and Emperors. It has been too long and it is such a delight to hear again as usual in an in depth discussion about the meaning of Emperor. Bravo!

She is a wonder and a great orator. She makes the mundane unmundane. Her passion comes through and makes you impassioned.

What a great contribution she has made by making ancient Rome accessible to everyone interested.

I haven't thought about the Roman Empire all day. Thanks, History Hit.

I found a Mary Beard book at the Dollar Tree, “How We Look”. Amazing look and as a History buff it was a true find! She deserves all the accolades she receives!

Love Mary! She would be the ultimate tour guide for a tour of Italy.

Love Mary Beard. She presents her subject in an easy to understand, approachable way instead of a dry droning lecture. I also appreciate her humor.

Always a pleasure, never a chore. Mary's teachings are always eagerly anticipated by myself. Just visited Amaz' and purchased 'Emperor of Rome'. Brilliant deal!!! Thanks Mary and Tristan.

Mary is such a lovely human being AND she has worked so hard to get where she is, to educate the public and to give like-minded people an appreciation for history and why it’s important to our existence today. If I could invite people to run my life from a board of directors, I would to have Mary as director!

I can listen to Mary Beard for hours and hours, I can’t have enough of her knowledge of the ancient world ❤

Isn’t Mary Beard so great to listen to. 👌🏻

Very few broadcasters, immediately draw my attention, but Mary does each time, she never disappoints ❤️

Any time I see a video with Mary Beard I watch it more than once. By far one of my VERY favourite historians. We are quite lucky to be able to listen to her speak on Roman History

Mary is fantastic! I love how she articulates and presents history 😍 Thank you 👍

Mary Beard. Perfect! Engaging, interesting, knowledgeable, bloody fantastic. More of her please, keep it coming!

The Tiktok challenge shouldn't be just to ask someone how often they think about the Roman Empire, it should be to simply ask them " Do you know who Mary Beard is?" Their answer will tell you all u need to know 😊

Mary is always so interesting to listen to, I’d love to hear more from her on your channel’

Love Mary Beard, she got me into Roman history 10yrs ago

I love Mary Beard. The ancient world needs Mary Beard.

I absolutely love Mary Beard 💗 she's so enthusiastic and I love everything she does

Mary... A grand Lass, amazing Teacher, and a lovely lovely Soul... You can't imagine how much I appreciate you...❤

put Mary Beard on whenever you want. the minutiae of her scholarship will always draw me in. the little popping noise that accompanied the appearance of the imperial visages was quite amusing.

Mary Beard I LOVE LISTENING TO YOU TALK ABOUT ROME. Alllll day I could. Thank you.

I wish Mary would make so many more videos on Rome. She really brings it to life.

Mary Beard irreplaceable living treasure of history. Somehow a portal between ancient Rome and today’s world. Each question in the interview you can see her eyes focus to fully comprehend the it, and simultaneously scan a vast library to conjure a perfect example from history and paint a picture with words. Genius.

A wonderful scholar and a superb communicator. Her passion and enthusiasm shines through.

IIRC it was Witold Rodzinski in The Walled Kingdom who remarked that in Chinese history, the first Emperor of a dynasty was always remembered as a wonderful person, while the last one was always a monster. The British equivalent is Shakespeare's portrayal of Richard III. Just like those Chinese historians, Shakespeare knew which side his bread was buttered.

Masterly and so insightful as usual from the wonderful Mary Beard! She is always worth listening to!

Many thanks dear Lady.../ I always love your captivating indepth scrutiny into Ancient Rome... Best regards from Bucarest ROMANIA 💐🤗🌹

Mary is wonderful. So estute, so understandible, so interesting and WITHOUT any presumptions or academic pomposity. Where was she when I was in school? :-)

I like what Mary has to say on the Romans watch all of her programmes in the past, a very knowledgeable person keep the good work up.

Her enthusiasm is contagious in all she does

The great Mary Beard! Lovely woman, always a pleasure to listen to her!

As Prof Beard said about the formation (and maintenance of its power) of Rome: ‘We don’t really know why, because everyone around them was making war.’ I suspect that what made Rome so powerful was its engineering- especially how it was taken on by the military. I also suspect that the standardisation of the Roman way of life was based on their engineering. Eg. Towns made one day’s march on a ‘Roman road’ away from each other; towns being built to a basic Roman architectural layout - forum, marketplace etc. Water works, drainage of swamps, harbours, houses… Roman engineering shaping its culture and power maintenance.

I would certainly love to sit at a dinner table with Mary Beard - I could listen to her all day. 🙂

"The Empire produced the Emperors, rather than the Emperors gaining the Empire." What a fascinating point, and one I'd never realized. It did eventually require a massive civil war to concentrate the power (political, military and social/religious/civic) in the hands of an individual following the diffusion of power (nominally) following the mythological overthrow of the Ancient Kings of Rome. Regardless of how you slice it the great Imperia of Rome, won following the 2nd and 3rd Punic Wars primarily, existed for quite some time before the concept of the Princeps (which wasn't exactly an Emperor initially) even existed.

Mary Beard is my hero! I need that book!!!

“Displaying their modesty “ … reminds me of the threatening line spoken by Commodus in Gladiator “Am I not merciful?” … really puts the Mary’s words into context … she’s is a wonderful historian and presenter ! Wonderful interview.

Yes please, more with Mary Beard. Tfsharing ❤

Mary is a great listen, wonderful time.

