J. B. Bury in the context of Byzantinist

The History of the Peloponnesian War (/pɛləpəˈniːʃən/) is a historical account of the Peloponnesian War (431–404 BC), which was fought between the Peloponnesian League (led by Sparta) and the Delian League (led by Athens). The account, apparently unfinished, does not cover the full war, ending mid-sentence in 411. It was written by Thucydides, an Athenian historian who also served as an Athenian general during the war. His account of the conflict is widely considered to be a classic and regarded as one of the earliest scholarly works of history. The History is divided into eight books.

Analyses of the History generally occur in one of two camps. On the one hand, some scholars such as J. B. Bury view the work as an objective and scientific piece of history. The judgment of Bury reflects this traditional interpretation of the History as "severe in its detachment, written from a purely intellectual point of view, unencumbered with platitudes and moral judgments, cold and critical."

Flavius Aetius (also spelled Aëtius; Latin: [aːˈɛtiʊs]; c. 390 – 21 September 454) was a Roman general and statesman of the closing period of the Western Roman Empire. He was a military commander and the most influential man in the Empire for two decades (433–454). He managed policy in regard to the attacks of barbarian federates settled throughout the West. Notably, he mustered a large Roman and allied (foederati) army in the Battle of the Catalaunian Plains, ending an invasion of Gaul by Attila in 451, though the Hun and his subjugated allies still managed to invade Italy the following year, an incursion best remembered for the Sack of Aquileia and the intercession of Pope Leo I. In 454, he was assassinated by the emperor Valentinian III.

Aetius has often been called the "Last of the Romans". Edward Gibbon refers to him as "the man universally celebrated as the terror of Barbarians and the support of the Republic" for his victory at the Catalaunian Plains. J.B. Bury notes, "That he was the one prop and stay of the Western Empire during his life time was the unanimous verdict of his contemporaries."

Erasmus Smith's Professor of Modern History is a chair in history at Trinity College Dublin. It was founded in 1762 and funded by the Erasmus Smith Trust, which was established by Erasmus Smith, who lived 1611–1691. It had been preceded by a Professorship of Oratory and History in 1724, and in 1762 the original professorship continued as a Professorship of Oratory alone.

One of its incumbents was the celebrated J. B. Bury (1861-1927), author of History of the Roman Empire (1893), The Life of St. Patrick and his place in History (1905) and A History of Freedom of Thought (1914). The current occupant of the Erasmus Smith’s chair is Professor Jane Ohlmeyer, a historian of the seventeenth-century Irish nobility.