Combining a crime story with a complex and at times unlovely historical background is not easy, but I present my (very personal) top five classic Roman crime fiction series, (illustrated, fairly randomly, with some of the photos I’ve just rediscovered after a massive sort out).
Beginning with “The King’s Gambit” this lively series focuses on the extremely posh Decius Caecilius Metellus, who belongs to a family at the heart of Roman politics. The events of the last fifty years of the Roman Republic are depicted with pace and humour, and Decius’ brand of empire-weary cynicism fits the era perfectly
The Bocca della Verità, or mouth of truth, possibly a Roman drain cover, currently in the wall of Santa Maria in Cosmedin, Rome
Saylor sets his series in the same era as Roberts, but his hero is the middle-class and philosophical Gordianus. We see the young lawyer Cicero climbing his way to the top, as Gordianus first works for him as an investigator then observes him as an increasingly distant acquaintance. Gordianus is employed by some of the highest in Roman society and he isn’t impressed by most of them.
The pons Fabricius, built in the first century BCE
In his book “Ovid”, Wishart created a scion of the noble Corvinus clan, an idle lad-about-town, Marcus, who lives at the start of the first century. Marcus has seen the rise of the emperor Tiberius and wants nothing to do with politics, but he can’t seem to avoid being drawn into some very dodgy conspiracies, and a deliciously evil empress Livia features in several of the early tales.
Falco is a lower-class Roman from the unfashionable end of the Aventine, with a family of interfering mother and sisters, dodgy father and useless brothers-in-law. Under the Emperor Vespasian in the seventies AD, Falco is an informer, the nearest thing Rome had to a modern private eye. It’s not a popular profession, but Falco himself is a very well-drawn and interesting character.
Downie’s hero Ruso works as an army doctor when we first meet him in “Medicus”. The series is mostly set in Britannia but occasionally moves further afield, as Ruso introduces his slave-girl, and later wife, Tilla to the delights of Gaul and even Rome itself. Ruso and Tilla are superb characters and Ruso’s medical and army background is used to great effect.
Thin sheets of marble jazz up a brick house in Ostia !
And if you get through all of these, for Roman Britain fans, I recommend Jane Finnis while Caroline Lawrence’s Roman Mysteries are a good introduction for younger readers. And then you can move on to the world of Ancient Greece…
Street in Pompeii with you-know-what in the background…
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Great list Fiona!
Agreed. I was so sad when I read the last SPQR book, because I knew there weren't any more. And who doesn't love Falco?