Wonders of the World

Wonders of the World is a series of concise histories devoted to celebrated monuments and the meanings accumulated around them. Each volume combines the structure’s original setting and construction with archaeology, changing use, restoration, tourism and the political arguments that influence how it is remembered.

Mary Beard’s The Parthenon and The Colosseum, the latter written with Keith Hopkins, show the series at its most effective: neither building is treated as a static relic. Both books trace how later religions, governments, collectors and visitors repeatedly altered the monument and recast what it represented.