By the Spear
Philip II, Alexander the Great, and the Rise and Fall of the Macedonian Empire
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Narrated by:
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Phil Holland
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By:
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Ian Worthington
About this listen
Alexander the Great, arguably the most exciting figure from antiquity, waged war as a Homeric hero and lived as one, conquering native peoples and territories on a superhuman scale. From the time he invaded Asia in 334 to his death in 323, he expanded the Macedonian empire from Greece in the west to Asia Minor, the Levant, Egypt, Central Asia and "India" (Pakistan and Kashmir) in the east. Although many other kings and generals forged empires, Alexander produced one that was without parallel, even if it was short-lived. And yet, Alexander could not have achieved what he did without the accomplishments of his father, Philip II (r. 359-336). It was Philip who truly changed the course of Macedonian history, transforming a weak, disunited, and economically backward kingdom into a military powerhouse. A warrior king par excellence, Philip left Alexander with the greatest army in the Greek world, a centralized monarchy, economic prosperity, and a plan to invade Asia. 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. By the Spear also explores the impact of Greek culture in the East, as Macedonian armies became avatars of social and cultural change in lands far removed from the traditional sphere of Greek influence. In addition, the book discusses the problems Alexander faced in dealing with a diverse subject population and the strategies he took to what might be called nation building, all of which shed light on contemporary events in culturally dissimilar regions of the world. The result is a gripping and unparalleled account of the role these kings played in creating a vast empire and the enduring legacy they left behind.
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You know my name...say it.
- By Steven on 12-10-14
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A Brief History of the Samurai
- Brief Histories
- By: Jonathan Clements
- Narrated by: Jonathan Keeble
- Length: 12 hrs and 1 min
- Unabridged
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From a leading expert in Japanese history, this is one of the first full histories of the art and culture of the Samurai warrior. The Samurai emerged as a warrior caste in Medieval Japan and would have a powerful influence on the history and culture of the country from the next 500 years. Clements also looks at the Samurai wars that tore Japan apart in the 17th and 18th centuries and how the caste was finally demolished in the advent of the mechanized world.
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An Excellent History of the Samurai
- By Michael on 08-08-14
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Alexander the Great: A Life from Beginning to End
- By: Hourly History
- Narrated by: Jimmy Kieffer
- Length: 59 mins
- Unabridged
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Alexander the Great. A boy, groomed for greatness from the earliest age, who would put his stamp on the world for generations to come. A man who sought immortality and achieved it in just 10 years. A soldier whose genius for strategy and tactics is still studied in the modern world. A ruler who understood how to win the hearts and minds of his subjects. This is the story of a Titan of the ancient world, a man who rose but, though he died, never truly fell.
By: Hourly History
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God's Wolf
- The Life of the Most Notorious of All Crusaders, Scourge of Saladin
- By: Jeffrey Lee
- Narrated by: Nigel Patterson
- Length: 8 hrs and 40 mins
- Unabridged
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In a 2010 terrorist plot, Al-Qaeda hid a bomb in a FedEx shipment addressed to Reynald de Chatillon, a knight who had died centuries ago in the Crusades. A reviled figure in Islamic history, often portrayed as the very epitome of brutality, Reynald remains as controversial - and as vividly present in the minds of many in the Middle East - as the story of the Crusades themselves.
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A great look into the life of a great crusader
- By Jon on 02-28-19
By: Jeffrey Lee
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Carthage Must Be Destroyed
- The Rise and Fall of an Ancient Civilization
- By: Richard Miles
- Narrated by: Grover Gardner
- Length: 14 hrs and 9 mins
- Unabridged
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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.
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Outstanding! This is THE book on Carthage.
- By Haakon B. Dahl on 01-21-13
By: Richard Miles
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The History of the Ancient World
- From the Earliest Accounts to the Fall of Rome
- By: Susan Wise Bauer
- Narrated by: John Lee
- Length: 26 hrs and 20 mins
- Unabridged
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This is the first volume in a bold new series that tells the stories of all peoples, connecting historical events from Europe to the Middle East to the far coast of China, while still giving weight to the characteristics of each country. Susan Wise Bauer provides both sweeping scope and vivid attention to the individual lives that give flesh to abstract assertions about human history. This narrative history employs the methods of "history from beneath" - literature, epic traditions, private letters, and accounts - to connect kings and leaders with the lives of those they ruled.
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An Historic Achievement
- By Ellen S. Wilds on 04-25-14
By: Susan Wise Bauer
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Masters of Command
- Alexander, Hannibal, Caesar, and the Genius of Leadership
- By: Barry Strauss
- Narrated by: Michael Prichard
- Length: 11 hrs and 9 mins
- Unabridged
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Alexander, Hannibal, Caesar: Each was a master of war. Each had to look beyond the battlefield to decide whom to fight and why; to know what victory was and when to end the war; to determine how to bring stability to the lands he conquered. Alexander, Hannibal, and Caesar had to be not only generals but statesmen. And yet each was a battlefield commander, a strategist, a leader of men - in short, a warrior.
