King Edward I was the first of three Edwards who reigned in perfect succession. He was one of the most important kings in English history, but he was also one of the most controversial. This was the king who subdued Wales and fought Scotland to a standstill for much of his reign. He battled leading Scottish figures that are recognizable to even novice history students. Both William Wallace and Robert the Bruce butted heads with this English ruler.

Filled with unforgettable stories of emperors, generals, and religious patriarchs, as well as fascinating glimpses into the life of the ordinary citizen, Lost to the West reveals how much we owe to the Byzantine Empire that was the equal of any in its achievements, appetites, and enduring legacy. For more than a millennium, Byzantium reigned as the glittering seat of Christian civilization.

The Crusades is an authoritative, accessible single-volume history of the brutal struggle for the Holy Land in the Middle Ages. Thomas Asbridge - a renowned historian who writes with "maximum vividness" (Joan Acocella, The New Yorker) - covers the years 1095 to 1291 in this big, ambitious, listenable account of one of the most fascinating periods in history.

An epic history of a doomed civilization and a lost empire. The devastating struggle to the death between the Carthaginians and the Romans was one of the defining dramas of the ancient world. In an epic series of land and sea battles, both sides came close to victory before the Carthaginians finally succumbed and their capital city, history, and culture were almost utterly erased.

The struggle between Rome and Carthage in the Punic Wars was arguably the greatest and most desperate conflict of antiquity. The forces involved and the casualties suffered by both sides were far greater than in any wars fought before the modern era, while the eventual outcome had far-reaching consequences for the history of the Western World, namely the ascendancy of Rome. An epic of war and battle, this is also the story of famous generals and leaders: Hannibal, Fabius Maximus, Scipio Africanus, and his grandson Scipio Aemilianus, who would finally bring down the walls of Carthage.

In AD 793 Norse warriors struck the English isle of Lindisfarne and laid waste to it. Wave after wave of Norse "sea wolves" followed in search of plunder, land, or a glorious death in battle. Much of the British Isles fell before their swords, and the continental capitals of Paris and Aachen were sacked in turn. Turning east, they swept down the uncharted rivers of central Europe, captured Kiev, and clashed with mighty Constantinople, the capital of the Byzantine Empire.

Very few of the ancient empires and nations were able to challenge the Romans, who were famous for their military might. Even fewer were able to make them shiver just by mentioning their name. In fact, only one enemy of Rome managed to engrave such fear into their bones. That was Carthage, sometimes called the Carthaginian Empire. It was a formidable state that stretched across northern Africa, from Algeria and Tunisia to the shores of Morocco and southern Spain.

Three captivating manuscripts in one audiobook: Ancient Egypt, Ancient Greece, and Ancient Rome.

In God's Battalions, award-winning author Rodney Stark takes on the long-held view that the Crusades were the first round of European colonialism, conducted for land, loot, and converts by barbarian Christians who victimized the cultivated Muslims. To the contrary, Stark argues that the Crusades were the first military response to unwarranted Muslim terrorist aggression.

The Punic Wars between 264 BCE and 146 BCE were a series of wars fought between the armies of ancient Carthage and Rome. In the years before the battles broke out, Carthage had risen from a small port community to the Mediterranean region's richest and most powerful city. Carthage had a powerful navy, a mercenary army, and ample resources to act as an authority in trade and politics. As such, Carthage prohibited Roman trade in the Western Mediterranean through an agreement with what was then just a small city called Rome. Rome didn’t stay small and insignificant for long.

Emerging as a market town from a cluster of hill villages in the eighth and seventh centuries B.C., Rome grew to become the ancient world's preeminent power. Everitt fashions the story of Rome's rise to glory into an erudite book filled with lasting lessons for our time. He chronicles the clash between patricians and plebeians that defined the politics of the Republic. He shows how Rome's shrewd strategy of offering citizenship to her defeated subjects was instrumental in expanding the reach of her burgeoning empire.

Adrian Goldsworthy has received wide acclaim for his exceptional writing on the Roman Empire - including high praise from the acclaimed military historian and author John Keegan - and here he offers a new perspective on the empire by focusing on its greatest generals, including Scipio Africanus, Marius, Pompey, Caesar, and Titus.

In just over a hundred years - from the death of Muhammad in 632 to the beginning of the Abbasid Caliphate in 750 - the followers of the Prophet swept across the whole of the Middle East, North Africa, and Spain. Their armies threatened states as far flung as the Franks in Western Europe and the Tang Empire in China. The conquered territory was larger than the Roman Empire at its greatest expansion, and it was claimed for the Arabs in roughly half the time.

In The Race for Paradise, Paul M. Cobb offers a new history of the confrontations between Muslims and Franks we now call the "Crusades", one that emphasizes the diversity of Muslim experiences of the European holy war. There is more to the story than Jerusalem, the Templars, Saladin, and the Assassins. Cobb considers the Arab perspective on all shores of the Muslim Mediterranean, from Spain to Syria.

Pax Romana examines how the Romans came to control so much of the world and asks whether traditionally favorable images of the Roman peace are true. Goldsworthy vividly recounts the rebellions of the conquered and examines why they broke out, why most failed, and how they became exceedingly rare. He reveals that hostility was just one reaction to the arrival of Rome and that from the outset, conquered peoples collaborated, formed alliances, and joined invaders, causing resistance movements to fade away.

