The fundamental difficulty of studying ancient history is the fact that only a fraction of it has been documented, and only a fraction of those recorded histories have survived into the present day. Literacy was not widespread in any culture until long after the end of ancient history, so there were few people capable of writing histories. Even those written histories which were produced were not widely distributed; the ancients, not having the luxury of a printing press had to make copies of books by hand. The Roman Empire was one of the an ...

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Ancient history, Ancient history - The study of ancient history, Ancient history - Archaeology, Ancient history - Primary sources, Ancient history - Chronology, Ancient history - Prehistory, Ancient history - Important events, Ancient history - End of ancient history in Europe, Ancient history - Some prominent civilizations of ancient history, Ancient history - Europe and the Mediterranean, Ancient history - East Asia, Ancient history - Central and Southwest Asia, Ancient history - Saharan and Sub-Saharan Africa, Ancient history - The Americas, Ancient history - References and further reading

Read more here: » Ancient history: Encyclopedia II - Ancient history - The study of ancient history