Ever since Edward Gibbon gave the world several thousand pages about the decline and fall of the Roman Empire, those wishing to write about that time and place have had to measure up to his thoroughness and verbiage with their own innovations in research and interpretation.

To Stanley Bing, Rome was the world's first multinational corporation.

In Rome, Inc. Bing, the author of such loftily titled works as Sun Tzu Was a Sissy and 100 Bullshit Jobs, brings us in just 200 pages not only the decline of Rome, but also its rise, interpreted as a business allegory. The little village of 753 B.C., the hungry republic that lasted 500 years and the fat empire of another millennium (if one counts Western and Eastern) were the ancient world's equivalent of our modern-day megacorporations, both in innovation and influence. The consul or emperor was chief executive officer, the senate was the board of directors, the provinces were branch offices, and gladiatorial spectacles were really bloody company picnics.

If it sounds like a plausible analogy, that's because at times it fits surprisingly well. Romulus and Remus inherit an upstart mom-and-pop company, instill it with the necessary corporate culture, followed later with a merger with the Etruscans here, an acquisition of Judea there, and voila: Pax Romana and AOL-Time Warner don't seem too different.

But if it also sounds like a concept that can, like Caligula's coronation festivals, become an exercise in overkill, that too is true.