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Cleopatra and Antony: Power, Love, and Politics in the Ancient World Diana Preston On a stiflingly hot day in August, 30 B.C., the thirty-nine-year-old Queen of Egypt, Cleopatra, took her own life, rather than be paraded in chains through Rome by her conqueror, Octavian, the future emperor Augustus. A few days earlier, her lover of eleven years, Mark Antony, had died in her arms following his own botched suicide attempt. Oceans of mythology have grown up around them, all of which Diana Preston puts to rest in her stirring history of the lives and times of a couple whose names—more than two millennia later—still invoke passion, curiosity, and intrigue. This book sets the romance and tragedy of Antony and Cleopatra's personal lives within the context of their political times. There are many contemporary resonances: the relationship between East and West and the nature of empire, the concealment of personal ambition beneath the watchword of liberty, documents forged, edited or disposed of, special relationships established, constitutional forms and legal niceties invoked when it suited. Indeed their lives and deaths had deep political ramifications, and they offer a revealing perspective on a tipping point in Roman politics and on the consolidation of the Roman Empire. Three hundred years would pass before the east would, with the rise of Constantinople and the Byzantine Empire, once again take a share of political power in the Mediterranean. In an intriguing postscript, Preston speculates on what might have happened had Antony and Cleopatra defeated Octavian at the Battle of Actium in 31 B.C. |
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The Kingdom of Numidia (The Forgotten Civilisations of Africa) Bob Idjennaden Besides Egypt, many other great civilizations once existed in Africa.
Some of these autochthonous civilizations (genuinely African in their roots) built pyramids akin to the Egyptian ones, some built great cities (the remains of which can still be visited today) and some even invented their own writing systems thousands of years ago…
This first civilisation to be studied in this series is the Kingdom of Numidia. The best known also because many ancient texts (Carthaginian, Greek and Roman) mention it.
Numidia existed centuries BC and in its long history got involved in many wars and notably in the Punic wars between Rome and the Carthaginians. Both rivals tried to get the support of the powerful Numidian kings.
One of these king called Massinissa was so famous that his love story with Sophonisbe (daughter of the enemy Hasdrubal Gisco, a Carthaginian general) was turned into a play by Corneille and some even mutter it might be the basis for the story "Romeo and Juliet"....
If you are somebody that likes to discover things genuinely new and different, then you will love this book! |
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Buried Kingdoms of The Garamantes (The Forgotten Civilisations of Africa) Bob Idjennaden The Garamantes are the sole people that managed to create a civilisation in the middle of the Sahara desert (with even their own style of pyramids akin to those of Egypt!)
They only had temporary rivers (wadis) but they managed to develop an ingenious underground water system that allowed them to tap water directly from the table water that lies tens of meters (sometimes hundreds of meters) under the surface.
They were also great warriors that roamed the desert in their chariots tracked by horses and they collected a toll from all the numerous caravans that needed to cross their vast empire (that stretches as far as Sudan).
They were so powerful that Rome had to intervene if they wanted to remain the dominant civilisation in North Africa...which was not easy! |
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Death on a Wind: The Numidians of the Second Punic War Charles King Charles R. King utilizes his academic education in physics and classical history to apply an original quantitative and empirical face to the study of one of the most celebrated and feared elements in classical history, the Numidian Cavalry. Accessible to both the professional historian and the buff, this 20 page analysis enables the reader to approach the Numidians of the Second Punic War from a new and different outlook and even allows the reader to understand how they fought and why they were so effective and devastating to the Romans. The author utilizes primary sources and examination of the weapons and society of the Numidians to provide unique insights.
Charles R. King's specific area of interest has always been the Roman Republic period and the Punic Wars which have fascinated him since childhood. This work not only utilizes his education and academic background, but also takes advantage of his experience as a career military officer and of physical visits to many of the significant sites of the Punic Wars. |
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The Kings of Mauretania (The Forgotten Civilisations of Africa) Bob Idjennaden The Kingdom of Numidia was the most powerful autochthonous civilisation in North Africa until Rome set foot on the African soil. Numidia became even too powerful for its own good and Rome (that just got rid of its rival Carthage) did not intend to let a new rival develop in its vicinity.
Rome fought many times against the Numidian kings and at some stage they managed to occupy completely their lands.
After that Numidia disappeared completely from the maps but the neighbouring kingdom of Mauretania survived and grew in power and in importance. Mauretania and Rome co-existed “in peace” for a while but at some stage, the Romans, decided to expand further in Africa and moved towards… Mauretania.
