The Treasury is absolutely brilliant! It describes each of the main characters one by one and then has a short piece apparently by each person. Each character describes their own childhood so vividly that you feel transported back in time. Each person has their own subject as listed here:
Flavia - festivals and holidays , myths and legends
Captain Geminus - transport and ,trade patrons and clients
Uncle Gaius - f arming and agri culture
Jonathan - sport and entertainment , religon
Doctor Mordecai - medicine death and burial
Miriam - love and marriage
Pulchra - fashion and beauty, Roman society
Nubia - freeborn and slave
Pliny the younger - the erruption of Vesuvius
Titus - emperors of Rome
Lupus - art , writing
Pliny the elder - scholarship
Alma -food and drink , entertaining and dining , recipes.
This amazing book can be read on its own but you might enjoy it more if you read some of the other Roman mysteries first. It's definitely a must for any RomanMysteries fan.
Reading the Treasury makes you understand the Roman Mysteries characters in context and how much research must have been needed to write them.
I had always thought that the Romans very very different from us because of slavery and their love of gladiatorial combats. But as Caroline points out on her website, we seem to enjoy very violent films and as for slavery I read only the other day, a story from Uzbekistan, where nine year olds pick cotton - so perhaps we are not that different.