Humphries is brave to take this on and does a superb job of selecting his evidence carefully in order to represent the range of transformations that took place across a variety of urban landscapes. Cities is valuable chiefly for this: as an attempt to come up for air, gain perspective, survey the field, and see whether any general conclusions have emerged.

Mark Humphries. Cities and the meanings of late antiquity. Brill research perspectives. Ancient history. Leiden: Brill, 2019.

From Bryn Mawr Classical Review (BMCR). Review by Anthony Kaldellis, The Ohio State University