This is an excellent study of a key part of Justinian’s reign, and provides a good overview of the wide range of military activities carried out under his rule. As such it adds a great deal to other books that tend to focus on one campaign or one general.

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History of War

Enhanced for academia with the inclusion of a four page Glossary, a twenty page Bibliography, and a nine page Index, "The Wars of Justinian I" is a masterpiece of historical scholarship and is recommended as a core addition to community, college, and university library Roman History collections and supplemental curriculum studies lists.

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Midwest Book Review

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Video review by Dr Alexander Clarke

This is a thorough - and thoroughly footnoted - history of the military and paramilitary conflicts of Justinian I's long reign. The author takes the time to survey the Roman Empire's government, organisation and finances first, noting that these are vital to the prosecution of wars, before providing theatre-by-theatre breakdowns of the conflicts. Broadly speaking, this means the separate analysis of the Persian, African, Italian, Balkan and internal fronts.

The chosen organisation approach has both positives and negatives - for instance, it helps keep the progress of each theatre more contiguous, but made it harder for me to appreciate how simultaneous conflicts were impacting each other. It can also sometimes get a little dry, with a blizzard of often similarly-named men fighting, allying and betraying each other.

Probably the key thing this account brought home was the quicksand-like nature of military alliances and social loyalties during the time. Key figures would often switch sides multiple times, with allies becoming enemies becoming subordinates becoming rebels becoming allies ... it's eye-opening how much impact personal slights and ambitions played in the fates of thousands of people.

NetGalley, Adam Windsor