Before writing that poem, however, Ovid had published the self-help poem I’d like to discuss here. He wrote it for readers based in the city of Rome itself, and he did that because, in Ovid’s ...

Much like the melting pot of modern New York, ancient Rome was home to a vast array of cultures, with immigrants bringing their own customs, languages, and gods to the capital.

Dickey said we know about speech variances in ancient Rome because of writings by grammarians like Pompeius. "There were a lot of Greek speakers, not everybody spoke Latin" said Dickey.

8 things people get wrong about ancient Rome. From gladiators to vomitoriums, delve into Rome’s most persistent myths and find out what really happened. A conservationist restores a Roman bust.