This is a concise but comprehensive biography of Augustus, the man who implemented the Roman Empire and served as its most famous emperor. From the intro: "To those who have no more than a general idea of the history of Rome, the name Augustus, or even Octavian, conveys little more than the memory of a man who followed Julius Caesar, who won the battle of Actium against Mark Antony, and who was the first Emperor of Rome. And indeed Roman history itself, without some degree of study, does not seem to present more than the rise of a big republic from a small town on the hills, then a general confusion of wars and horrors, then one great luminous figure, Julius Caesar, and after him a long succession of emperors, some good and many bad, and, at the last, a general overthrow, an inrush of savage Northern tribes and the beginning of the Dark Ages. But when we look more closely into the history of Rome we begin to see that one thing seems to lead into another, that there is a certain chain of events and consequences, almost inevitable in their occurrence and development, and that certain changes that came about were essential to Rome's development."