This description represents one of the few testimonia that survive regarding Peter ‘the Patrician’ (c. 500–c. 565 a.d.). Peter was a late-antique lawyer, administrator (holding the position of Magister Officiorum under Justinian), diplomat (to both the Ostrogoths and the Persians) and historian. The author of About State Protocol, Peter also wrote what appears to have been an extensive history of the Roman Empire from possibly the rise of Octavian to perhaps the reign of Constantius II, which survives mostly in fragments in the Excerpta Historica compiled by scholars under the tenth-century Byzantine Emperor Constantine VII Porphyrogenitus. In the early nineteenth century Barthold Niebuhr pointed out that fragments of Peter's History survived in quotations in part of the Excerpta Historica devoted to embassies (the Excerpta de Legationibus Gentium ad Romanos and the Excerpta de Legationibus Romanorum ad Gentes) as well as in the contemporary Lexica Segueriana (and also speculated that Peter's work might lie behind some historical passages in the Excerpta de Sententiis). In the late nineteenth century Ursulus Boissevain and Carl de Boor confirmed that Peter was the anonymous historian (sometimes known by scholars as the continuator of Dio) used by the compilers of the Excerpta de Sententiis.

In this present volume in the Routledge Classical Translations series, B. presents an introduction, translations of the testimonia of Peter and fragments of Peter's History, as well as commentaries of varying length on these testimonia and fragments. B. is a well-known scholar of late Roman history and historiography, who has published several articles over the course of the last 30 years on the works of the late fourth-century Eunapius of Sardis, a translation of the fourth-century anonymous Epitome de Caesaribus, as well as a translation (together with E. Lane) of part of the Historical Epitome written by the twelfth-century Byzantine scholar Zonaras (in this series). The present volume is a welcome addition to the growing number of new English translations of late-antique works.

B. starts with a sixteen-page introduction on Peter's life, the encounters of classical scholars with his work in the nineteenth century, and the History as a work. B.’s analysis of the history of modern scholarship on Peter's History presents a highly-readable, and fascinating, distillation of a very complex issue. The translation that follows begins with the 22 testimonia regarding Peter. Some of which, like those of Peter's contemporaries John Lydus, Procopius and Cassiodorus, are quite valuable in adding to our understanding of Peter and his career.

The translation section then shifts to the 215 fragments of Peter's History drawn from the Lexica Segueriana, the Excerpta de Legationibus Gentium ad Romanos and the Excerpta de Legationibus Romanorum ad Gentes. Building upon the work of Niebuhr, Boissevain and de Boor, B. also includes passages from the Excerpta de Sententiis that probably derive from Peter's work. When extant portions of Dio's History, Xiphilinus’ Epitome of Dio or other texts survive for the same (or similar) material, B. provides parallel translations, so the reader can compare and contrast with Peter's version. The fragments give the reader a sense of Peter's interests and what material was in his long-ranging History. Each passage is followed by a commentary. In the commentaries, B. provides references to other primary sources that treat the historical material and various historical and historiographic problems. For instance, at F 151 describing Caracalla's rebuke of the method of execution used for the jurist and administrator Papinian, B. draws the reader to passages in the Historia Augusta (Caracalla 4.1 and Geta 6.3) as well as to a modern study. When there are moralising statements in Peter's text that are absent in Dio or Xiphilinus, B. allows that sometimes it is hard to know what actually comes from Peter's History and what was the product of the tenth-century compiler(s) through whose work the fragments survive. Even with that caveat, he concludes that, if Peter's History survived, it would have been a useful text for the modern historian, especially for the latter half of the third century due to our paucity of historical narratives for that period.

B. follows the translations and commentaries with a bibliography of texts and translations of primary sources and scholarship mentioned in the volume. There is also a series of useful indexes on the correlation of fragment numbers with Mueller's FHG, literary sources mentioned in the commentaries, inscriptions mentioned in the commentaries, manuscripts and, finally, an index of people, gods and places.

The translations are sound. Because B. is such a good scholar and knows so much about late Roman historiography as well as scholarly debates, it is tempting to wish for a fuller introduction. His overview of Peter's life and career is more expansive than that given in PLRE III, but scholars will still want to consult the detailed treatment by Maria Assunta Nagl in RE 19.2 (1938): col. 1295–304. It would have been intriguing to read more on the interrelationship of Peter's History with other late-antique historians. From what sources, aside from Dio, did Peter draw information? How does his work connect with Eunapius, the so-called Leoquelle, Philostorgius and possibly even the lost books of Ammianus? It is in the commentaries, especially when the fragments come from the part of Peter's History covering the mid third century onwards, that we really see B.’s strengths. For instance, when commenting upon F 176 (relating to a festival held by the Persian Emperor Sapor I in 261 a.d.), B. wrestles with whether this might have been Nô Rôz or Frawardigan, and cites both ancient and modern bibliography on those important Zoroastrian celebrations. At F 213 (describing the usurpation of Magnentius and his desire to marry Constantia, the sister of Constantius II), B. provides a parallel text from Zonaras (13.7) and provides prosopographical information on various individuals mentioned by Peter, but it is curious that Magnentius’ marriage to Justina (Zosimus, 4.19.1, 4.43.1) is absent from Peter's fragment (although perhaps it would have appeared immediately afterwards).

This book, with its approachable translation and commentaries, is a useful resource for a scholar wrestling with third- and fourth-century history and historiography. It is the type of work one could lay out on a desk together with Greek and Latin texts and other translations and commentaries when tracing a historical problem. It would be a valuable addition to any research library with strengths in late-antique history and ancient historiography.