Well-documented argumentation.

Ancient Warfare, March/April 2018 – reviewed by Korneel Van Lommel, University of Antwerp

I found this book to be very interesting, and enlightening reading. The 21 maps add greatly to understanding the events. I was even motivated to refer to the 3 appendices (Glossary, Outline Chronology, Select Personalities). There are extensive notes and references for those who are delving more deeply.

A fascinating aspect of the period was the invasion from Britain, of Gaul and Spain, and recognition by the Emperor Honorius of the invader as co-Emperor Constantine 111. Lasted only 4 years.

Terrific read. I look forward to reading more of Ian Hughes’ books.

Dr John Viggers, Freelance

As mentioned in

Barnsley Chronicle

A very sound and much-needed biographical addition to the scholarship of late antiquity. Highly recommended.

Despite being half-Vandal, the late Roman generalissimo Flavius Stilicho in striking ways resembled the great men of the Roman Republic far more than the emperors he served. Stilicho rose through the ranks of the army to become the last consul to celebrate a triumph, and when his political enemies succeeded in a coup d'etat, he stoically accepted his execution in dramatic fashion. Hughes eloquently describes the details of this Roma life, and much more besides. His book is both a well-wrought, superbly researched biography and a thorough glimpse into the Roman world at the end of the Western Empire. Hughes deftly describes the cast of characters around Stilicho and the main events of his life, and in several excurses fleshes out his story with excellent details, as when describing the late Roman army and its opponents. If Hughes has a fault, it may be his tendency to follow the panegyric sources a bit too far in tone, although he does make a solid attempt at some revisionist arguments.

Choice Mag