A fatal thing happened on the way to the forum
Becka Eissenova and Anna Eissenova gave me Emma Southon’s book “A fatal thing happened on the way to the forum” for Christmas. Apart from my longtime interest in history, there was a particular reason for this choice. Rebecca took five years of Latin in middle school and high school. She got a 5 on the Latin AP exam, which entitled her to college credit, although I’m not sure whether Colorado State awarded that credit on her transcript. Along the way, she learned 33 words for “kill” and supplied me a cheat sheet of these words along with the book. The lexicon turned out to be unnecessary, but it illustrates the scope of the task Southon undertook in writing this book. Homicide, both intentional and inadvertent, was common in ancient Rome. Just how common is unclear, since many killings went undocumented. In ancient Rome, the idea of murder lacked the moral overlay that it has acquired today in most cultures. The most important lesson in the book is just how remote and foreign ancie...