Pliny the Elder’s Naturalis Historia ( Natural History ) is the largest single work surviving from the Roman Empire and is widely regarded as the first scientific encyclopedia. Published around 77 CE, it consists of 37 books intended to document all human understanding of the "natural world, or life".
Modern scholarship, most notably Trevor Murphy’s The Empire in the Encyclopedia , argues that Pliny’s work was more than a reference tool; it was a political monument to Roman imperial power. Pliny the Elder's Natural History: The Empire i...