The Eagle (of the Ninth) & Roman Military Studies

At long last, on YouTube, the trailer for the forthcoming film The Eagle, based on Rosemary Sutcliff's classic novel The Eagle of the Ninth. Now we just have to wait until February to see the film itself. Comments so far seem dominated by the (questionable) acting abilities of the star, Channing Tatum, who plays Marcus Aquila*. I'm more interested in how faithful the film is to the novel, although really bad acting by the star might just sink it.

*LatinGeek note: full marks to whoever is responsible for Aquila being pronounced correctly.

I've recently discovered History of the Ancient World, a splendid source of academic articles about the ancient world. There are frequent headsy-upsies on Twitter (@historyancient). The website appears to make freely available articles from a few years ago that were first published in learned journals not accessible to non-academics. Anyway, there's one from 2002 by Simon James about Roman military studies in Britain which I found riveting.

There's quite a lot at the beginning about the development of Roman military studies in Britain during the 20th century, including the rivalry between historians and archaeologists (fascinating in a not-very-edifying way), and how changing attitudes to the study of war and violence have influenced Roman military studies. But the most interesting part is later on, where we get to more recent developments and the question is asked: Was there such ever such an entity as The Roman Army? And the author makes a startling comparison between the Roman military and the Georgian Royal Navy (he could have been writing that just for me, as both fascinate me). Read on...

Writing the Legions: The Development and Future of Roman Military Studies in Britain by Simon James. Archaeological Journal, Vol. 159 (2002)

Funny Stuff and Bookish Snippets

An Archbishop of Canterbury Tale from Iowahawk.

That "wickedly subversive" Cambridge don, Mary Beard, reveals her next writing project: What Made The Romans Laugh.

What makes historians think they're qualified to write historical fiction? Joel Rickett in The Guardian reports that increasing numbers of academics are doing just that.

James Holland, The Burning Blue and A Pair of Silver Wings
Alison Weir, Innocent Traitor, The Lady Elizabeth
Simon Sebag Montefiore, Sashenka (Perhaps he got some handy tips from wife Santa Montefiore, who writes historical romances)
Katie Hickman, The Aviary Gate
Stella Tillyard, famous for the bestselling Aristocrats, has sold two historical novels, the first of which will be published in 2010.

Perhaps it's because the most popular historical non-fiction these days is being written by historians who know how to tell a good story with vividly drawn characters and convincing settings. As long as they resist the temptation to weigh down their fiction with a burden of historical detail, they should add greatly to the gaiety of (reading) nations. Which is more than can be said for this recent crop of hapless historicals (unless the reviewer is one of those snooty types who thinks historical fiction is all rather rubbish).

And then of course there's the mega-selling Philippa Gregory who has a history degree and published her first historical novel around the same time as she got her PhD in 18th-century literature. Here she is in The Times on how her novel The Other Boleyn Girl got the Hollywood treatment.