Michael Scott

Michael Scott's new book is Ancient Worlds: A Global History of Antiquity. From his Q&A with Deborah Kalb:

Q: You divide the book into three sections focusing on politics, war, and religion. How did you decide on the organization of the book?

A: This is the most difficult step with global history – how do you make the story manageable without creating your own artificial boundaries – either temporal or geographical.

To me, these three moments in time – end 6th century BC, 3-2nd century BCE and 4th century CE – seemed to me fascinating moments when all the parts of the ancient world was changing - sometimes independently of one another and sometimes because of one another.

And those moments in time seemed to me to be about different things: politics, warfare and empire building, and religious...[read on]

--Marshal Zeringue