The success of the Roman economy is to a large degree beholden to its vast empire. While farming was the backbone of the Roman economy, trade played an important role, too. Learn about Roman mills, shops, construction, mining, currency, and taxation. Also explored are the roles of women and slaves in the Roman economy. Highly informative, with a wealth of primary source images. Gr 3-6-Large, full-color photos of Roman art, architecture, and artifacts are the strongest elements of these introductions. Each title has 10 short chapters that discuss a single aspect of the subject. The texts are limited to only one to three short paragraphs per page, but the photo captions add some facts. ("The emperor Hadrian had the Pantheon built in about AD 126.") The format severely restricts the amount of background information and details that can be included. While these books won't be helpful for report writers, their outstanding illustrations do provide an impressive visual history of Roman life and accomplishments, making them additional purchases.α(c) Copyright 2013. Library Journal. LLC, a wholly owned subsidiary of Media Source, Inc. No redistribution permitted.