Greater Rome and Greater Britain

This 1912 work analyses the strengths and weaknesses of the British Empire by means of comparison with that of Rome.

Sir Charles Prestwood Lucas (Author)

9781108024013, Cambridge University Press

Paperback / softback, published 9 December 2010

198 pages
21.6 x 14 x 1.2 cm, 0.26 kg

In later Victorian England, although classical literature had long dominated education, Roman history and politics became popular areas of study, particularly after Queen Victoria became Empress of India in 1877. Many writers on colonialism drew parallels between the Roman and British Empires, but Sir Charles Lucas' book, first published in 1912, went further in its analysis. He stresses that the causes of an empire's growth and strength are numerous, and that geography and technological development are particularly important. Like writers such as Froude, he attempts to forecast the future development of the British Empire. He also points out differences between the two empires. Roman expansion was not accompanied by widespread emigration, in the way that British colonists settled North America and Australasia, for example. British India, manifesting the military and economic domination of a much larger subject people by a tiny administrative class, bore more resemblance to Roman imperialism.

1. Roman terms
2. Space
3. Youth
4. Science and empire: I. Distance
5. Science and empire: II. Water and medical science
6. The individual, the company, and the state
7. Class, colour, and race
8. The natural and the artificial
9. The two empires
10. The British instinct and the law of national life
Index.

Subject Areas: Politics & government [JP]