Rome and Persia : the seven hundred year rivalry
"Drawing on extensive research, historian Adrian Goldsworthy traces how the empires clashed as they co-evolved, from first-century diplomatic misunderstandings between the Roman Republic and Parthia, through centuries of bitter assaults on both sides under dozens of leaders, to the Sassanid clan's seizure of Persian power from the Parthian dynasty in the third century, to a fifth-century return to wary peace between nations as the strength of bot...