Barrett argues that Agrippina - mother of Nero, wife of Claudius and brother to Caligula - has been misunderstood and had much influence and power in her own right.

Agrippina the Younger attained a level of power in first-century Rome unprecedented for a woman. In this first biography of Agrippina in English, Anthony A. Barrett draws on the latest archaeological, numismatic, and historical evidence to create a startling new picture of this influential and misjudged woman. According to ancient sources, she achieved her success by plotting against her brother, the emperor Caligula, murdering her husband, the emperor Claudius, and controlling her son, the emperor Nero, by sleeping with him. Although she was ambitious, Barrett argues that she made her way through ability and determination rather than by sexual allure, and that her political contributions to her time seem to have been positive.

'The most valuable part of the book is the inventory of source material at the end where not only the more familiar literary evidence is catalogued but the coins, statues and inscriptions featuring Agrippina.' - Miriam Griffin, History Today