OK, I have now finished Simon Elliott’s Roman Britain’s
Pirate King so here are a few thoughts.
At 167 pages this is a short book and I should have heeded the
review of goodreads.com on the back cover, “... It’s written in a way that
doesn’t over complicate things..., making it easy to read for even the most novice
reader of Roman history”.
The first 60% of the book sets the scene looking at the
third century in a most superficial way and then providing detail on the army
from Republican times onwards which, while interesting, are largely irrelevant
to the tale.
Elliot is no numismatist when dealing with the coinage of
Carausius and Allectus and presents some statements that are contradictory,
others confusing and others still plainly wrong.
Finally some irritating date proofing issues, eg p. 106, “As
AD 297 began Carausius was most likely resident in Rouen”. He’d been dead
nearly 4 years and this should be 287. On p. 130 Diocletian established the
tetrarchy in 197!
All in all I think John Casey’s1994 work on Carausius and
Allectus is a better purchase, even though it is now a little dated.
[For those who are curious, the cover coin is the aureus
that was found at Portswood in 1975. Reverse PAX CARAVSI AVG, and has appeared
in a couple of sales; Seaby CMB Dec 1976, number 459 and NAC 46, 4 Feb 2008,
lot 684.]