From the time of Ancient Sumeria, the heavy infantry phalanx dominated the battlefield. Armed with spears or pikes, standing shoulder to shoulder with shields interlocking, the men of the phalanx presented an impenetrable wall of wood and metal to the enemy. Until, that is, the Roman legion emerged to challenge them as masters of infantry battle.

The one character trait that, sometimes, surpasses the human instinct for survival is curiosity. When humans discovered an entire hemisphere that lay beyond their own Eastern Hemisphere, the race was on. What opportunities would these new lands hold? Surely, a small country in Europe could wield the power of an empire if it could claim these new lands in the Americas.

One of the names most synonymous with brilliant military strategy is Hannibal. He was the legendary Carthaginian general who marched elephants over the snowy Alps and took on Rome, the growing power in Europe at the time. He outsmarted the best strategists that Rome had to offer and twice sat in front of the gates of Rome with his army. There was never any doubt that Hannibal would serve his country in the military, but no one could have predicted just how well. Even centuries later, Romans used the phrase “Hannibal’s at the gates!” as a way of indicating misfortune or fear.

The Mongols were also known to be both merciful as well as tolerant. Moreover, their conquests weren’t aimed against civilized life; in fact, they helped connect numerous cultures and facilitated the spread of ideas and knowledge across the continent. Of course, the Mongols themselves were not uncultured brutes, as they had their own civilization, society, and traditions. With all that being said, this does not mean they were innocent for all the destruction they caused. Instead, it is implied that the Mongols weren’t like fire, causing annihilation wherever they passed.

The Mongols were known to be both merciful as well as tolerant. Moreover, their conquests weren’t aimed against civilized life; in fact, they helped connect numerous cultures and facilitated the spread of ideas and knowledge across the continent. Diving deep inside their culture and society, we’ll cast off their barbaric image. By the end of this guide of the Mongol conquests, you will get a better understanding of not only the history of the Mongols but of all of humankind as well.

The Battle of Thermopylae is one of the most famous battles in human history. It featured two of the ancient world’s most prominent cultures, the Achaemenid-led Persian Empire and the fragmented yet culturally advanced Greeks. It also included some of history’s most famous leaders, such as the Persian king Xerxes and the Spartan king and military general Leonidas.

Explore how the Second World War began, the aftermath, and the events in between, while also getting an in-depth look into the extraordinary military operation called D-Day. The Second World War was one of the most traumatic events in human history. Across the world, existing conflicts became connected, entangling nations in a vast web of violence. D-Day was one of the most extraordinary achievements not only of the Second World War but in the whole of military history.

The Greco-Persian Wars are often portrayed as a battle between good and evil. This is simultaneously an exaggeration and an oversimplification, but there is no doubt that this war, or series of wars, fought between some of the most powerful civilizations of the ancient era helped to plot the course of human history that we have been following up until this very day.

In this audiobook, you will be led on a journey through almost 2,000 years of Chinese history, showing you all the ups and downs of those ancient times, the sufferings and joys of the Chinese people, along with their greatest achievements and failures. Dynasties will change, people will be killed and born, art made and destroyed, but the Chinese civilization will prevail, rising from humble beginnings to an empire that at some points outshined any other in the world at that time.

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.

This definitive biography of one of history's most influential father-son duos tells the story of two rulers who gripped the world - and their rise and fall from power.

Here in a single volume is the entire, unabridged recording of Gibbon's masterpiece. Beginning in the second century A.D. at the apex of the Pax Romana, Gibbon traces the arc of decline and complete destruction through the centuries across Europe and the Mediterranean. It is a thrilling and cautionary tale of splendor and ruin, of faith and hubris, and of civilization and barbarism. Follow along as Christianity overcomes paganism... before itself coming under intense pressure from Islam.

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.

