Little did R and R know their city would survive (so far getting on for 2800 years). Rome became the centre for an Empire that survived for six or seven hundred years, and at its height stretched from the fringes of the Sahara, North Africa and the Nile, from the west to the eastern Mediterranean, from Spain to Israel, and north to Gaul and Britain.

A handsome bronze antiquity showed us the baby boys reaching towards the lupine nipples. But a few years later the twins founded Rome, and Romulus, a true son of the murderous father, committed fratricide. A king, fearing potential rivalry if his infant twin sons reached maturity, ordered a servant to dispose of them Romulus and Remus were carefully placed by the Tiber, in flood, but were rescued, suckled and nurtured by a she-wolf, herself of course a predator at the top of the food chain. We started with the founding myth, that had much in common with the stories of family dysfunction so characteristic of every religion, not to mention contemporary fiction. Beyond her brisk walks through the byways and highways of Rome, our guide took to every form of transport to facilitate her journey – bicycle, cars, including a sports car, in which she sped along those typically long and straight Roman roads, helicopter, tuk tuk and sea-going archaeological ship, dredging up the remnants of the great sea battle between Rome and Carthage in 214 BC.

Indeed, all roads were to lead to Rome, and here was the Professor, striding along the Appian Way. Did the greatness of Rome and its power happen because of their empire-building, or did the Romans create the empire because they were already powerful? Scholars still argue whether Rome conquered Greece or Greece conquered Rome

Why the Romans? was her fundamental question. The first instalment included examinations of the city of Rome, journeys around what became the Roman sea, the Mediterranean ( Mare Nostrum, Our Sea) with some stopovers, and nifty aerial maps to show us Rome’s expansion. Inviting us to share her passionate interest in Roman history, she was almost obsessively determined to ensure that we too can understand why the subject is so compelling and important.

Roman history mary beard