The Battle of Hastings 1066: The Uncomfortable Truth

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Author :
Publisher : Casemate Publishers
ISBN 13 : 178159984X
Total Pages : 336 pages
Book Rating : 4.7/5 (815 download)

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Book Synopsis The Battle of Hastings 1066: The Uncomfortable Truth by : John Grehan

Download or read book The Battle of Hastings 1066: The Uncomfortable Truth written by John Grehan and published by Casemate Publishers. This book was released on 2013-02-19 with total page 336 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This historical study upends the traditional narratives surrounding the Norman Conquest by revealing the true location of its most important battle. The Duke of Normandy’s victory at the Battle of Hastings on October 14th, 1066, was one of the most important events in English history. As such, its every detail has been analyzed by scholars and interpreted by historians. Yet one of the most fundamental aspect of the battle—the ground upon which it was fought—has never been seriously questioned, until now. Could it really be that for almost 1,000 years everyone has been studying the wrong location? In this in-depth study, the authors examine both early sources and modern interpretations, unravelling compulsive evidence that historians have chosen to ignore because it does not fit the traditional narrative of this foundational event. Most importantly, the authors investigate the archaeological data to reveal the exact terrain on which history was made.

Mysteries of the Norman Conquest

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Author :
Publisher : Frontline Books
ISBN 13 : 1399088068
Total Pages : 241 pages
Book Rating : 4.3/5 (99 download)

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Book Synopsis Mysteries of the Norman Conquest by : Robert Allred

Download or read book Mysteries of the Norman Conquest written by Robert Allred and published by Frontline Books. This book was released on 2022-07-20 with total page 241 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Recent challenges to the traditional site of the Battle of Hastings have led to a surge of interest in the events surrounding England’s most famous battle. This, in turn, has increased speculation that the titanic struggle for the English crown in 1066 did not take place on the slopes of what is today Battle Abbey, with a number of highly plausible alternative locations being proposed. The time had clearly come to evaluate all these suggestions, and Robert Allred decided to take on that task. Taking nothing for granted, Robert hiked round the sites of the three battles of 1066 – Fulford, Stamford Bridge and Hastings. Armed with the medieval sources and much of the current literature, he set out to appraise the evidence and to draw his own unbiased conclusions. Following in the footsteps of the Viking warriors of Harald Hardrada, the knights of William of Normandy and the Anglo-Saxon soldiers of King Harold, the reader is taken on a journey from Yorkshire to the South Coast and down through the ages to re-examine what has been written about that momentous year – the intrigues, preparations and manoeuvres – which culminated on 14 October 1066, on a bloody hill somewhere in Sussex. Whether this will settle the debate over the site of the Battle of Hastings or prompt further investigations remains to be seen, but it will be a book which cannot be ignored and which the reader will be unable to put down!

The House of Godwin

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Publisher : Amberley Publishing Limited
ISBN 13 : 1445694077
Total Pages : 361 pages
Book Rating : 4.4/5 (456 download)

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Book Synopsis The House of Godwin by : Michael John Key

Download or read book The House of Godwin written by Michael John Key and published by Amberley Publishing Limited. This book was released on 2022-03-15 with total page 361 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The most powerful dynasty behind the throne of Anglo-Saxon England, shedding new light on events such as the Battle of Hastings.

Memory, Heritage, and Preservation in 20th-Century England

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Author :
Publisher : Springer Nature
ISBN 13 : 303104469X
Total Pages : 309 pages
Book Rating : 4.0/5 (31 download)

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Book Synopsis Memory, Heritage, and Preservation in 20th-Century England by : David Strittmatter