This book will deal with this other great civilisation (too little known too) that existed more than 2000 years ago. |
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The Shores of Tripoli (Kindle Single) Marc Herman Marc Herman, who covered the Libyan revolution for The Atlantic, shines a light on the stories of three rebels and their perilous path to freedom on the road to Tripoli--culminating in Qaddafi's death and the rebels' triumph. |
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The Wretched of the Earth Frantz Fanon A distinguished psychiatrist from Martinique who took part in the Algerian Nationalist Movement, Frantz Fanon was one of the most important theorists of revolutionary struggle, colonialism, and racial difference in history. Fanon's masterwork is a classic alongside Edward Said's Orientalism or The Autobiography of Malcolm X, and it is now available in a new translation that updates its language for a new generation of readers. The Wretched of the Earth is a brilliant analysis of the psychology of the colonized and their path to liberation. Bearing singular insight into the rage and frustration of colonized peoples, and the role of violence in effecting historical change, the book incisively attacks the twin perils of post independence colonial politics: the disenfranchisement of the masses by the elites on the one hand, and intertribal and interfaith animosities on the other. Fanon's analysis, a veritable handbook of social reorganization for leaders of emerging nations, has been reflected all too clearly in the corruption and violence that has plagued present-day Africa. The Wretched of the Earth has had a major impact on civil rights, anticolonialism, and black consciousness movements around the world, and this bold new translation by Richard Philcox reaffirms it as a landmark. |
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Carthage Must Be Destroyed: The Rise and Fall of an Ancient Civilization Richard Miles 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.
Drawing on a wealth of new archaeological research, Richard Miles vividly brings to life this lost empire-from its origins among the Phoenician settlements of Lebanon to its apotheosis as the greatest seapower in the Mediterranean. And at the heart of the history of Carthage lies the extraordinary figure of Hannibal-the scourge of Rome and one of the greatest military leaders, but a man who also unwittingly led his people to catastrophe.
The first full-scale history of Carthage in decades, Carthage Must Be Destroyed reintroduces modern readers to the larger-than-life historical players and the ancient glory of this almost forgotten civilization.
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An Army at Dawn: The War in North Africa, 1942-1943, Volume One of the Liberation Trilogy Rick Atkinson In the first volume of his monumental trilogy about the liberation of Europe in WW II, Pulitzer Prize winner Rick Atkinson tells the riveting story of the war in North Africa
The liberation of Europe and the destruction of the Third Reich is a story of courage and enduring triumph, of calamity and miscalculation. In this first volume of the Liberation Trilogy, Rick Atkinson shows why no modern reader can understand the ultimate victory of the Allied powers without a grasp of the great drama that unfolded in North Africa in 1942 and 1943. That first year of the Allied war was a pivotal point in American history, the moment when the United States began to act like a great power.
Beginning with the daring amphibious invasion in November 1942, An Army at Dawn follows the American and British armies as they fight the French in Morocco and Algeria, and then take on the Germans and Italians in Tunisia. Battle by battle, an inexperienced and sometimes poorly led army gradually becomes a superb fighting force. Central to the tale are the extraordinary but fallible commanders who come to dominate the battlefield: Eisenhower, Patton, Bradley, Montgomery, and Rommel.
Brilliantly researched, rich with new material and vivid insights, Atkinson's narrative provides the definitive history of the war in North Africa. An Army at Dawn is the winner of the 2003 Pulitzer Prize for History. |
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They Poured Fire on Us From the Sky: The Story of Three Lost Boys from Sudan Benjamin Ajak, Benson Deng, Alephonsian Deng, Judy Bernstein Benjamin, Alepho, and Benson were raised among the Dinka tribe of Sudan. Their world was an insulated, close-knit community of grass-roofed cottages, cattle herders, and tribal councils. The lions and pythons that prowled beyond the village fences were the greatest threat they knew. All that changed the night the government-armed Murahiliin began attacking their villages. Amid the chaos, screams, conflagration, and gunfire, five-year-old Benson and seven-year-old Benjamin fled into the dark night. Two years later, Alepho, age seven, was forced to do the same. Across the Southern Sudan, over the next five years, thousands of other boys did likewise, joining this stream of child refugees that became known as the Lost Boys. Their journey would take them over one thousand miles across a war-ravaged country, through landmine-sown paths, crocodile-infested waters, and grotesque extremes of hunger, thirst, and disease. The refugee camps they eventually filtered through offered little respite from the brutality they were fleeing. In They Poured Fire on Us From the Sky, Alepho, Benson, and Benjamin, by turn, recount their experiences along this unthinkable journey. They vividly recall the family, friends, and tribal world they left far behind them and their desperate efforts to keep track of one another. This is a captivating memoir of Sudan and a powerful portrait of war as seen through the eyes of children. And it is, in the end, an inspiring and unforgettable tribute to the tenacity of even the youngest human spirits. |