Although Macedonia played a key part in the eastward expansion of the Roman state during the second and first centuries b.c.e., and there is a wealth of new archaeological and epigraphic data available from the region, this is the first attempt at offering a synthetic monograph on Macedonia’s material record, from the beginnings of its subjection to Rome to Late Antiquity, for an English-speaking audience. The author has previously published a monograph (in Greek, 2010) on the agora in Roman Greece, followed by a substantial paper on the same topic, in English, in the Annual of the British School at Athens, as well as a raft of subsequent articles on aspects of the built environment of Roman Greece. The present book builds on these earlier publications.

Since this is a first attempt at providing a synthetic account of many kinds of material data, and of socio-cultural and economic phenomena that are reflected in the material remains, the author has been obliged to make radical decisions about what to include and how to frame the evidence. The book is divided into 20 chapters, grouped into three parts. Part I, on history, people, cities and resources, is the shortest section of the book (1–37). Part II is the longest (39–169). It surveys the material evidence that provides contemporary archaeological data on the built environment, from public spaces and administrative buildings, through commercial and productive foci, sanctuaries and religious constructions, to theatres and other places of entertainment; the infrastructure of water provision; the enhancement of streets with porticoes, archways and gates; housing; fortifications; burial grounds; and, finally, rural establishments. This middle section of the book covers an enormous amount of data, and much of it is likely to be entirely unknown to most readers of Roman provincial material culture. Part III is a more discursive section, which summarises broad changes over the course of some 700 years, and engages with the main scholarly themes deployed by historians and archaeologists in other provinces, with regard to Roman conquest and administration, to see how far these also apply to Macedonia and the ways in which this province can be seen to have developed a distinct cultural profile of its own (171–96).

Even this brief description of the book’s contents should make clear that this is a ground-breaking publication of considerable scholarly significance. E. offers a remarkable synthesis of information, mostly published in specialist Greek journals (Archaiologikon Deltíon and AEMΘ/AEMTh, Τo Αρχαιολογικό Έργο στη Μακεδονία καì στη Θράκη). The importance of the data and arguments presented here is not always easy for the general reader of things Roman to navigate, even though the text is generally written in a clear and accessible style. The sheer novelty of the material discussed deserves some emphasis. The author has not been well served by the book’s designer, who has chosen to reproduce the author’s own, well-designed maps at a very small scale. Not only does this make it hard to read the details, but it also makes it difficult to appreciate the context of the information that is being conveyed.

In a short review it is not easy to point out the many features that combine to make the book a must-read for students of the wider Roman Empire. Each of the 20 chapters could have been expanded to monograph length. The author’s (and publisher’s) reasons for keeping the book short are understandable. The author has also been constrained by the rate of publication of primary data. The majority of reports, even for long-term projects, such as that of the international team that works at Philippoi, are interim, not final ones. The intention of this book is therefore to provide a well-defined sketch of what is currently known about the region, and to offer some distinctive interpretative arguments. Two major themes have been tackled less successfully. One is the issue of provincial boundaries. Readers need help with understanding what the boundaries of Macedonia were as a Roman province and how these changed over the course of the Empire. They also need some explanation of the complex ethnic make-up of the region, which is referred to occasionally, but with tantalising brevity. Notwithstanding these challenges, the author deserves to be congratulated on a remarkably successful synthesis.