How did you get into Roman history?

I've always been a fan of ancient history, so I found myself wanting to learn more about it, especially with cultural aspects. It started off with mythology; got Greek and Roman mythology books, wanted to know random facts, always got bored with U.S. history and fascinated with even older stuff. I'm in college now, history major ofc, and I'm just now wrapping up a course on Eastern and Western Christianity, where I learned a lot of both sides, especially with how Romans and the Byzantine Empire tied into the religion.

I wrote a paper for that class about monasticism from the view point of a monk and, although I spent 17 hours on it in the span of 3.5 days start to finish, I really enjoyed learning about these things.

I'm taking a dedicated Greco-Roman class next semester, and I wanna focus on ancient Mediterranean history when I graduate, so I'll learn even more about this stuff and I'm so excited!

My first Latin teacher was the one who got me into ancient Rome. I can't really recall whatever was going on in my mind but it wasn't the best, yet his class would always make me feel better no matter what we did; whether it be translations, learning about how people lived in Rome/Pompeii, their gods or whatever else my teacher prepared for that day's class.

Somehow, I had heard about the empress Livia Drusilla (I really can't remember how lol) somewhere and started to read her Wikipedia page. And I LOVED it! The idea of a woman being so powerful (especially for her time) and having that much control over Augustus absolutely fascinated me and so I learned more and more about her.

Now, my quest to learn as much as I can about the Roman empire is far from over and that's a lovely thing since it's such a rich topic in scholarly spaces and there's so much to read about. :)