Greenhill is releasing a new edition of a classic of military history, Peter Connolly's highly regarded and bestselling Greece and Rome at War. The book was first published 18 years ago and has sold many thousands, and been a delight for all interested in the ancient world. It has, however, been out of print for quite a number of years and the high price copies command on the secondhand market attests to the desire of those who have the original edition to keep it. For the new Greenhill edition Peter Connolly has taken advantage of research in the subject area over the years to make a number of small but valuable adjustments. That a new generation is looking forward to the new Greece and Rome at War is evinced by book clubs enthusiastically (two in the United States) committing to taking the book for their members. Because Greece and Rome at War is such a famous book, and Peter Connolly is so well known in the subject area from television and other books we have researched his work. Here is a brief biography of Peter Connolly and his writing career: Peter Connolly began his professional career as an illustrator working in advertising. He went on to illustrate educational books and, believing that it requires more research to illustrate a book well than to write it, decided to write his own books. In 1975 he produced The Roman Army, the fruit of his long standing obsession with Greek and Roman history, particularly its military aspects, which was intended t'or the general market and He followed this up with The Greek Armies and Hannibal and the Enemies of Rome, completing his study of warfare in the classical world. He was also a respected authority, having written numerous articles in addition to his books, on armour, weapons, tactics and battlefield topography. For many years he was deeply involved in the study of Greek, Roman and Celtic weapons in relation to their function and made copies in order to try them out. In 1979 he widened his field with the book Pompeii which was published to coincide with the 1900th anniversary of the eruption of Vesuvius in 79AD. This proved to be his most successful book to date. In 1981 he published Greece and Rome at War, a much more detailed study of ancient warfare. For the book he had done substantial primary research which included studying the sites of all the important Greek and Roman battles. He also drew on years of experience having spent ten years exploring every possible route that Hannibal could have used over the Alps before concluding that he must have used the Montgenevre Pass. The book used illustrative material from The Roman Army and The Armies of Greece with new illustrations, photographs, maps and a completely new text. However, his publisher, Macdonalds, was in financial difficulty and was taken over by Robert Maxwell. Despite excellent reviews Greece and Rome at War was remaindered, also republished as a promotional book, and another project on Caesar's military campaigns was dwnped as 'unlikely to make a profit'. In despair he parted company with Macdonalds. He was invited to move to Oxford University Press, but only to produce educational books. His first book there was The Jews in the Time of Jesus. It met with considerable success in America and Israel, becoming a virtual handbook for guides in Jerusalem, but it was less successful in Britain where it was seen as a religious book that was not. His next book with OUP, The Legend of Odysseus, won the Times Educational Supplement Senior Information Book Award in 1986 and is probably his most successfi~l book. He then returned to military subjects in his two Tiberius Claudius Maximus books, The Legionary and The Cavalryman. His research for the latter involved trying to solve the problem of the Roman saddle from which many leather and bronze pieces survive. The accepted wisdom was that the Romans did not use a true saddle and without stirrups they could only engage in light tactics. Convinced that the experts were wrong and that Roman cavalry tombstones showed real saddles with four horns, Connolly began a series of experiments which, after much frustration, produced a rigid four horned saddle. It was shown to the Roman Military Equipment Conference in 1987, the evidence was reassessed and the reconstruction is now generally accepted. Riding experiments showed that stirrups were unnecessary with such a saddle as the four horns kept the rider in the saddle. The whole concept of Roman cavalry was revolutionised and it is now accepted that they could and did use shock tactics. He recently completed his latest intensely illustrated book The Ancient City which will be published by OUP at the same time as Greece ant Rome at War. The book took him more than five years to complete and is a study of the ancient cities of Athens (500-350BC) and Rome (0-200AD). He has now returned to unfinished business. A revised edition of the sumptuous Greece and Rome at War will be published by Greenhill in March 1998 and he is determined in the light of recent excavations at Caesarian sites to revise and publish his book on Caesar within the next few years. Peter Connolly is a fellow of the Society of Antiquaries and was given an honorary research fellowship at the Institute of Archaeology in 1985. Currently he is writing his doctoral thesis on 'The Colosseum as a functioning amphitheatre' at the Institute of Archaeology in London. Peter Connolly has participated over the years in a number of television programmes. He is perhaps best known for presenting six programmes on the Bible lands some ten years ago on BBC 1. He presented the first two programmes in the Great Commanders series (Caesar and Alexander), and recently appeared on the television programme 1, Caesar. He has also served as advisor to the makers of War Horse, a programme on the history of the war horse which will also appear in 1998. Back to Greenhill Military Book News No. 81 Table of Contents Back to Greenhill Military Book News List of Issues Back to Master Magazine List © Copyright 1998 by Greenhill Books This article appears in MagWeb (Magazine Web) on the Internet World Wide Web. Other military history articles and gaming articles are available at http://www.magweb.com