1. Why should study western civilization?
This lecture helps you to conquer Rome by dividing Roman history, culture, and legacy into five parts. Although the parts follow a rough chronological order, they overlap a bit as they refer back and forth.
Part I. gives you necessary background for studying the Romans by laying out major periods of history and setting the stage in the Mediterranean for Rome’s rise. It also provides thumbnail answers to some “frequently asked questions” and directs you to more information elsewhere in the book.
In our fast-forward world, you’d think that the ancient past would be too obscure, too remote, and too foreign to be of relevance. Nowadays the present seems obsolete. And yet, ancient civilizations captivate us. Why?
在我们这个飞速发展的世界里，你一定会认为古代世界过于朦胧，过于遥远，过于陌生，与我们没有太大的关系。如今，眼下正流行的事物似乎很快就会过时。然而，古代文明却能让我们迷恋不已。这是问什么呢？Well, in part, we are drawn by similarities and differences between these cultures and our own. It’s really interesting to see how other people lived, worked, fought, and loved. Ancient civilizations often confront us with differences so stark that they shock, delight, and appall us. As remote as some aspects of these civilizations are,
isn’t it engaging that they were still people? Both similarities and differences speak to the human condition, and what it means to live as a member of the human race.
其实，古代文化与现代文化之间的相似之处和差异，在一定程度上吸引着我们。了解一下其它民族如何生活，如何工作，如何战斗，如何相爱，真的是一件很有趣的事情。我们所面对的古代文明是那么不同，常常会使我们感到震惊或恐惧，但有时也会让我们感到欣喜。尽管古代文明的某些方面离现在已经很遥远了，但其深远的影响依然存在。无论是相似之处还是不同之处，所涉及的都是人类状况和人类社会成员的生活意义。
In addition, we sometimes look to ancient civilizations for models. We like patterns, and in a complicated world, it would be helpful to find models for solving (or avoiding) some of our own problems and to predict what might happen next. Humans have been at the work of being humans for a long time. Perhaps someone already figured out one of our problems, or tried similar solutions to them.
此外，我们经常希望从古代文明那里寻找模式。我们喜欢模式，尤其是在一个复杂的世界里，利用现成的模式解决（或规避）我们自己的一些问题或预测以后会再现的什么问题，都是很有益处的。人类社会在地球上已经存在很长时间了，我们的问题也许早已有人解决过或者采用过类似的解决方法。
Finally, we sometimes look back to better understand how things got the way they are. Sometimes we just don’t know; other times it
becomes clear that our understanding has been blunted by stereotypes, generalizations, and inaccurate ideas. As we look closer, generalizations begin to yield to a more complicated picture than the one we began with. Sometimes that original picture changes a lot, and sometimes it stays pretty much the same, but inquiry always produces a more accurate, insightful, and satisfying understanding.最后，我们有时还须回顾过去，以便更好地理解事情是如何发生的。有些时候我们只是不知道；而有些时候显然是由于过于陈腐的观念，根据不足的推论和不准确的思想，才导致我们在理解方面的迟钝。当我我们近一些观察时，概括就会开始让步与一个更为复杂的概念。有时最初的印象改变了许多，有时印象则几乎保持不变，但是探索总能形成一个更为准确、更为深刻、更令人满意的理解。
You may hear people object, what can the past offer us anyway? History is written by the conquerors; the same people have been in charge of the same things since the Bronze Age. Such stereotypes and generalizations deserve to go in the trash bin of history along with the many others that elicited such remarks in the first place. Fortunately for all of us, it’s much more complicated, much more interesting, and much more important than that.
也许你听到人们不赞成这种说法，过去到底能为我们提供什么呢？历史是由胜利者书写的；自青铜器时代起就是如此。这样的陈词滥调和推论，连同其它很多由此引发的议论都应该扔进历史的垃圾堆里。让我们大家感到
