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PREFACE

Professor Henry F. Pelham of the University of Oxford I am indebted for reading all the chapters, but in their more extended form as they appear in my Rome: Its Rise and Fall, of the Roman part; while to Professor George L. Burr of Cornell University I am under like deep obligation for giving me his scholarly aid in the revision of the sheets of those chapters of my Middle Ages on which the continuation of the present work from the extinction of the Roman Empire in the West to its restoration by Charlemagne is based.

I wish further to make grateful acknowledgment of the assistance given me by Mrs. Mabel E. Hodder, graduate student of Radcliffe College, Cambridge, in the revision and extension of the bibliographies of the Greek and Roman chapters; and of the aid I have received from my former pupil, Miss Lucy M. Blanchard, who has kindly given me the benefit of long class-room use of the earlier work by making various suggestions which I have found very helpful.

I would also tender my thanks to the officers of the Architectural Library of the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, of the Fogg Museum of Harvard University, of the Public Library of Boston, and of the Public Library of Cincinnati, for the use and loan of books, photographs, and other illustrative material. To the courtesy of the editors of the magazine Records of the Past I am indebted for a photograph of the original picture entitled "The Three Towers of Babylon." In this connection it is fitting that mention should be made of the fact that the many fine pen drawings which embellish the book are by the artist Mr. Homer W. Colby of Boston.

Lastly, to my publishers I feel prompted to express my appreciation of the generosity they have shown, exceeding even what I have dared to suggest, in enriching the volume with maps, cuts, and plates; and to make acknowledgment of the courtesies and efficient aid I have received from the heads and members of the various departments of their house.

P. V. N. M.
College Hill, Ohio,
May 12, 1904.