An epic history of a doomed civilization and a lost empire. The devastating struggle to the death between the Carthaginians and the Romans was one of the defining dramas of the ancient world. In an epic series of land and sea battles, both sides came close to victory before the Carthaginians finally succumbed and their capital city, history, and culture were almost utterly erased.

In just over a hundred years - from the death of Muhammad in 632 to the beginning of the Abbasid Caliphate in 750 - the followers of the Prophet swept across the whole of the Middle East, North Africa, and Spain. Their armies threatened states as far flung as the Franks in Western Europe and the Tang Empire in China. The conquered territory was larger than the Roman Empire at its greatest expansion, and it was claimed for the Arabs in roughly half the time.

In The Race for Paradise, Paul M. Cobb offers a new history of the confrontations between Muslims and Franks we now call the "Crusades", one that emphasizes the diversity of Muslim experiences of the European holy war. There is more to the story than Jerusalem, the Templars, Saladin, and the Assassins. Cobb considers the Arab perspective on all shores of the Muslim Mediterranean, from Spain to Syria.

Pax Romana examines how the Romans came to control so much of the world and asks whether traditionally favorable images of the Roman peace are true. Goldsworthy vividly recounts the rebellions of the conquered and examines why they broke out, why most failed, and how they became exceedingly rare. He reveals that hostility was just one reaction to the arrival of Rome and that from the outset, conquered peoples collaborated, formed alliances, and joined invaders, causing resistance movements to fade away.

The War of the Three Gods is a military history of the Near and Middle East in the seventh century - with its chief focus on the reign of the Eastern Roman Emperor Heraclius (AD 610-641) - a pivotal and dramatic time in world history. The Eastern Roman Empire was brought to the very brink of extinction by the Sassanid Persians before Heraclius managed to inflict a crushing defeat on the Sassanids with a desperate, final gambit.

Published to coincide with Marathon's 2500th anniversary, a riveting history of the historic battle. The Battle of Marathon in 490 B.C. is not only understood as the most decisive event in the struggle between the Greeks and the Persians, but can also be seen as perhaps the most significant moment in our collective history. 10,000 Athenian citizens faced a Persian military force of more than 25,000.

If you want to discover the captivating history of Sparta, then pay attention...Sparta is one of the first names that comes to mind when we think about the ancient world. And this is for good reason. After its founding sometime in the 10th century BCE, Sparta soon rose to be one of the most powerful city-states in not only the Greek but the entire ancient world.

Have you ever wondered how the world got to where it is today? Get ready to discover the rich history of our planet. You will be astonished to learn about some of the events that have occurred! Subjects include: Ancient Greece, Ancient Egypt, The Roman Empire, Constantine and Christianity, India, Ancient Korea, Chinese Dynasties, Napoleonic Europe, Foundation of USA, The 1812 War, Australia and Wars, World War I, World War II, The Ottoman Empire, Greece and North Africa, The Diem Regime, Pearl Harbor, and much more!

For the first time, By the Spear offers an exhilarating military narrative of the reigns of these two larger-than-life figures in one volume. Ian Worthington gives full breadth to the careers of father and son, showing how Philip was the architect of the Macedonian empire, which reached its zenith under Alexander, only to disintegrate upon his death.

The death of the Roman Empire is one of the perennial mysteries of world history. Now, in this groundbreaking book, Peter Heather proposes a stunning new solution: Centuries of imperialism turned the neighbors Rome called barbarians into an enemy capable of dismantling an Empire that had dominated their lives for so long. A leading authority on the late Roman Empire and on the barbarians, Heather relates the extraordinary story of how Europe's barbarians, transformed by centuries of contact with Rome on every possible level, eventually pulled the empire apart.

The struggle between Rome and Carthage in the Punic Wars was arguably the greatest and most desperate conflict of antiquity. The forces involved and the casualties suffered by both sides were far greater than in any wars fought before the modern era, while the eventual outcome had far-reaching consequences for the history of the Western World, namely the ascendancy of Rome. An epic of war and battle, this is also the story of famous generals and leaders: Hannibal, Fabius Maximus, Scipio Africanus, and his grandson Scipio Aemilianus, who would finally bring down the walls of Carthage.

Ranging from prehistory to the 21st century, The Great Sea is above all the history of human interaction across a region that has brought together many of the great civilizations of antiquity as well as the rival empires of medieval and modern times.

If you want to discover the captivating history of the Peloponnesian War, then pay attention. The Peloponnesian War enveloped the entire Greek world, from Syracuse on the island of Sicily to the shores of western Turkey. It ravaged the Greek population and produced great hardships, and it led to the eventual downfall of the Athenian Empire and the rise of the Spartan Empire.

In God's Battalions, award-winning author Rodney Stark takes on the long-held view that the Crusades were the first round of European colonialism, conducted for land, loot, and converts by barbarian Christians who victimized the cultivated Muslims. To the contrary, Stark argues that the Crusades were the first military response to unwarranted Muslim terrorist aggression.

In 1517, the Ottoman Sultan Selim "the Grim" conquered Egypt and brought his empire for the first time in history into direct contact with the trading world of the Indian Ocean. During the decades that followed, the Ottomans became progressively more engaged in the affairs of this vast and previously unfamiliar region, eventually to the point of launching a systematic ideological, military and commercial challenge to the Portuguese Empire, their main rival for control of the lucrative trade routes of maritime Asia.