Reading Shelf

This week I've been reading

Or as my family calls it the Cyberman book!!

Anyway it's very good, if off my current painting and gaming areas (must resist).  It's a big canvas covering the Late Roman (i.e. Byzantine), Sassanid and Arab empires and touches on a lot.  Much of the book is about the development of the key religions during late antiquity and the interactions between religion and state politics.

A topic that I found interesting was the fate of some of the lesser known sects and religions that lost out in the politics.  I had encountered Manichaeism and Nestorian Christians in earlier readings about the Silk road, and it was interesting to find out where they came from before they self-exiled themselves to Central Asia.

So far I'm half way through and still haven't hit the conquests of Belisarius, Heraclius or Muhammad and his followers.