Download or read book Memory, Heritage, and Preservation in 20th-Century England written by David Strittmatter and published by Springer Nature. This book was released on 2023-03-09 with total page 309 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This book explores commemoration practices and preservation efforts in modern Britain, focusing on the years from the end of the First World War until the mid-1960s. The changes wrought by war led Britain to reconsider major historical episodes that made up its national narrative. Part of this process was a reassessment of heritage sites, because such places carry socio-political meaning as do the memorials that mark them. This book engages the four-way intersection of commemoration, preservation, tourism, and urban planning at some of the most notable historic locations in England. The various actors in this process—from the national government and regional councils to private organizations and interested individuals—did nothing less than engineer British national memory. The author presents case studies of six famous British places, namely battlefields (Hastings and Bosworth), political sites (Runnymede and Peterloo), and world’s fairgrounds (the Crystal Palace and Great White City). In all three genres of heritage sites, one location developed through commemorations and tourism, while the other ‘anti-sites’ simultaneously faltered as they were neither memorialized nor visited by the masses. Ultimately, the book concludes that the modern social and political environment resulted in the revival, creation, or erasure of heritage sites in the service of promoting British national identity. A valuable read for British historians as well as scholars of memory, public history, and cultural studies, the book argues that heritage emerged as a discursive arena in which British identity was renegotiated through times of transitions, both into a democratic age and an era of geopolitical decline.

Mythical Battle

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Author :
Publisher : The Crowood Press
ISBN 13 : 0719824761
Total Pages : 237 pages
Book Rating : 4.7/5 (198 download)

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Book Synopsis Mythical Battle by : Ashley Hern

Download or read book Mythical Battle written by Ashley Hern and published by The Crowood Press. This book was released on 2017-11-29 with total page 237 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The Battle of Hastings is one of the key events in the history of the British Isles. This book is not merely another attempt to describe what happened at Hastings - that has already been done supremely well by many others - but instead to highlight two issues: how little we actually know for certain about the battle, and how the popular understanding of 14 October 1066 has been shaped by the concerns of later periods. It looks not just at perennial themes such as how did Harold die and why did the English lose, but also at other crucial issues such as the diplomatic significance of William of Normandy's claim to the English throne, the Norman attempt to secure papal support, and the extent to which the Norman and Anglo-Saxon armies represented diametrically opposed military systems. This study will be of great interest to all historians, students and teachers of history and is illustrated with 10 colour and 10 black & white photographs.

The Battle of Hastings

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Author :
Publisher : Simon and Schuster
ISBN 13 : 164313633X
Total Pages : 228 pages
Book Rating : 4.6/5 (431 download)

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Book Synopsis The Battle of Hastings by : Jim Bradbury

Download or read book The Battle of Hastings written by Jim Bradbury and published by Simon and Schuster. This book was released on 2021-01-05 with total page 228 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: A rousing historical narrative of the best-known and arguably most significant battle in English history. The effects of the Battle of Hastings were deeply felt at the time, causing a lasting shift in British cultural identity and national pride. Jim Bradbury explores the full military background of the battle and investigates both what actually happened on that fateful day in 1066 and the role that the battle plays in the British national myth. The Battle of Hastings starts by looking at the Normans—who they were, where they came from—and the career of William the Conqueror before 1066. Next, the narrative turns to the Saxons in England, and to Harold Godwineson, successor to Edward the Confessor, and his attempts to create unity in the divided kingdom. This provides the background to an examination of the military development of the two sides up to 1066, detailing differences in tactics, arms, and armor. The core of the book is a move-by-move reconstruction of the battle itself, including the advance planning, the site, the composition of the two armies, and the use of archers, feigned retreats, and the death of Harold Godwineson. In looking at the consequences of the battle, Jim Bradbury deals with the conquest of England and the ongoing resistance to the Normans. The effects of the conquest are also seen in the creation of castles and developments in feudalism, and in links with Normandy that revealed themselves particularly in church appointments. This is the first time a military historian has attempted to make accessible to the general reader all that is known about the Battle of Hastings and to present as detailed a reconstruction as is possible. Furthermore, the author places the battle in the military context of eleventh-century Europe, painting a vivid picture of the combatants themselves—soldiery, cavalry, and their horses—as they struggled for victory. This is a book that any reader interested in England’s history will find indispensable.

