When I read Emma Southon’s A Fatal Thing Happened on the Way to the Forum I was pleased by the way Southon’s immense understanding of the available primary and secondary sources historians have available to work from regarding Roman history impact the ways in which we can know anything at all about things that happened so long ago. That same nuance in explaining the sources – and how much they can or cannot be trusted – is utilized to great degree in A Rome of One’s Own as Southon begins the process of putting women back into the story of Rome’s history.
Southon, as it were, is doing battle with what we know in the past two hundred years as the Great Man theory, but has been invading our historical documentation for well over 2,500 years. This sort of focus on cultural and social history is wherein many (such as me) believe is the actual work of history. Putting people back into the narrative and focusing on what can be learned in the gaps about regular people leading regular lives is crucial to making history real and relevant.
Southon’s strong authorial voice, which I loved in A Fatal Thing Happened on the Way to the Forum, is on display here as well, to great effect. Since she is no longer hampered by what is acceptable in academic writing, Southon’s sense of humor is allowed to shine through, making her insights even more accessible to her audience. So, the reader is introduced to Southon’s favorite sources and gets to go along a many century and thousands of mile adventure across the landscape of Rome using the women traditionally left out of the tale to tell us more about the details and nuances that exist to be learned focusing on how life functioned for these women, and what that means for the larger story.
