The best time of year for reading epic fantasy

I love the holidays in general but even more so for reading. Books are published with the Christmas season in mind.

It makes sense. Books make wonderful Christmas gifts and I love holding a book. There is nothing like the smell of  anew book or the feel of turning a page and that is something a digital book can never duplicate.

A Century at a time- notable people and events of the 4th and 5th Centuries

      

This period has been referred to as the “Dark Ages” as well as the Middle Ages. The ‘center’ of the world was considered to be Rome (remember, all roads led to Rome). Emperor Constantine had been the first Roman Emperor to convert to Christianity when it spread but the “pagan” worship of Gods didn’t stop completely. The Church had to adapt local deities and traditions to encourage the populace to join even though the Romans banned the worship of paganism. In Egypt, the Temple of Serapis was destroyed during as part of a series of civil disturbances against Christians. Alas, the Roman Empire had been on a long downfall and finally crashed and burned in A.D. 476 when the Vandals took control of the territories. As Roman society fell apart, other peoples took advantage of the discourse: Ostrogoths, Visogoths, Burgundians, Franks, Saxons, and the aforementioned Saxons. By 493 AD, Italy was under the rule of Theodoric, an Ostrogoth. Clovis is names King of the Franks in 481 – Clovis drives the Visigoths from Gaul in 507.