He had no desire for palatial dwellings, though many upwardly mobile Romans did: Crassus was able to satisfy their needs, but at a price, and of course he could lend them the money.

With great persistence and skill Crassus made his way through the danger and treachery of Roman politics to approach its zenith, but then fatally overreached, launching a disastrous military campaign against the Parthians that cost him his life and diminished his stature. In The First Tycoon, Peter Stothard, former editor of the Times and the TLS, tells the fascinating and ultimately tragic story of his life, perhaps for the first time since the Greek historian Plutarch wrote his Life of Crassus in the 1st century AD. Since the days of Plutarch, if not before, Marcus Licinius Crassus has been viewed as the ultimate exemplar of folly and dishonesty in the super-rich. The financier of Rome's Late Republic, member of the unofficial Triumvirate with Caesar and Pompey, and suppressor of Spartacus's rebellion, he is perhaps best remembered as the loser at Carrhae when - after watching his son's untimely death - he has his own head removed from his body, later (according to rumour) to be used as a prop in a Greek play. It is a well-known story and therefore a difficult challenge to breathe new life into this long-dead man.Caroline Stanbury, 47, showcases the results of her 'petrifying' botched face lift while celebrating Thanksgiving with Sergio Carrallo, 29 Born into an ancient Roman family Crassus was not an ‘entrepreneur’ or ‘self-made man’, and the environment in which he built and maintained his wealth was not that of a modern democratic state in which even the powerful cannot — at least completely — evade the rule of law. But the exceptional administrative, strategic, deal-making and diplomatic skills that allowed him to develop a property empire unlike anything the ancient world had seen — he owned virtually all of the city’s three square miles at various times — bear comparison with those of the CEOs of today’s major corporations. Like them he accumulated far more wealth than he could ever spend, and an attendant sense of power. But like so many of them he was troubled by a gnawing sense that his success in the realm of money was not accorded the respect and popularity afforded to peers who come to prominence by other, more ‘heroic’ means: in Crassus’s day, victory on the battlefield, or command of the political arena. Although he had an acute understanding of what today would be called risk management, he ultimately overreached in pursuit of the glamour Pompey and Caesar had won through military conquest, a quest that ended in catastrophe at the Battle of Carrhae in 53 BCE, a defeat which entered Roman lore as a disaster of comparable magnitude to the slaughter of the empire’s best legions by Germanic tribes at the Teutoburg Forest during the reign of Augustus. Stothard’s life is a study in the compulsions of power with rich contemporary resonances.

Prince William 'set the wheels in motion' in stripping Andrew of his royal duties because he thought the family was being 'too soft' with duke's sex assault case Now, Peter Stothard has given us the final decades of the republic through the eyes of Crassus—Rome’s wealthiest man and former consul who famously embarked on a vainglorious and ultimately failed conquest of Parthia that culminated in his embarrassing death.” Jayne Torvill and Christopher Dean show off their incredible skating skills as Winter Olympics winners rehearse aheadof Dancing On Ice

The First Tycoon

Omid Scobie's 'Sussex Squad': Royal biographer recruits influencers and bloggers to promote his new book Endgame An obscenely wealthy oligarch seeks new prestige by invading a neighbouring country whose resilience he doesn’t appreciate—and meets with catastrophe. This is a superb life of an ancient Roman whose experiences horrifically echo our own time.”—Andrew Roberts, author of Churchill: Walking with Destiny The uniqueness of Stothard’s account of the tumultuous final decades of the Roman Republic is in a new east-west narrative in which we see the inner workings of Rome as well as the vibrancy—however brief in the narrative—of Parthia. Most readers will not find new details about how the last years of the Roman Republic unfolded; but many readers may discover new things about how Parthia was (and about how Parthians were perceived by Romans). Though brief, Stothard’s little biography of Crassus offers glimpses into other great civilizations and peoples during the first century B.C. Gwyneth Paltrow joins ex Chris Martin, Dakota Johnson and children Apple and Moses on a helicopter after Thanksgiving party Kieron Dyer, 44, was dying with a rare liver disease just 11 weeks ago. Now, he speaks for the first time after a 'miracle' transplant

After Crassus was killed, historians told many stories of his demise. Some said that his open mouth, shriveled by desert air, had been filled with molten gold as testament to his lifetime of greed. His story poses both immediate and lasting questions about the intertwining of money, ambition, and power. Between Crassus and Vanderbilt came King Lear. In her spectacular debut novel from 2017, Taneja takes on Shakespeare to show an Indian hotel tycoon and political fixer playing three daughters against one another. A tragic take on the godlike status of the Indian rich. He forged a surprise alliance with a rival, Pompey, and a former protégé, Caesar, that shook Roman politics in the early 50s BC. Crassus, Pompey, and Caesar were “the three-headed monster” of Rome. They used that power to gain further military commands—a source of prestige and power that was older, more durable, and riskier than Crassus’s financial innovations. As Caesar’s power and fame grew through year after year of conquest in Gaul, Crassus’s ambition to be more than just Rome’s tycoon led him to plan his own campaign—a war against the Parthian kingdom, approximately situated in modern day Iraq and Iran. The war, carefully planned, led to disaster, as Crassus and his officers proved ignorant and unprepared for Parthian military tactics.Kerry Katona reveals her daughter Dylan-Jorge, 9, was taken to hospital for an MRI scan after suffering fainting spells at home as they await results

Paley’s CBS is now part of the media empire founded by Sumner Redstone who died in 2020. Not every tycoon finds the right biographer but Hagey, a reporter on the Wall Street Journal, gives a vivid and nuanced account of how a “mad genius” came to dominate so much while staying much less known than his rivals. Hagey explores deeply the father-daughter relationship, so central to tycoon-watchers. Shari Redstone is on the way to needing her own biographer as a tycoon herself. Princess Andre, 16, looks just like her famous mum Katie Price as she cuts a casual figure at PrettyLittleThing event Everyone has heard of Caesar; many are aware of Pompey and his conquests. But few of us now know much about Crassus. This slim, riveting biography from Peter Stothard, a renowned writer about the classics and a former editor of The Times, should put the record straightOne shortcoming is that I would have liked to know more about why Crassus became so rich. The focus is really on the power politics of the times and much less on the day to day life of this 'first financier'. It would have been interesting to learn more about this. Still, it continues to surprise me how much we know of this period. Omid Scobie accuses King Charles of evicting Prince Harry and Meghan Markle from Frogmore Cottage in 'cheap shot' to 'punish' couple for Netflix series