A THREE-PART history series, Mothers, Murderers And Mistresses: Empresses Of Ancient Rome, is coming to BBC4.

It tells how exceptional women came to stand at the epicentre of imperial power.

The series, which will start next Wednesday – is presented by Catharine Edwards, professor of classics and ancient history from the University of London.

She travels across the empire, from its heart in Rome to its rich eastern fringes in Jerusalem, to explore the impact women made throughout the Roman world.

In the first episode, The Trailblazers, she traces the role of three women in the early empire, revealing how women who understood the realities of politics could become leaders, but those who did not would end up as victims.

The second episode, The Rivals, looks at how Rome’s autocracy took shape in the first century AD. As the imperial court became a bloody, sexually-charged arena in which the future of the empire was forged, two notorious women competed in a deadly power struggle.

The final episode, The Outsiders, profiles the women who lived through the renewal of the empire and ultimate transformation of the empire.