Rule Britannia, northern pearl of the empire

Of all of the provinces of the Roman Empire perhaps none has generated such a wealth of new literature in the past 30 years as Britannia. One of the most prolific authors of this literary cascade must be the writer of this history, which plans to give a modern authoritative account of the province combining both textual and archaeological evidence.

Guy de la Bédoyère is well known from television's Time Team , and it is presumably at this market that his book is directed, although it would certainly be neither charitable nor correct to say that it would not be of interest to all levels of those captivated by the Roman era.

The author attempts to draw together the many strands of recent work on Roman Britain, criticising previously published surveys of the province that have contained contributions by a selection of specialists in the field but lacking an overall perspective. I would disagree with his claim that it is commonplace for such specialists to know little or anything beyond their immediate Roman campus. Without such knowledge, especially in the arts, one really could not claim to be a specialist. De la Bédoyère's greatest asset is his attention to original texts and his knowledge of Latin, which, as he quite correctly claims, is nowadays often lacking. Ancient authors and inscriptions contain a wealth of information that we disregard at our peril.

The first three chapters concentrate on retelling the history of Britannia from the Iron Age up to AD410. This is a lucid account drawing on British epigraphic evidence. The remainder focus on various aspects of life in the province with chapters such as "Governing Britain", "Towns in Roman Britain" and "People and places of Roman Britain". The latter is arguably the most interesting and novel in the book, with particularly memorable sections on longevity, disease and health in Britannia.

The final chapter, "The aftermath", is an able and useful extension of Britannia into the sub-Roman world. From a basic architectural point of view, one wonders if Diocletian's Draconian decrees trapping artisans and their heirs into their trades ultimately resulted in such skills as making mortar becoming so specialist that any widespread epidemic might have deprived Britain of the knowledge and ability to repair or build anew.

The text incorporates much new archaeology and is a useful round-up as such. De la Bédoyère's reconstructions and interpretation of buildings are not always easy to agree with, however. His claim that the two seemingly outwardly identical buildings at Bradford on Avon were both houses ignores the fact that one was obviously constructed as a place for conducting agricultural processes and perhaps slave accommodation and completely lacked the domestic refinements of its neighbour.

The book is peppered with 23 "topic boxes". These variably sized sections cover subjects such as Hadrian's Wall and the cult of Mithras. Surrounded by terracotta lines, they are quite separate from the main text but are often included on the same page. I found the arrangement unnecessary and distracting when reading the main text and felt that they could either have been more happily incorporated in the text or placed at the end of each chapter.

De la Bédoyère seems uneasy in his knowledge of Roman iconography. The season captioned as "Autumn" at Lullingstone Villa is in fact Summer, with corn in her hair, and the curiously old-fashioned notion on pages 214-215 that the "astronomer" figure from the main reception room at Brading was intended to be the owner, when it was clearly abstracted from the famous group of the Seven Sages, is bizarre. Likewise, the equation of the Medusa head from the temple at Bath with Oceanus ignores the fact that the image has the traditional Gorgon wings in its hair and is paralleled in its moustaches by at least two other carvings in the province, as well as being labelled as that in the plate on page 236.

The illustrations in the volume are both attractive and well chosen. I was particularly pleased to see the remarkable Meonstoke facade illustrated in colour, and new inscriptions such as that from Southwark and the inscription to Viridios at Ancaster also given the same treatment.

De la Bédoyère set himself the task of combining the knowledge of many specialisms in one volume. That he has not quite succeeded here is not altogether surprising, as the task is an onerous one. It is, however, a useful introduction to Roman Britain and certainly a visually attractive one.

Anthony Beeson is art librarian, Bristol Art Library/Archivist Association for Roman Archaeology.