This is a valuable and innovative contribution to the relatively new subfield of Rome-China comparative studies. The author, Randolph B. Ford—a graduate of the interdisciplinary Institute for the Study of the Ancient World at New York University—has acquired a strong command of Greek, Latin, and Classical Chinese and a deep understanding of the histories of both late antiquity and early medieval China. His book draws on and engages with modern scholarship in an even wider range of languages, including English, French, German, Italian, and Chinese, although the bibliography for China is limited to English and Chinese works. Mistakes in the reading of Chinese sources are few and relatively minor, but one is worth pointing out here, as it is central to Ford's reading of the relevant passage. On page 200, youshu choulei 有殊醜類 should be understood as “he was different from the wicked races,” rather than “he was of an...
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