Bettany Hughes is one of the UK’s prominent writers and broadcasters on ancient history. The historian has presented over 50 TV and radio programmes on the subject, including her latest series, Lost Worlds: Dawn of Civilisations, which explores archaeological discoveries and cultural landscapes in ancient Anatolia, modern-day Turkey, reshaping our understanding of historical narratives, reports BritPanorama.
Her new book, There Was An Egyptian in Your School, serves as a children’s guide to education in ancient times, aiming to spark a passion for classical civilisation among young readers. Hughes has also shared her top five books that prominently feature themes from the ancient world.
If not, winter: the complete fragments of Sappho by Anne Carson
“Sappho’s poems should be read in all schools. The works of the 7th-century poet from the island of Lesbos are acute, inspiring and teach about the impact of early love – both how beautiful it is and how disruptive. Sappho was the first to describe love as bittersweet – although, enjoyably, she says it is sweet and then bitter.”
The Iliad by Homer, translated by Emily Wilson
“I read this whenever I can, along with Homer’s Odyssey and The Cypria, another ancient poem linked to the Trojan War, which is supposedly by the poet Stasinus. The relationship between translators and their texts is a very intimate one – I enjoyed the freshness Emily Wilson brought to The Iliad. Each of the texts are transporting in so many ways – they offer different perspectives on the epic stories of the Aegean Bronze and Iron Ages. One of my favourite pursuits is to try to match archaeological evidence with the history-by-accident concealed within the verses.”
The Amazons by Adrienne Mayor
“A revolutionary book that turns on its head the misogyny that has coloured our ideas of the Amazons for thousands of years. Tracing their story in myth and archaeology, Mayor proved that there were indeed individual warrior women who fought in battle from the Bronze Age onward. I have seen the graves of some of these women, the skeletons showing cut marks to their arms, heads, and legs – and some with obsidian arrow tips still lodged in their bones. The Amazons lived!”
Egeria’s travels, translated by John Wilkinson
“Either a lay sister or part of a community of nuns from Spain, Portugal or Southern France, Egeria travelled solo through the Holy Land as she perceived it in the 4th century AD. Here, her eyewitness accounts in letter form are still in print – providing a unique historical record. They give us fascinating insights into Constantinople, Southern Turkey, Syria, and Egypt – where she details how the pyramids were the ‘granaries’ of the biblical First Testament patriarch, Joseph.”
Pericles by Paul Cartledge
“An expansive, exacting and epic study of one of the most fascinating characters from Ancient Greek history. For me, one of the geniuses of Pericles was the inspiration he took from his courtesan consort Aspasia. A reminder that while women were second-class citizens in ancient Athens – and Aspasia, being a foreigner, had even fewer rights – they could nonetheless have status and standing in one of the most influential epochs of world history.”
‘There Was An Egyptian in Your School’ by Bettany Hughes is published by Puffin, £8.99