The Battles That Created England 793-1100

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Author :
Publisher : Frontline Books
ISBN 13 : 1399088017
Total Pages : 266 pages
Book Rating : 4.3/5 (99 download)

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Book Synopsis The Battles That Created England 793-1100 by : Arthur C Wright

Download or read book The Battles That Created England 793-1100 written by Arthur C Wright and published by Frontline Books. This book was released on 2023-01-30 with total page 266 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: In popular imagination the warfare of the Early Middle Ages is often obscure, unstructured, and unimaginative, lost between two military machines, the ‘Romans’ and the ‘Normans’, which saw the country invaded and partitioned. In point of fact, we have a considerable amount of information at our fingertips and the picture that should emerge is one of English ability in the face of sometimes overwhelming pressures on society, and a resilience that eventually drew the older kingdoms together in new external responses which united the ‘English’ in a common sense of purpose. This is the story of how the Saxon kingdoms, which had maintained their independence for generations, were compelled to unite their forces to resist the external threat of the Viking incursions. The kingdoms of East Anglia, Mercia, Northumbria, Kent, Essex, Sussex, and Wessex were gradually welded into one as Wessex grew in strength to become the dominant Saxon kingdom. From the weak Æthelred to the strong Alfred, rightly deserving the epithet ‘Great’, to the strong, but equally unfortunate, Harold, this era witnessed brutal hand-to-hand battles in congested melees, which are normally portrayed as unsophisticated but deadly brawls. In reality, the warriors of the era were experienced fighters often displaying sophisticated strategies and deploying complex tactics. Our principal source, replete with reasonably reliable reportage, are the Anglo-Saxon Chronicles, comprehensive in collation though subject to oral distortion and mythological excursions. The narrative of these does not appear to flow continuously, leaving too much to imagination but, by creating a complementary matrix of landscapes, topography and communications it is possible to provide convincing scenery into which we can fit other archaeological and philological evidence to show how the English nation was formed in the bloody slaughter of battle.

Decoding the Bayeux Tapestry

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Author :
Publisher : Pen and Sword
ISBN 13 : 1526741113
Total Pages : 255 pages
Book Rating : 4.5/5 (267 download)

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Book Synopsis Decoding the Bayeux Tapestry by : Arthur Colin Wright

Download or read book Decoding the Bayeux Tapestry written by Arthur Colin Wright and published by Pen and Sword. This book was released on 2019-07-30 with total page 255 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: For the first time, a scholar reveals the meaning of the marginal images on the Bayeux Tapestry, unlocking a completely new meaning of the work. The story of the Norman Conquest and the Battle of Hastings as shown in the Bayeux Tapestry is arguably the most widely-known in the panoply of English history, and over the last 200 years there have been hundreds of books on the Tapestry seeking to analyze its meanings. Yet, there is one aspect of the embroidery that has been virtually ignored or dismissed as unimportant by historians—the details in the margins. The fables shown in the margins are neither just part of a decorative ribbon, nor are they discontinuous. They follow on in sequence. When this is understood, it becomes clear that they must relate to the action shown on the body of the Tapestry. After careful examination, the purpose of these images is to amplify, elaborate, or explain the main story. In this groundbreaking study, Arthur Wright reveals the significance of the images in the margins. Now it is possible to see the “whole” story as never before, enabling a more complete picture of the Bayeux Tapestry to be constructed. Wright reexamines many of the scenes in the main body of the work, showing that a number of the basic assumptions, so often taught as facts, have been based on nothing more than reasoned conjecture. It might be thought that after so much has been written about the Bayeux Tapestry there was nothing more to be said, but Decoding the Bayeux Tapestry shows how much there is still to be learned.

1066: The Lost Hastings Battlefield

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Author :
Publisher : Pen and Sword Military
ISBN 13 : 1399049097
Total Pages : 234 pages
Book Rating : 4.3/5 (99 download)

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Book Synopsis 1066: The Lost Hastings Battlefield by : David John Barnby