Thanks again History Hit for another awsome episode! 😃☑

Love Mary Beard. She's one of ky favorite history teacher. I loved her Roman History lesson. ❤️👏

I love Mary Beard 😍 So passionate about Rome. Brilliant ❤

Intresting and as insightfull as ever Mary Beard at her best . I like how she almost gossip's about these people as if they live down her road which makes it so relatable and yes she dose know a lot about them ..... brillant !

Great informative chat with Mary Beard! The adverts are so often though 😢

A wonderful historical coverage video about the Roman empire with an informative introduction of political circumstances and political system mobilized..her knowledgeable introducing was most exciting...thank you (history Hit) channel for sharing

Brilliant! After this interview, I have just added one of her books to my amazon shop cart.

I love Mary Beard, best historian ever.

I love Mary Beard! I wish I heard more from her, she’s at the top of my ‘who would you invite dead or living’.

I love Western history. It's history's greatest culture and people.

Mary Beard is a national treasure ❤

BRILLIANT! TY!!

Mary’s observation that institutions and rhetoric remains while the real power is shifting is so acute… It certainly applies to the present as well

I think of Rome daily and so does Mary Beard.

Mary!!!! Thank you

Good job as always from Tristan.

Sweet! Mary is terrific ❤

I'm a very naïve person because I was brought up and surrounded by absolutely good, honest and upright people (relatives and family friends alike). What I have formulated for myself over the years is that the most efficient way of flattery - and self-aggrandisement at the same time to people with an inclination to it - is telling the truth in a carefully phrased, timed and dosed manner. Now, that will invaribaly show people's weakness and exactly where that lies (pun there).

My favourite analogy is when I told a friend that he and his siblings were so different from one another He said ‘we are like the fingers of one hand’ which I think you could apply to Roman emperors

Mary is so engaging. I would have loved to be a student of hers.

I think it would be fun to have a drink with Dr. Beard

Love Mary

My favourite historian 👍

The iberian peninsula has 6 to 9 native languages depending how you count them: Galician (the language Portuguese originates from and sometimes considered different languages sometimes considered dialectal forms of each other) then you have Asturo-Leonese, Castillian -the language of the kingdom of Castille that now most people call Spanish as it was the language sponsered by the monarchy and Spanish state and pushed out the other languages, some to the point of near extinction. Then you have Aragonese and Catalan that sometimes gets divided into proper catalan and Valencian. In the Pyrenees area you have a small area that speaks Aranes or Aranese. This is a dialect of Occitan, the native language of southern France. Finaly you have Basque. This is one of the most interesting languages of Europe as it has no known or at least proven relatives and is almost certainly the direct descendent of at least one of the languages spoken in Iberia before it was invaded by Rome (who called it the province of Hispania). It is actually very likely the direct descendent of a language that was spoken before the indo-european invasions that brought the indo-european language family into Europe (a large family that goes from Portuguese and Irish Gaelic in the far west of Europe to Hindi in northern India in the East, including persian, english, greek, etc)

I love Mary Beard been a fan of hers for years.

The study of the fall of the Roman Republic is so important. You went from a state that was violently opposed to one man rule to one that embraced it for hundreds of years. I never quite thought of it that the empire produced the emperors. It was almost an organic process. The state was trying to govern itself, and so created the emperors.

I like this a lot........from across the pond, hello for Houston, Texas

Exellent discussion

The timing of this upload 👌

I lover Mary Beard, I have one of her books

Hi Mary. Love your work 👍

This was great

She takes us there!!!!

She is amazing, love her.

Marvellous! Good ole Shropshire lass!!

Mary - I'm desperate to find the Latin and Greek text for Q Sulpicius Maximus. Loved your Being Roman podcast, and thought I might look at it with my adult Greek and Latin classes. Images of it on the internet are no good at all! Could you possibly help please? multas gratias!

26:05 inviting a lot of Roman tops to dinner? sounds like my kind of dinner

I adore Mary. Classical Studies student here. Wish I had her! She sounds a bit sick. I hope she’s ok. By the way, I would love all those books!

I just got this on recommendations. I will watch it later. Thumbs up. Mary is the history teacher you wished you had, in a disinterested secondary girls school in a working class Northern town. What did the Romans do for us? The first time I heard Caligula was in The Smiths Song, Heaven Knows I Miserable Now. Lol.

Are those Mary’s bookshelves ? Worth studying on their own !

How I wish I'd read and listened to Mary Beard BEFORE traipsing around Rome and Northern Italy, I think I would have gained even more from what was already quite an experience... ah well

it is difficult to know by the titling if this is new or watched before. I hate to miss any, but I find myself rewatching too, then I don't want to click and begin again

i love Mary...^^

I want to sit in a history lecture with her!

She’s Fab!

I love the latest conclusion: Augustus' daughter wasn't banished for immortality. She was banished because Augustus found out she was plotting to kill him.

The Roman imperial system was all about maintaining business as usual: conquering new territories to tax and exploit economically, imprisoning slaves to maintain productive activities in Roman cities and rural estates, keeping soldiers active and plundering resources to pay for military campaigns and pay for public construction in Rome and conquered territories, preserve existing trade routes and create new trade routes. A peaceful Roman empire was not possible. When it renounced military aggression or became unable to sustain it, Rome declined until it disappeared. The emperor's role was not to invent a new system but to ensure the functioning of the existing system.

Love her

Very useful to learn from the PAST../ help us a lot to better understand today humanity../ Regarding Roman Empire... Well... No matter which person was at a very point Emperor, all of them Did the same thing: To preserve Roman Empire .... All Empires do the same...

someone get poor Dr. Beard a handkerchief!

Another good example is Buonaparte... Authocracy& Military together for One Man Show... No matter the costs../ for Little PEOPLE!

She's my hero

I watched this entire video ad-free against RU-vid ToS.