This work on Livy’s first pentad began a very long time ago, with an article on the Appii Claudii of Books Two through Five (TAPhA 117 [1987] 203–26). Over the succeeding years, during a scholarly career devoted for the most part to Cicero’s rhetorical works, several other pieces on Livy were added – always focused on the first pentad and written with the conviction that these books revealed a historian who was deeply concerned with the political problems of his own age. Thanks in large part to a semester’s leave taken at the American Academy in Rome under the aegis of the Lucy Shoe Meritt Residency in the Humanities, I was able to integrate old and new material to produce the present monograph. I have profited from the thoughtful and skilled assistance of my editor, Laura Morris, from our first discussions about the possibility of publishing the book with Cambridge University Press to its final stages. The following were kind enough to read and respond to drafts of part or all of the work, and I am very grateful for their helpful comments: Wolfgang Haase, Jay Samons, and Christopher Smith. The three anonymous reviewers for the Press were extraordinarily careful, learned, and astute readers, and their suggestions, insights, and observations led to many changes that I hope have improved the original text. My husband Rich Young has been a source of unending encouragement, support, and affection throughout my career, and he made many generous contributions at all stages in the creation of this book, including offering excellent advice on matters of style and content, as well as helping with numerous aspects of preparation of the work for publication. The Boston University Center for the Humanities provided a grant covering final production costs, allowing me to avail myself of the excellent services of Rachel Fisher, a doctoral student in Classics at Boston University, who helped with proofreading and indexing. This book is dedicated to my parents, Tom and Carol Vasaly, whose love and support at every stage in my life have meant more to me than I can ever put into words. I only wish that my father, who passed away in August 2013, were here to read this.