Skip to content

Roman history is constantly being written around, it has always been done; In a sense, we know more about our ancient Romans than they themselves knew. In other words, Roman history is a work in progress.

— Mary Beard SPQR: A History of Ancient Rome (2017)

Another quote →

More quotes by Mary Beard

This is a dangerous myth if we think we are better historians than our predecessors.

SPQR: A History of Ancient Rome (2017)

It’s not easy to make women fit into a structure that is initially encoded as masculine: what needs to be done is to change the structure.

Women & Power: a Manifesto (2017)

Greek men didn't all look like this. And indeed, this guy, his musculature is actually physically impossible. What these are are images of a kind of perfect version of Greek masculinity.

Shock of the Nude (2020)

It’s a "high-end" power in the traditional sense and linked to the image of the "glass ceiling", which not only places women out of power, but imagines pioneers as successful superwomen who only a few vestiges of male prejudice prevented them from reaching the top.

Women & Power: a Manifesto (2017)

Roman society incorporated those who were mostly excluded in the ancient world, most obviously, women... They didn't have any formal political rights in Rome

All Mary Beard quotes →

Attribution

Quote text and notes from Wikiquote: Mary Beard (page history), available under CC BY-SA 4.0. Source quality and labels are our own summary of what Wikiquote records.