Download or read book 1066: The Lost Hastings Battlefield written by David John Barnby and published by Pen and Sword Military. This book was released on 2023-09-30 with total page 234 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: A fully illustrated examination of the Battle of Hastings' historic accounts and analysis on the terrain and topography of the land. The year 1066 is a date in English history that changed the way people lived and were governed, as well as transforming the language of the land. Astonishingly, this book finds the traditional site attracting many thousands of visitors each year is not where the battle was actually fought. The death of King Edward the Confessor in January 1066 set off competing claims for the English throne by Norwegian King Harald Hardrada, Duke William of Normandy and the English magnate, Harold Godwinson; contentions finally settled at the epic Battle of Hastings later that year. This book tells the compelling story, from the Norman duke's crossing with an army, that included a large cavalry contingent, in a fleet of Viking looking longboats from St Valery on the French coast, to the final battle, the Battle of Hastings, on Blackhorse Hill on the high ridge some two miles east of the traditional site at Battle Abbey. It was there that King Harold met his end when surrounded and attacked by Norman knights in the closing stages of the battle. In addition, the story from the Viking invasion of Lindisfarne until William’s crossing of the Channel and events leading up to William’s death have been included to provide context to our main story. The sequence of events told here relies upon the several historic accounts and the placing of events, carefully matching them to the terrain described there with the topography of the area, a painstaking process of trial and error, to accurately place the battle site on Blackhorse Hill. The author has made use of satellite imagery, not previously available to earlier authors on the battle, to confirm the location of the old Cinque port of Hastings (first proposed by Nick Austin in his Secrets of the Norman Invasion), the site of Duke Williams's pre-battle camp. The author has analyzed the relative distances from the old port to the Battle Abbey site and the Blackhorse Hill site to eliminate the former and confirm the latter. As far as is known, no-one has ever considered the Blackhorse Hill site before and it is hoped that this will inspire researchers to expand upon these findings.

English Collusion and the Norman Conquest

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Author :
Publisher : Frontline Books
ISBN 13 : 1526773732
Total Pages : 216 pages
Book Rating : 4.5/5 (267 download)

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Book Synopsis English Collusion and the Norman Conquest by : Arthur C Wright

Download or read book English Collusion and the Norman Conquest written by Arthur C Wright and published by Frontline Books. This book was released on 2020-09-30 with total page 216 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The reality of war, in any period, is its totality. Warfare affects everyone in a society. Here, for the first time, is a comprehensive analysis of eleventh century warfare as exposed in the record of the Norman Conquest of England. King William I experienced a lifetime of conflict on and off so many battlefields. In English Collusion and the Norman Conquest, Arthur Wright’s second book on the Norman Conquest, he argues that this monarch has received an undeserved reputation bestowed on him by clerics ignorant alike of warfare, politics, economics and of the secular world, men writing half a century after events reported to them by doubtful sources. How much of this popular legend was actually created by an avaricious Church? Was he just a lucky, brutal soldier, or was he instead a gifted English King who could meld cultures and talents? This is a tale of blood, deceit, ambition and power politics which pieces together the self-interested distortion of events, brutalizing conflict and superb strategic acumen by using and analyzing contemporary evidence the like of which is not to be found elsewhere in Europe. By 1072 King William should have been secure upon the English throne, so what went wrong? How did a Norman Duke and a few thousand mercenaries take and hold such a wealthy and populous Kingdom? Even in the ‘Harrowing of the North’, which probably saw the death of tens of thousands, who was really to blame and why did it happen?

The Battle of Hastings, 1066

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Author :
Publisher : Tempus Publishing, Limited
ISBN 13 :
Total Pages : 370 pages
Book Rating : 4.3/5 ( download)

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Book Synopsis The Battle of Hastings, 1066 by : Michael Kenneth Lawson

Download or read book The Battle of Hastings, 1066 written by Michael Kenneth Lawson and published by Tempus Publishing, Limited. This book was released on 2003 with total page 370 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: 1066 remains the most evocative date in English history, when Harold was defeated by William the Conqueror and England changed overnight from Saxon to Norman rule. It has long been believed that, according to the Bayeux Tapestry, Harold was shot in the eye by an arrow. M. K. Lawson argues that the tapestry was badly restored in the 19th century, and that we should not necessarily believe what we see. He goes to sources that depict the tapestry before that restoration and reveals some breathtaking insights which will revolutionize the way we view both the battle and the death of England’s last Saxon king.

