July - 2025

¿Defensores del pueblo romano? Historia del tribunado de la plebe (Zaragoza/Sevilla, Prensas Universitarias de Zaragoza/Editorial Universidad de Sevilla, 2024, 286 pages, €28 paperback) is the recent Spanish translation of Thibaud Lanfranchi's 2022 Italian book on the history of the Tribunate of the Plebs. The book offers a historical synthesis of the tribunician institution from its origins shortly after the birth of the Roman Republic, concluding with an epilogue on its later political uses, from the Renaissance to the present day, including the French Revolution. This new Castilian edition also features an unpublished chapter on the tribunes of the plebs during the imperial period. Primarily utilizing literary and epigraphic documentation, Lanfranchi explores the actions of the tribunes in the legal, political, and economic spheres, seeking to understand their roles within a broader social context. In doing so, he addresses the perspectives and ambiguities of these historical figures in their relationships with the "people" of Rome.

In The Remarkable Life, Death, and Afterlife of an Ordinary Roman: A Social History (Cambridge, Cambridge University Press, 2025, 204 pages, US$ 30.99 paperback), Jeremy Hartnett chronicles the story of Flavius Agricola, from a freedman's family who rose in the Roman world of the 2nd century CE, his wife, Flavia Primitiva, and his tomb, discovered in the Vatican necropolis in 1626 and now exhibited at the Indianapolis Museum of Art. Through material and literary sources, Hartnett explores the everyday social worlds of family dynamics, religious practices, and economic activities that could foster social mobility in the Roman world during the Antonine period. Furthermore, he also examines the modern world and the religious and artistic policies concerning ancient monuments. In this sense, he investigates how various contexts not only frame our interpretations but, in fact, shape the evidence itself.