Richard Hingley here asks the questions: What is Romanization? Was Rome the first global culture? Romanization has been represented as a simple progression from barbarism to civilization. Roman forms in architecture, coinage, language and literature came to dominate the world from Britain to Syria. Hingley argues for a more complex and nuanced view in which Roman models provided the means for provincial elites to articulate their own concerns. Inhabitants of the Roman provinces were able to develop identities they never knew they had until Rome gave them the language to express them. Hingley draws together the threads of diverse and separate study, in one sophisticated theoretical framework that spans the whole Roman Empire. Students of Rome and those with an interest in classical cultural studies will find this an invaluable mine of information. 'A valuable addition to the scholarly literature.' - BMCR 'The explicit recognition of the complex relationship between past and present is one of the book's many strengths... a sophisticated and nuanced picture of 'Roman' identities... this book will do much to set the tone for a new generation of studies of the Roman World.' - Britannia Specialist in Roman studies, with a particular focus upon Roman imperialism and the context of Roman research. Lecturer in Roman archaeology at the University of Durham. Author of Roman Officers and English Gentleman (Routledge 2000) and Images of Rome (Journal of Roman Archaeology, 2001).