The Norman Conquest

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Author :
Publisher : Simon and Schuster
ISBN 13 : 1639364005
Total Pages : 562 pages
Book Rating : 4.6/5 (393 download)

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Book Synopsis The Norman Conquest by : Marc Morris

Download or read book The Norman Conquest written by Marc Morris and published by Simon and Schuster. This book was released on 2022-09-13 with total page 562 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: A riveting and authoritative history of the single most important event in English history: The Norman Conquest. An upstart French duke who sets out to conquer the most powerful and unified kingdom in Christendom. An invasion force on a scale not seen since the days of the Romans. One of the bloodiest and most decisive battles ever fought. This new history explains why the Norman Conquest was the most significant cultural and military episode in English history. Assessing the original evidence at every turn, Marc Morris goes beyond the familiar outline to explain why England was at once so powerful and yet so vulnerable to William the Conqueror’s attack. Morris writes with passion, verve, and scrupulous concern for historical accuracy. This is the definitive account for our times of an extraordinary story, indeed the pivotal moment in the shaping of the English nation.

Battle Story: Hastings 1066

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Author :
Publisher : The History Press
ISBN 13 : 0752478559
Total Pages : 142 pages
Book Rating : 4.7/5 (524 download)

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Book Synopsis Battle Story: Hastings 1066 by : Jonathan Trigg

Download or read book Battle Story: Hastings 1066 written by Jonathan Trigg and published by The History Press. This book was released on 2011-11-30 with total page 142 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: In 1066 the most significant battle on English soil – and arguably the most important in British history – took place some six miles northwest of Hastings. A king would die on the battlefield and a new dynasty would be established. The fighting exemplified the superiority of an all-arms combined attack employing foot soldiers, cavalry and archers against massed infantry. To understand what happened and why – read Battle Story.Photographs of the battlefield today, artist’s interpretations and of course reproductions from the Bayeux tapestry place you in the centre of the action.Easy-to-read maps plot each development in the struggle.Descriptions of the weaponry, armour and tactics of the combatants help explain why the famous housecarls of England were obliterated for all time.Packed with fact boxes, this short introduction is the perfect way to explore a turning point in British and European history.

1066

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Publisher : Pen and Sword Military
ISBN 13 : 1526751984
Total Pages : 279 pages
Book Rating : 4.5/5 (267 download)

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Book Synopsis 1066 by : Michael Livingston

Download or read book 1066 written by Michael Livingston and published by Pen and Sword Military. This book was released on 2021-01-13 with total page 279 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: An illustrated history and guide to the Battle of Hastings by two leading medieval military historians. The Battle of Hastings, fought on 14 October 1066, changed the course of English history. This most famous moment of the Norman Conquest was recorded in graphic detail in the threads of the Bayeux Tapestry, providing a priceless glimpse into a brutal conflict. In this fresh look at the battle and its surrounding campaigns, leading medieval military historians Michael Livingston and Kelly DeVries combine the imagery of the tapestry with the latest modern investigative research to reveal the story of Hastings as it has never been told and guide visitors around the battlefield today. This absorbing new account of the battle will be fascinating reading for anyone keen to find out what really happened in 1066: the journeys by which Harold Godwinson and William of Normandy came to the battlefield, and the latest reconstructions of the course of the fighting on that momentous day. It is also a practical, easy-to-use guide for visitors to the sites associated with the conquest as well as the Hastings battlefield itself. This is essential reading and reference for anyone interested in the battle and the Norman Conquest. “The writing is concise, with many side bars to identify people, explain technical terms, and so forth, and each chapter ends with a recommended tour route. A very good book for anyone who knows little about the conquest, and one which even those well up on the subject may find interesting.” —The NYMAS Review “Followers of Bernard Cornwell’s Dark Ages series, The Last Kingdom, will be absolutely fascinated by Michael and Kelly's book, which fast forwards just a few years to the conquest of England by the Normans. Superbly illustrated.” —Books Monthly

A Little History of the World

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Author :
Publisher : Yale University Press
ISBN 13 : 0300213972
Total Pages : 461 pages
Book Rating : 4.3/5 (2 download)

