Furies

War in Europe, 1450-1700

By: Lauro Martines

Narrated by: Simon Brooks

During the European Renaissance, an age marked equally by revolutionary thought and constant warfare, it was armies, rather than philosophers, who shaped the modern European nation state. "Mobile cities" of mercenaries and other paid soldiers - made up of astonishingly diverse aggregations of ethnicities and nationalities - marched across the land, looting and savaging enemy territories.

In the 15th century, Poland hired German, Spanish, Bohemian, Hungarian, and Scottish soldiers. Later, Sweden fought in Muscovy with Irish, English, Scottish, French, and German troops. Units of Croats, Germans, Walloons, Albanians, and especially Swiss, served in French armies. In the Netherlands, Italians and Spaniards fought beside Irishmen, Germans, Dalmatians, and Walloons. Regiments of Swiss pikemen fought for Spain, France, and Venice, as well as for German and Italian princes. Companies of Poles, Hungarians, and Croatians fought in German regiments.

Growing national economies, unable to pay or feed massed armies for any length of time, thus became war states, an early nationalism which would later consume modern Europe. Furies: War in Europe, 1450-1700, by acclaimed historian of the Renaissance Lauro Martines, compellingly and simply delivers the story of modern Europe's martial roots, capturing the brutality of early modern war and how it shaped the history of a continent.

©2013 Lauro Martines (P)2013 Audible, Inc.

I wish I had purchased the actual book rather than the audiobook

First, the good. The book is a serious attempt to view war from the perspective of those who experienced it. It is very much not a story about great men - they are mentioned but not dwelt on. Instead the author draws on diaries and accounts of events in towns and villages and the countryside during a war and does an excellent job of conveying the horribleness of war's effect on the population. He clearly has a point of view and expresses it, but it's hard to listen to many of the truly awful accounts he quotes and not sympathize.

Now for the bad. The narrator is awful. I have listened to many books and have suffered through some bad narrators, but this is on an entirely new level. He seems incapable of pronouncing words correctly. A few examples I noted today during about 1.5 hours of listening.

Cill-ih-see-ah - for the location Silesia (Sigh-lee-see-ah or Sigh-lee-zha)
Back-ill-us - for the word "bacillus"
Nah-vair for "Navarre"
Cath-lick-ism for "Catholicism"
Veh-nal for "venal"

If I could give the performance 0 stars I would. I wish I'd purchased the e-book or the physical book. I would probably come back and re-read it, but I definitely can't listen to this reading of this book again

Narrator needs to go back to grade school

Would you try another book from Lauro Martines and/or Simon Brooks?

From Lauro Martines, yes. From Simon Brooks, no.

How did the narrator detract from the book?

A brilliant book with a clown of a narrator. Bad enough that the narrator couldn't master common place names (Genoa, Lombardy, Perugia, etc.) his mispronunciation of simple English words was even more jarring. Martines is a first-rate scholar: he deserves better.

Any additional comments?

Audible needs to screen its narrators.

The Highest Quality History

The purpose of this book is perfectly cultivated by a Master. Geoffrey Parker quality. Note- this book is not about Kings, Princes, and Warlords with their complex dynastic (selfish) feuds, it's about regular people in the renaissance period and how they survived the complex warfare of raging Elites. Augsburg, Magdeburg, Brescia, Siena, and the story of one German village.

Chapter 11 should be read by every history enthusiast to understand how we got our current maps and properly understand the motivations of historical elites. The elites cared not much for their regular people and thought them vile and expendable. Sacrificing them to violence and chaos really meant nothing in their world view. Phillip II, Francis, Medici, Gustavus Adolphus, Fluger, Cardinal Richelieu. Chapter 11 is best compact chapter of historical economics I have ever read.

There is also a scholarly treatment of the pseudo religious context for the 30 years war. Who were the Furies? What were the motivations of desperate, hungry men in tatters as Central Europe was devastated 500 years ago? You get intelligent, thoughtful analysis.

It would be cool for Dan Brown to write a bottom up interpretation of the War of the Roses. Did regular folks really care about the Warwicks, Tudors, and Lancasters that made so much havoc for them?

Ok

Book was written well but went outside the timeframe of the subtitle frequently. The narrator often mispronounced words which was annoying and he was a little sleepy.

Great Social-Military History

Focuses on the daily reality of European war for common people, both soldiers and civilians.

Better off with Hardcore History podcast

My first bad review...

This book feels random and sensational. The reader is mediocre.

I'm not very picky with this kind of stuff if I want to learn about the subject, but this book is exceptionally bad.

If you want to learn about the common solder in this era, try Dan Carlin's Hardcore History (which is amazing), and if you want to learn about the time period and it's wars, try the Great Courses series from Audible.