The First World War created the modern world. A conflict of unprecedented ferocity, it abruptly ended the relative peace and prosperity of the Victorian era, unleashing such demons of the 20th century as mechanized warfare and mass death. It also helped to usher in the ideas that have shaped our times - modernism in the arts, new approaches to psychology and medicine, radical thoughts about economics and society - and in so doing shattered the faith in rationalism and liberalism that had prevailed in Europe since the Enlightenment.

The Napoleonic Wars saw fighting on an unprecedented scale in Europe and the Americas. It took the wealth of the British Empire, combined with the might of the continental armies, almost two decades to bring down one of the world's greatest military leaders and the empire that he had created. Napoleon's ultimate defeat was to determine the history of Europe for almost 100 years. From the frozen wastelands of Russia, through the brutal fighting in the Peninsula to the blood-soaked battlefield of Waterloo, this book tells the story of the dramatic rise and fall of the Napoleonic Empire.

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.

One of the names most synonymous with brilliant military strategy is Hannibal. He was the legendary Carthaginian general who marched elephants over the snowy Alps and took on Rome, the growing power in Europe at the time. He outsmarted the best strategists that Rome had to offer and twice sat in front of the gates of Rome with his army. There was never any doubt that Hannibal would serve his country in the military, but no one could have predicted just how well. Even centuries later, Romans used the phrase “Hannibal’s at the gates!” as a way of indicating misfortune or fear.

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.

In a continuation of his multivolume series on ancient Sparta, Paul Rahe narrates the second stage in the six decades long, epic struggle between Sparta and Athens that first erupted some 17 years after their joint victory in the Persian Wars. Rahe explores how and why open warfare between these two erstwhile allies broke out a second time, after they had negotiated an extended truce.

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.

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.

For fans of Victor Davis Hanson, Donald Kagan, and Barry Strauss comes a rich, sweeping account of the most imitated---and vicious---battle in history.

This definitive biography of one of history's most influential father-son duos tells the story of two rulers who gripped the world - and their rise and fall from power.

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.

More than 2,000 years ago one of the greatest military leaders in history almost destroyed Rome. Hannibal, a daring African general from the city of Carthage, led an army of warriors and battle elephants over the snowy Alps to invade the very heart of Rome's growing empire. But what kind of person would dare to face the most relentless imperial power of the ancient world? How could Hannibal, consistently outnumbered and always deep in enemy territory, win battle after battle until he held the very fate of Rome within his grasp?

One of the greatest commanders of the ancient world brought vividly to life: Hannibal, the brilliant general who successfully crossed the Alps with his war elephants and brought Rome to its knees. Hannibal Barca of Carthage, born 247 BC, was one of the great generals of the ancient world. Historian Patrick N. Hunt has led archaeological expeditions in the Alps and elsewhere to study Hannibal's achievements. Now he brings Hannibal's incredible story to life in this riveting and dramatic audiobook.

At the bloody battle of Cannae, he trounced a Roman army twice the size of his own. With his brothers, he subdued nearly all of Italy, Spain and Northern Africa. A cunning tactician, he secured victory for Bithynia at sea by catapulting poisonous snakes onto the decks of his enemy’s ships. Biographer Ernle Bradford draws on the historical writings of Livy, Polybius, Plutarch and others in re-creating the fantastic story of the greatest general since Alexander the Great.

Prominent military historian Victor Davis Hanson explores the nature of leadership with his usual depth and vivid prose in The Savior Generals, a set of brilliantly executed pocket biographies of five generals (Themistocles, Belisarius, William Tecumseh Sherman, Matthew Ridgway, and David Petraeus) who single-handedly saved their nations from defeat in war. War is rarely a predictable enterprise - it is a mess of luck, chance, and incalculable variables. Today's sure winner can easily become tomorrow's doomed loser.

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.

This audiobook examines the meteoric rise of Sweden as the pre-eminent military power in Europe during the Thirty Years War during the 1600s, and then follows its line of warrior kings into the next century until the Swedes finally meet their demise, in an overreach into the vastness of Russia. A small Scandinavian nation, with at most one and a half million people and scant internal resources of its own, there was small logic to how Sweden could become the dominant power on the Continent.