This is an ambitious book on the important topic of decolonization and comes at a critical moment. Postcolonial critique in Roman history and archaeology is somewhat underdeveloped compared to many other Humanities fields. Classical Studies in general remains a conservative discipline, still adhering to agendas of study that were put in place in the 19th-20th century heyday of European colonialism. However, in the face of increasing accusations and perceptions of an underlying colonialist, racist, elitist and sexist character of Classical Studies, the field is having to re-evaluate the sustainability of its current agendas, structures and gatekeepers. In the final part of her book, Hyeonah Lambert alludes to some of the events that have given this issue particular prominence and urgency (though I wondered if that coda might have served better in the introduction). This book is certainly timely then.

What the book offers is an historiographical overview of debates, tracing the emergence of postcolonial thinking in works on ancient history and archaeology. There is plenty to admire in the author's close reading of selected key works and some of the connections she makes between pieces (as one of the authors who she discusses in Chapter 4, I can confirm that many of the earlier contributions to debate she discusses had indeed been strong influences in the formation of my own thinking). At just over 200 pages, this is by no means a comprehensive overview, but, given the paucity of long-form works in the field, it is a valuable contribution that will promote much-needed debate. The author has a keen appreciation of theory and is clearly well-read in both Postcolonial and Classical Studies. In several places, she states that the prime aim is to explore the impact of postcolonialism on Roman history, though in point of fact, most of the people whose work is discussed in detail are primarily Roman archaeologists. Debates running concurrently in ancient history about future directions have somewhat different emphases (see now W. Scheidel, What is Ancient History). It is a small but important distinction, but one that, in my view, may explain to some extent the relatively slow diffusion of paradigm-shifting efforts of archaeologists in the historical mainstream.

Lambert's book comprises a short introduction that sets the scene, followed by four more extensive chapters (tracing the evolution of ideas in distinct phases) and a short conclusion. The main focus of the analysis is English-language contributions to promoting or grappling with postcolonial thinking, but, in a neat feature that mostly works well, each main chapter has a short appendix briefly discussing European, mainly French, engagement with the issues. The Romanization paradigm is the focal point of analysis, though this becomes harder for the author to sustain as we move closer to the present day, as a fundamental postcolonial argument has become whether the Romanization paradigm is sustainable, given its colonialist origins and associations. It is an irony that a book devoted to decolonizing the discipline remains so wedded to a quintessentially colonial concept almost to the last page.

Chapter 1 covers the emergence of the concept of Romanization in the age of modern empires. This has been quite well covered before, but the foundation of the modern agendas is neatly linked also to a gradual move from gentlemen scholars (they were mostly men) to a professional academy.

Chapter 2 provides a good overview of some of the key early developments of postcolonial and decolonial writing (Said, Bhabha, Spivak, Foucault and so on). It brings out some of the most significant themes of postcolonial thinking relevant to empires like Rome: knowledge and power, interactions between the Self and the Other.

Chapter 3 seeks to trace the first stirrings of postcolonial thinking in Roman studies, interestingly connecting this with Dyson's early work on resistance and rebellion, or Harris' presentation of Roman imperialism as more aggressive (rather than defensive) in intent. The second half of the chapter, focusing on Millett's Romanization of Britain and Woolf's Becoming Roman, marks the moment when postcolonial critique became more explicit in language and referencing. These were certainly pioneering studies that, as the author says, marked a tipping point, though most evident in more archaeologically-focused study of the north-western provinces.

Chapter 4 links further developments of the later 1990s and early 2000s to growing interest in the concept of Globalization. The work of three British academics forms the focus of analysis: Jane Webster, Richard Hingley and myself (respectively on Creolization, Globalization and Imperial Possession [sic]). There is some perceptive analysis here of the epistemological shifts that went on at this time - overlaps are unsurprising as we attended the same conferences and discussed issues a lot together.

Chapter 4's discussion focuses overwhelmingly on one main output of each of us, rather than more carefully following how ideas were developed and changed in what we have written subsequently. It is c. 20 years since these 'key' works were published and our ideas are presented as though preserved in aspic, rather than dynamically evolving to the present day. There is also some tendency to offer critique in the form of long quotes from selected reviews of our work, rather than for the author to lay out clearly their own reactions to the ideas. In my case, a main pillar of my work - to attempt to replace the Romanization paradigm with the concept of Discrepant Identity in writing provincial Roman histories - is not clearly explained. Although it appeared too late for her to take account of, my 2023 book Between Sahara and Sea. Africa in the Roman Empire, is a second application of my approach to a different part of the empire (but had been trailed by many publications over the years).

In the conclusion, the author starts to reveal her own thinking a bit more. She proposes that 'historical intervention' (pace Bhabha) is a way forward from the 'totalization of Romanization'. Historical intervention, in the sense of writing a different more problematized history that takes account of diverse perspectives and experiences of empire (rather than simply adopting a pro-empire perspective as traditional accounts of Rome have tended to do), is in many ways what those of us involved in the postcolonial turn in Classical Studies have been long engaged with. However, I do like the author's emphasis on 'travelling ideas' - a cross-disciplinary pollination that allowed postcolonial ideas to germinate.

I found much to admire in the book, though occasionally the jargon-laden language is a bit repetitive. It offers an individual perspective on important historiographical events and deserves to be a point of reference in the field. I certainly look forward to reading more from her in future as her ideas develop further.

David Mattingly