Man of High Empire

Pliny the Younger (c. 60-112 C.E.)--senator and consul in the Rome of emperors Domitian and Trajan, eyewitness to the eruption of Vesuvius in 79, and early ''persecutor'' of Christians on the Black Sea--remains Rome''s best documented private individual between Cicero and Augustine. No Roman writer, not even Vergil, ties his identity to the regions of Italy more successfully than Pliny. His indivi...