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Too much jumping around
- By Nick on 03-12-17
By: Barry Strauss
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God's Battalions
- The Case for the Crusades
- By: Rodney Stark
- Narrated by: David Drummond
- Length: 7 hrs and 59 mins
- Unabridged
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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.
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A lively and useful introduction
- By Tad Davis on 01-06-10
By: Rodney Stark
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Alexander the Great
- The Hunt for a New Past
- By: Paul Cartledge
- Narrated by: John Lee
- Length: 9 hrs and 28 mins
- Unabridged
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Paul Cartledge, one of the world's foremost scholars of ancient Greece, illuminates the brief but iconic life of Alexander (356-323 B.C.), king of Macedon, conqueror of the Persian Empire, and founder of a new world order. Alexander's legacy has had a major impact on military tacticians, scholars, statesmen, adventurers, authors, and filmmakers.
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NOT a Chronology of Alexander’s Life
- By Blane Richoux on 12-30-20
By: Paul Cartledge
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The Race for Paradise
- An Islamic History of the Crusades
- By: Paul M. Cobb
- Narrated by: Paul M. Cobb
- Length: 12 hrs and 30 mins
- Unabridged
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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.
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A heady piece of history and a romp.
- By Meeno on 05-28-15
By: Paul M. Cobb
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History's Greatest Generals
- 10 Commanders Who Conquered Empires, Revolutionized Warfare, and Changed History Forever
- By: Michael Rank
- Narrated by: Kevin Pierce
- Length: 5 hrs and 31 mins
- Unabridged
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Whether it is Hannibal of Carthage marching elephants across the Alps and attacking the heart of Rome, Khalid ibn al-Walid boasting an undefeated military career and destroying the Persian Empire while subduing the Byzantines, or Russian General Alexander Suvurov and his elevation of the bayonet to a work of art that could cut down any European army, great military leaders have exerted tremendous influence on society. This book will look at the lives of the 10 greatest military commanders in history.
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Great Book
- By MICHAEL H on 01-27-14
By: Michael Rank
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From classicist James Romm comes a thrilling deep dive into the last decades of ancient Greek freedom leading up to Alexander the Great’s destruction of Thebes - and the saga of the greatest military corps of the age, the Theban Sacred Band, a unit composed of 150 pairs of male lovers.
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Stop now and don’t buy this book.
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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.
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A little dry but very interesting
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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.
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A New HIstory but not a better history
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The Scythians were nomadic horsemen who ranged wide across the grasslands of the Asian steppe from the Altai mountains in the east to the Great Hungarian Plain in the first millennium BC. Their steppe homeland bordered on a number of sedentary states to the south and there were, inevitably, numerous interactions between the nomads and their neighbours. The Scythians fought the Persians on a number of occasions, in one battle killing their king and on another occasion driving the invading army of Darius the Great from the steppe.
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Well researched but narrator is terrible
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Great book!
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From classicist James Romm comes a thrilling deep dive into the last decades of ancient Greek freedom leading up to Alexander the Great’s destruction of Thebes - and the saga of the greatest military corps of the age, the Theban Sacred Band, a unit composed of 150 pairs of male lovers.
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Stop now and don’t buy this book.
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A little dry but very interesting
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A New HIstory but not a better history
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By 330 B.C.E., Alexander the Great had reached the pinnacle of success. Or so it seemed. He had defeated the Persian ruler Darius III and seized the capital city of Persepolis. His exhausted and traumatized soldiers were ready to return home to Macedonia. Yet Alexander had other plans. He was determined to continue heading east to Afghanistan in search of his ultimate goal: to reach the end of the world.
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Ghost on the Throne
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When Alexander the Great died at the age of 32, his empire stretched from the Adriatic Sea in the west all the way to modern-day India in the east. In an unusual compromise, his two heirs - a mentally damaged half brother, Philip III, and an infant son, Alexander IV, born after his death - were jointly granted the kingship. But six of Alexander's Macedonian generals, spurred by their own thirst for power and the legend that Alexander bequeathed his rule "to the strongest," fought to gain supremacy.
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ends a bit short
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Praetorian
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Founded by Augustus around 27 BC, the elite Praetorian Guard was tasked with the protection of the emperor and his family. As the centuries unfolded, however, Praetorian soldiers served not only as protectors and enforcers but also as powerful political players. Fiercely loyal to some emperors, they vied with others and ruthlessly toppled those who displeased them, including Caligula, Nero, Pertinax, and many more. Guy de la Bédoyère provides a compelling first full narrative history of the Praetorians.
