"The first book of its kind, this richly informative and comprehensive guide to the world of late antiquity offers the latest scholarship to the researcher along with sheer reading pleasure to the browser. In eleven in-depth essays and over 500 encyclopedia entries, an international cast of experts provides essential information and fresh perspectives on the history and culture of an era marked by the rise of two world religions, unprecedented political upheavals that remade the map of the known world, and the creation of art of enduring glory." -- from interior flap. Edited by G.W. Bowersock, Peter Brown, and Oleg Grabar. Essays by Averil Cameron, Béatrice Caseau, Henry Chadwick, Garth Fowden, Patrick J. Geary, Brent D. Shaw, Christopher Kelly, Ricahrd Lim, Hugh Kennedy, Henry Maguire, and Yizhar Hirschfeld. Includes maps, alphabetical guide, and index. Printed in color and black-and-white.