To do a great right, do a little wrong. But where does it end?

VIEWERS of the recent BBC 2 dramatisation of life in ancient Rome will no doubt agree that the old town was a pretty rough spot to be born in.

Ancient Rome, according to the BBC’s own blurb, was a place where “mercy was a weakness, cruelty a virtue, and all that mattered was personal honour, loyalty to yourself and your family.”

The Archbishop of Canterbury, Dr Rowan Williams, talked about the Roman empire at Christmas. “Christ was born into a society we can hardly imagine in which any notion of the sanctity of every life was completely alien,” he said.