Imperial General: The Remarkable Career Of Petellius Cerialis

Who was Petellius Cerialis? Certainly not a household name, nor one that anyone outside of academic circles would have heard of. The Romans themselves wrote no stories about him, and aside from the odd mention in the sources we have left, he would seem a very insignificant character.

Cerialis was however an important man in very significant times. From Rome's legendary origins in 753BC to the eventual destruction of the Roman state by Islamic Turks in the fifteenth century, it is only the two extraordinary centuries which saw the Republic conquered by Rome's first imperial dynasty who then destroyed themselves for the love of wealth and power that define our ideas of what Rome was...

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