Ancient culture and society

"The author makes it possible for the modern reader to appreciate the real feeling behind the seemingly conventional and formalistic imprecations and appeals to the gods of Roman literature, and to understand the faith which sustained many of Rome's most distinguished citizens. He makes wide us of original material (all of which is quoted in translation) to give a picture of religious life at Rome between 80 B.C. and A.D. 69. He tells us how the Romans prayed; what happened at a sacrifice; what sort of gods they believed in and how seriously they took their religion." [Back cover].

"Although there is no exact equivalent of our term 'science' in Greek, Western science may still be said to have originated with the Greeks, for they were the first to attempt to explain natural phenomena consistently in naturalistic terms, and they initiated the practice of rational criticism of scientific theories. This study traces Greek science through the work of the Pythagoreans, the Presocratic natural philosophers, the Hippocratic writers, Plato, the fourth-century B.C astronomers, and Aristotle. [The author] also investigates the relationship between science and philosophy and science and medicine; he discusses the social and economic setting of early Greek science; and he analyzes the motives and incentives of the different groups of writers"--Back cover.