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Buy it
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The Grand Strategy of Classical Sparta
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More than 2,500 years ago, a confederation of small Greek city-states defeated the invading armies of Persia, the most powerful empire in the world. In this meticulously researched study, historian Paul Rahe argues that Sparta was responsible for the initial establishment of the Hellenic defensive coalition and was, in fact, the most essential player in its ultimate victory.
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Excellent Investigation Undermined by Bad Editing
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What listeners say about By the Spear
Average customer ratingsReviews - Please select the tabs below to change the source of reviews.
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- Jeffery
- 06-03-22
Informative but flat narration
I thought this was read by some kind of voice synthesizer because it's so darn flat. The information is very dense and being unable to locate a good map of the ancient world, I was unable to make use of the material.
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- Caleb N. Diffell
- 10-08-15
Narrator doesn't know how to pronounce Greek words
Would you recommend this book to a friend? Why or why not?
No. It's pop history and the narration seriously detracts.
How did the narrator detract from the book?
Doesn't know how to pronounce Greek terms.
Did By the Spear inspire you to do anything?
Yes: uninstall it.
Any additional comments?
This book has some of the worst qualities of pop history: a dubious premise, writing badly in need of a competent editor, and overall very boring.
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- Luis
- 01-30-19
Great Book
The accomplishments of Both Philip and Alexander are covered outstandingly in this book. It is certainly a good book for those who are well versed with the Greatness of Alexander but not of his Father. I recently read "Alexander of Macedon" by Peter Green which covers pretty much the same topics as this book. I believe Green does a better job but for anybody looking to take in a new Narrative "By The Spear" will not disappoint.
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- BPW
- 06-17-24
Not recommended
A decent book that covers Philip and Alexander, both of whom deserve attention 2300 years on. Now for criticism. Flat narration, but tolerable. The author uses most sources but writes most on negative information of Alexander. The author is downright self contradictory at times in his analysis. He writes that Alexander was always pragmatic just sentences after saying he thought that he was a god. He writes Alexander failed as a statesman because he introduced foreigners and foreign practices in one section then criticizes him for insisting on Greek and Greek form. Later he writes that Alexander was thoughtless of the other cultures in his imposition of his authority and in his edicts. The wording is often clumsy. There is more difficulty, but suffice it to say that it is a good book but isn’t the best and isn’t one I’d recommend for the topic.
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- mrieke
- 10-23-15
Good detail, poor narration
I liked the story because of the detail. The narrator's nearly monotone, sing-song style was annoying
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1 person found this helpful
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- John Stone
- 03-30-15
A good listen.
Very good addition to my studies in Greek history. Easy to follow and listen to on the drive. I'm an amateur in historical studies but I thought the entertaining manner in which the material was presented improved my knowledge of Big Phil and Big Al.
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- Tomus Magnus
- 11-19-17
Good overview
The overview of Philip and Alexander is great, although the narration can be a bit dry. Also, as an audio book, it can be a bit hard to follow all of the names and locations without a map a.
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- Maya
- 09-22-15
Pitting one against the other?
While I love much of the information here, I don't like how it keeps being presented--and I'm not even finished.
One, trying to compare Philip and Alexander, even if the author leaves it up to the reader (or listener) is just silly. Would there be the latter without the former? Uhh...Some of the assertions about the two had me saying "duh!!", though maybe this is meant for someone who hasn't read all the source material available on Alexander.
I bought this primarily for information on Philip, and wasn't disappointed in the least. The military aspect of it was great, but when comparing him and his son, things get a little rocky. Why do it? They were clearly both great men in their own rights, and everyone (despite what the author thinks, apparently) knows it. It's unnecessary, because the other information presented in this book, and all together, is awesome! Philip and Alexander carved Macedon into history together, not one or the other more.
Two, the narration is positively. mind. numbing. Eleven hours of Arrian wasn't this bland. The only thing keeping me engaged was the fact that I wanted to know this stuff. Otherwise? My god. If you need to put your kid to sleep or something, this is the book for you.
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2 people found this helpful
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- Mohad Cheridi
- 08-31-16
Very good book....but the reading could be better
I particularly appreciated the well-balanced analysis of the reign of philip and alexander; it's neither a criticism nor a eulogy of the reign of both monarchs but a successful attempt at giving each one his due. Prof. Worthington's book deserved a better performance...but i wouldn't be as harsh as others on phil holland's reading...it wasn't so bad after all !!
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- Luke Walton
- 10-19-17
Ian Worthington Should've Narrated
Perfect book for falling asleep to. Subject matter is fascinating and well researched. Narration is monotony incarnate. Big fan of Prof. Worthington and his Great Courses.
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