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Book Synopsis A Little History of the World by : E. H. Gombrich

Download or read book A Little History of the World written by E. H. Gombrich and published by Yale University Press. This book was released on 2014-10-01 with total page 461 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: E. H. Gombrich's Little History of the World, though written in 1935, has become one of the treasures of historical writing since its first publication in English in 2005. The Yale edition alone has now sold over half a million copies, and the book is available worldwide in almost thirty languages. Gombrich was of course the best-known art historian of his time, and his text suggests illustrations on every page. This illustrated edition of the Little History brings together the pellucid humanity of his narrative with the images that may well have been in his mind's eye as he wrote the book. The two hundred illustrations—most of them in full color—are not simple embellishments, though they are beautiful. They emerge from the text, enrich the author's intention, and deepen the pleasure of reading this remarkable work. For this edition the text is reset in a spacious format, flowing around illustrations that range from paintings to line drawings, emblems, motifs, and symbols. The book incorporates freshly drawn maps, a revised preface, and a new index. Blending high-grade design, fine paper, and classic binding, this is both a sumptuous gift book and an enhanced edition of a timeless account of human history.

Why War?

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Author :
Publisher : Oxford University Press
ISBN 13 : 0197644228
Total Pages : 198 pages
Book Rating : 4.1/5 (976 download)

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Book Synopsis Why War? by : Christopher Coker

Download or read book Why War? written by Christopher Coker and published by Oxford University Press. This book was released on 2021-12-01 with total page 198 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: What are humanity's biological origins? What are the mechanisms, including culture, that continue to drive it? What is the history that has allowed it to evolve over time? And what are its functions--how does it survive and thrive by exploiting the features that define it as a species? These are the four questions of the Tinbergen Method for explaining animal behavior, developed by the Nobel Prizewinning Dutch ethologist Niko Tinbergen. This book contends that applying this method to war--which is unique to humans--can help us better understand why conflict is so resilient. Christopher Coker explores these four questions of our past and present, and looks at our post-human future, assessing how far scientific advances in gene-editing, robotics and AI systems will de-center human agency. He concludes that we won't witness war's end until it has exhausted its evolutionary possibilities--meaning that, well into the future, war is likely to remain what Thucydides first called it: 'the human thing'. From the Ancients to Artificial Intelligence, Why War? is an exhilarating tour d'horizon of humankind's propensity to warfare and its behavioral underpinnings, offering new ways of thinking about our species' unique and deadly preoccupation.

The Needle in the Blood

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Author :
Publisher : Sourcebooks, Inc.
ISBN 13 : 1402265921
Total Pages : 542 pages
Book Rating : 4.4/5 (22 download)

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Book Synopsis The Needle in the Blood by : Sarah Bower

Download or read book The Needle in the Blood written by Sarah Bower and published by Sourcebooks, Inc.. This book was released on 2012-03-01 with total page 542 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: His lust for power gave him everything. But it might cost him the love of his life. The Bishop hired her for a simple job: embroider a tapestry. It is an enormous work, a cloth trophy of the conquest of England. But her skill with a needle and thread is legendary. It would be uncomplicated. She plans to kill him as soon as she gets the chance. He and his brother, William the Conqueror, murdered her King and destroyed her world. Revenge, pure and clean. It would be simple. But neither planned to fall desperately in love. As the two become hopelessly entangled, friends become enemies, enemies become lovers, and nothing in life—or the tapestry—is what it seems. An unlikely love story born of passion and intensity, crafted by critically acclaimed historical novelist Sarah Bower,The Needle in the Blood is a "story of love, war, and the tangled truth of England's birth." Praise for Sarah Bower's Sins of the House of Borgia "Sizzling."—USA Today "The sheer grandeur of the papal and Ferrara courts and the spectacle of the Borgia and Ferrara siblings' rivalries and revenges form a glittering take on one of the most notorious families of the Italian Renaissance."—Publisher's Weekly "Bower brilliantly merges history with politics and convincing characters to draw readers into a lush and colorful tapestry of Renaissance life...This powerful piece of fiction ranks with some of the finest of the genre."—RT Book Reviews