Forsythe - A critical history of early Rome: from prehistory to the first Punic War

The many debts of gratitude incurred in the course of researching and writing this book are too numerous to be easily enumerated, but common decency requires that the author at least make an attempt to acknowledge the most obvious and important ones. Thanks are due to Kurt A. Raaflaub, A. John Graham, Martin Ostwald, Michael Alexander, Brent Vine, Mark Toher, Richard Mitchell, and Ernst Badian for their comments, criticisms, and suggestions. Thanks are due also to Kate Toll, the copy editrix, whose intelligent and well-informed editing of the text has made it more readable. A great debt is owed to Scott Pathel for his computer expertise employed in the preparation of the maps and other illustrations used in this book. Thanks are due to the people at the reference desk in the Westchester Public Library in Chesterton, Indiana for their assistance in obtaining many books and articles through inter-library loan.

Although the author was occupied with the research and writing of this book from the summer of 1997 to the spring of 1999, in a certain sense this book has been in the making for very many years; and as a direct consequence of the author's blindness, he is greatly indebted to many friends and fellow college students, who over the years have given him many hours of their time in order to read books and articles to him. Out of this very long list of devoted volunteer readers the author wishes to mention by name the following persons whose voices recorded on tape have been the author's constant companions as he wrote the present volume: Lloyd Daly, Peter Denault, Becky Harrison, Sarah Kimball, Scott Rusch, Nell Wright, Sina Dubovoj, and especially Terry Trotter (who now teaches mathematics in San Salvador), Peg Decker (who died at about the time the work on this book was begun), Kitty Reip and her sister Kandi Kaliher (the latter of whom died of cancer in November of 1994). Special thanks are also due to the author's dear college friend of many years ago, Bryan McMurray, and his gracious wife, Joanna, for allowing the author to enjoy the hospitality of their home in Champaign, Illinois, while he made use of the University of Illinois's vast library resources. Unfortunately, due to her death the author's wife, Dorothy Alice Forsythe, was not able to assist in the final proofreading of the copyedited text. This task was carried out by a very dear friend, Marnie Veghte. Yet the greatest debt of gratitude by far is owed to the author's wife, Dorothy, for her countless hours of assistance in every conceivable capacity. Attempting to record the innumerable ways in which this book is indebted to this extraordinary woman would involve an entire chapter of its own.