Pliny the Elder's natural history

the long version

"The most important surviving encyclopedia from the ancient world, Pliny the Elder's Natural History is unparalleled as a guide to the cultural meanings of everyday things in first-century Rome." "Murphy demonstrates the Natural History's political significance by concentrating on Pliny's accounts of foreign lands and peoples, the monstrous, and the barbarian. Furthermore, Pliny's ethnographies and geography demonstrate how Roman power outstrips the rest of the world in the control of the powers of nature." "The selection and arrangement of the encylopedia's material show that it is more than an instrument of reference: it is a monument to the power of Roman imperial society."--BOOK JACKET.