The Restoration of Rome (Barbarian Popes & Imperial Pretenders) - Peter Heather




I was a bit disappointed with this book. Of course I knew it was not a popular fiction book, but a scientific historic work. The writer did his best to make it as easy to digest as possible. Maybe it could have been done better, certainly not by me.


I was after more knowledge about the start of papism, the first popes and who ruled (western) Europe after the Roman Empire collapsed. I learned about a lot of new people who had power in the (early) middle ages and before that. Names like Zeno, Basilium and so on. I knew about the Visigoths but nothing about Theoderic. And he might be called "The Great" because he managed to be named an emperor. His empire did collaps after he died.

I did know about the Merovingians and the Carolingians, not about how the family of Charlemagne took the power over the Franks. I did know about how part of his empire grew to become "the Holy Roman Empire". It had not a lot in common with the Roman Empire.
Yet this make me finally understand why Hitler decided to become the ruler of "The Third Reich". I can imagine that his dream was to become Emperor of it.

And I wanted to know more about the first Popes, how all of this and the Vatican started.
Writer Peter Heather is more interested in who can claim that he rules because his authority comes straight from God. Is it the Pope or are the Kings and Emperors more entitled to declare this.
It was very surprising to read that the authority of the Pope is merely based on a fake document, The Pseudo Isidore.

I can now see more clearly too that the role of the British Monarch in the Church of England is very peculiar. In no other country is the head of state also the head of the State religion.

I enjoyed a lot of this. Reading about church laws and how they came about was very boring. I understand why the writer has put this in the book, but it almost caused me to put the book away, stop reading.

All in all, if you want to know more about this period in history, this is a good book for that. Not if you are after an easy read. I want to give it 3 stars.

Being an atheist I have my doubts about stating that St.Peter and St.Paul were in Rome. I can imagine that there were Jews dragged to Rome. It is known that slaves can be freed by their Roman masters for whatever reason. They can have been living there with their families for generations. Part of them could have started the sekt that became Christianity in Rome and spread it around the Mediterranean. Just my thoughts about it.

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