Palatine

The Julio-Claudians were the first imperial dynasty of ancient Rome, founded by the emperor Augustus. Their rule was harsh, and each change of succession brought fresh crisis and the constant danger of civil war. The household finally collapsed in 69 CE, when four rivals fought violently for the throne in the year of four emperors. Yet the years between Augustus and that upheaval were defined more by peace than by conflict, even though they included an invasion of Britain and unrest among Jews in the time of Christ.

Many accounts already cover this family, but Palatine looks at the early empire from a angle its own historians would have preferred to keep hidden. The story is set within the residences on the Palatine hill, which rises at the edge of the ancient Forum. It follows a father and son. Lucius Vitellius, who lived from around 10 BC to AD 51, was a discreet courtier of the kind found in many eras. He spent his life in imperial service and grew steadily more influential through the reigns of Tiberius, Claudius, Caligula and Nero. His son Aulus Vitellius, who lived from AD 12 to 69, briefly held the imperial title, competing against rulers who came before and after him. He became known for appetite, cruel laziness and a dramatic death.

Written in vivid, novelistic prose, the book narrates one of the most consequential half centuries in European history.