History Of The Wars Books I And Ii

"History of the Wars - Volume I" from Procopius. Prominent late antique scholar from Palaestina Prima (500-565A.D.).

A fully-outfitted edition of Prokopios' late Antique masterpiece of military history and ethnography--for the 21st-century reader. "At last . . . the translation that we have needed for so long: a fresh, lively, readable, and faithful rendering of Prokopios' Wars, which in a single volume will make this fundamental work of late ancient history-writing accessible to a whole new generation of students." --Jonathan Conant, Brown University

Herodotus, the great Greek historian, wrote this famous history of warfare between the Greeks and the Persians in a delightful style. Herodotus portrays the dispute as one between the forces of slavery on the one hand and freedom on the other. This work covers the rise of the Persian influence and a history of the Persian empire, a description and history of Egypt, and a long digression on the landscape and traditions of Scythia. Because of the comprehensiveness of this work, it was considered the founding work of history in Western literature. A must-have for history enthusiasts.

War has changed, but we have not. From our hunter-gatherer ancestors to the rival nuclear powers of today, whenever resources have been contested, we’ve gone to battle. Acclaimed historian Gwynne ­Dyer illuminates our many martial clashes in this brisk account, tracing warfare from prehistory to the world’s first cities — and on to the thousand-year “classical age” of combat, which ended when the firearm changed everything. He examines the brief interlude of “limited war” before eighteenth-century revolution ushered in “total war”— and how the devastation was halted by the nuclear shock of Hiroshima. Then came the Cold War and Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, which punctured the longest stretch of peace between major powers since World War II. For all our advanced technology and hyperconnected global society, we find ourselves once again on the brink as climate change heightens competition for resources and superpowers stand ready with atomic bombs, drones, and futuristic “autonomous” weapons in development. Throughout, Dyer delves into anthropology, psychology, and other relevant fields to unmask the drivers of conflict. The Shortest History of War is for anyone who wants to understand the role of war in the human story — and how we can prevent it from defining our future.

"History of the Wars - Volume IV" from Procopius. Prominent late antique scholar from Palaestina Prima (500-565A.D.).

At the end of 1918 one prescient American historian began to write a history of the Great War. "What will you call it?" he was asked. "The First World War" was his bleak response. In Between the Wars Philip Ziegler examines the major international turning points - cultural and social as well as political and military - that led the world from one war to another. His perspective is panoramic, touching on all parts of the world where history was being made, giving equal weight to Gandhi's March to the Sea and the Japanese invasion of China as to Hitler's rise to power. It is the tragic story of a world determined that the horrors of the First World War would never be repeated yet committed to a path which in hindsight was inevitably destined to end in a second, even more devastating conflict.

Procopius of Caesarea was born in approximately 500. He is generally considered to be the last major historian of the ancient world. His works have given us a unique and intimate account both of the Roman Military and its Emperor Justinian. A native of Caesarea in Palaestina Prima little else is known of his early life, and apart from assuming that he would have received a classical Greek Education the rest is deduction rather than based on known facts. In 527, the first year of Eastern Roman Emperor Justinian I's reign, he became the adsessor (legal adviser) for Belisarius, Justinian's chief military commander who was then starting out on what would become a brilliant military career, initially in the East of the Empire. After early successes Belisarius was defeated in 531 at the Battle of Callinicum and recalled to the Empire's heart in Constantinople. Justinian was without doubt clever but cruel. When part of Constantinople rose against him in the Nika riots of January, 532, he sent Belisarius and his fellow general Mundo to repress them in a savage massacre in the Hippodrome - witnessed by Procopius. The following year Procopius accompanied Belisarius on his victorious expedition against the Vandal kingdom in North Africa and took part in the capture of Carthage. Procopius remained in Northern Africa with Belisarius' successor, Solomon the Eunuch, when Belisarius returned to Constantinople. Procopius rejoined Belisarius for his campaign against the Ostrogothic kingdom in Italy and was there for the Gothic siege of Rome that lasted a year and nine days and ended in March, 538. He witnessed Belisarius' entry into the Gothic capital, Ravenna, in 540. However at some point in the next few years Procopius seems to have been moved away from working with Belisarius. When the latter was sent back to Italy in 544 to cope with a further outbreak of the war with the Goths, Procopius appears to have no longer been with Belisarius' staff. Procopius continued to record history and his works are both insightful and clear headed, distilling the complexities of the times into several classic books. His death is thought to have been around 560.