History of Ancient Civilization: Volume I The Ancient Near East and Greece, Volume II The Roman World.

History of Ancient Civilization (1936 and 1939) is a two-volume survey by Albert Augustus Trever (1874–1939), Professor of History at Lawrence College in Appleton, Wisconsin, and one of the most influential classical historians working in the American Midwest during the interwar period. The work became one of the most widely used textbooks in its field for several decades, with both volumes stressing the human side of history, ideas, and the abiding cultural values of ancient civilization. The first volume covers the Ancient Near East and Greece, while the second addresses the Roman world, together spanning the full arc of Mediterranean antiquity from the earliest Near Eastern civilizations through the Roman Empire. Trever was a pioneer in his insistence that history could not be properly understood as a mere chronicle of battles, royal names, and dates, but must be approached as a synthetic discipline that illuminated the interconnection of political, economic, social, and cultural forces — a methodological conviction he shared with Tenney Frank and others of his generation who were transforming classical studies in America. He argued strenuously that any given cultural phase of history can only be properly understood in intimate relation with its political and social setting, a principle elaborated throughout both volumes with a clarity and accessibility that made the work essential reading for generations of American undergraduates. Trever Hall was dedicated as a student residence at Lawrence College in 1963, a lasting testament to the esteem in which one of the institution's most dominant faculty figures was held by his students and colleagues