The first in a new series of five books describing and illustrating the seminal architectural traditions of the world, Antiquity traces architectural history from its very beginnings until the time when the traditions that shape today's environments began to flourish.

More than a catalogue of buildings, in this work Tadgell provides their political, technological, social and cultural contexts and explores architecture, not only as the development of form and space but as an expression of the civilization within which it evolves. The buildings are analyzed and illustrated with over 1200 colour photographs and 400 drawings while the societies that produced them are brought to life through a broad selection of their artefacts.