The Companies of Death: Mercenaries of the Late Middle Ages
The Right Form of War Series
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The Companies of Death: Mercenaries of the Late Middle Ages
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Narrated by:
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Robert L. Stone Jr.
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By:
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James M. Volo
About this listen
During the rise of feudalism, the best weapon systems of the day had only been available to the select few, usually the lords and knights of the realm who had the income that could support them. As technology advanced, the crossbow, arbalest, and firearms were developed and a relatively untrained foot soldier could kill a knight with a single shot, canceling out a lifetime of mounted discipline. The more egalitarian methods of military organization in the Late Middle Ages and the Rennaisance challenged the nobility’s supremacy on the battlefield and ushered in the age of a more modern form of warfare with its more cynical and predatory aspect — the professional mercenary.
The true interest in the centuries of the High Middle Ages lies with the gradual evolution of new forms of military efficiency, which ended in the establishment of a military caste as the chief power in war and the human mechanism of government. The 15th century in particular was an era of change in military science. Many of the same forces that inspired the Renaissance in science, art, literature, governance, and society brought about changes in the right form of war. It was in this environment that the condottieri flourished. These mercenary bands of professional warriors largely replaced the knights of a more chivalric era.
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-
History's Greatest Generals
- 10 Commanders Who Conquered Empires, Revolutionized Warfare, and Changed History Forever
- By: Michael Rank
- Narrated by: Kevin Pierce
- Length: 5 hrs and 31 mins
- Unabridged
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Overall4 out of 5 stars 55
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Performance4 out of 5 stars 49
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Story4 out of 5 stars 49
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.
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5 out of 5 stars
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Great Book
- By MICHAEL H on 01-27-14
By: Michael Rank
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Carnage and Culture
- Landmark Battles in the Rise to Western Power
- By: Victor Davis Hanson
- Narrated by: Bob Souer
- Length: 20 hrs and 32 mins
- Unabridged
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Overall5 out of 5 stars 310
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Performance5 out of 5 stars 278
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Story5 out of 5 stars 277
Examining nine landmark battles from ancient to modern times - from Salamis, where outnumbered Greeks devastated the slave army of Xerxes, to Cortes' conquest of Mexico to the Tet offensive - Victor Davis Hanson explains why the armies of the West have been the most lethal and effective of any fighting forces in the world. Looking beyond popular explanations such as geography or superior technology, Hanson argues that it is in fact Western culture and values which have consistently produced superior arms and soldiers.
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5 out of 5 stars
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Wow! This truly is a great book. A rarity!
- By GEJ on 11-12-19
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The Cambridge History of Warfare
- By: Geoffrey Parker
- Narrated by: Andrew Cullum
- Length: 21 hrs and 29 mins
- Unabridged
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Overall4.5 out of 5 stars 69
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Performance4.5 out of 5 stars 60
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Story4.5 out of 5 stars 60
The new edition of The Cambridge History of Warfare, written and updated by a team of eight distinguished military historians, examines how war was waged by Western powers across a sweeping timeframe beginning with classical Greece and Rome, moving through the Middle Ages and the early modern period, down to the wars of the 21st century in Afghanistan, Iraq, and Syria.
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3 out of 5 stars
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Too anglocentric
- By A. Siegel on 10-27-22
By: Geoffrey Parker
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The Horde
- How the Mongols Changed the World
- By: Marie Favereau
- Narrated by: Anne Flosnik
- Length: 12 hrs and 8 mins
- Unabridged
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Overall4.5 out of 5 stars 69
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Performance4 out of 5 stars 58
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Story4.5 out of 5 stars 58
Favereau takes us inside one of the most powerful sources of cross-border integration in world history. The Horde was the central node in the Eurasian commercial boom of the 13th and 14th centuries and was a conduit for exchanges across thousands of miles. Its unique political regime - a complex power-sharing arrangement among the khan and the nobility - rewarded skillful administrators and diplomats and fostered an economic order that was mobile, organized, and innovative.
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5 out of 5 stars
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Golden Horde complete history, well done
- By Amazon Customer on 03-10-22
By: Marie Favereau
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A History of Warfare
- By: John Keegan
- Narrated by: Frederick Davidson
- Length: 19 hrs and 12 mins
- Unabridged
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Overall4 out of 5 stars 343
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Performance4 out of 5 stars 216
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Story4 out of 5 stars 212
Starting with the premise that all civilizations owe their origins to warmaking, Keegan probes the meanings, motivations, and methods underlying war in different societies over the course of more than two thousand years. Following the progress of human aggression in its full historical sweep, from the strangely ritualistic combat of Stone Age peoples to the warfare of mass destruction in the present age, his illuminating and lively narrative gives us all the world's great warrior cultures.
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3 out of 5 stars
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Not what I expected
- By Mark on 12-05-06
By: John Keegan
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God's Shadow
- Sultan Selim, His Ottoman Empire, and the Making of the Modern World
- By: Alan Mikhail
- Narrated by: James Cameron Stewart
- Length: 16 hrs and 11 mins
- Unabridged
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Overall4.5 out of 5 stars 227
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Performance4.5 out of 5 stars 192
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Story4.5 out of 5 stars 190
Long neglected in world history, the Ottoman Empire was a hub of intellectual fervor, geopolitical power, and enlightened pluralistic rule. Yet, despite its towering influence and centrality to the rise of our modern world, the Ottoman Empire's history has for centuries been distorted, misrepresented, and even suppressed in the West. Now Alan Mikhail presents a vitally needed recasting of Ottoman history, retelling the story of the Ottoman conquest of the world through the dramatic biography of Sultan Selim I (1470-1520).
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1 out of 5 stars
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Entertaining narrative, but poor scholarship
- By Yosemite on 09-15-20
By: Alan Mikhail
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Empires of the Weak
- The Real Story of European Expansion and the Creation of the New World
- By: J. C. Sharman
- Narrated by: John Lee
- Length: 6 hrs and 26 mins
- Unabridged
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Overall4.5 out of 5 stars 42
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Performance4.5 out of 5 stars 37
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Story4.5 out of 5 stars 37
What accounts for the rise of the state, the creation of the first global system, and the dominance of the West? The conventional answer asserts that superior technology, tactics, and institutions forged by Darwinian military competition gave Europeans a decisive advantage in war from 1500 onward. Empires of the Weak argues that Europeans had no general military superiority in the early modern era. Sharman shows instead that European expansion is better explained by deference to strong Asian and African polities, disease in the Americas, and maritime supremacy earned by default.
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5 out of 5 stars
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a great read
- By José de Ribera on 02-02-23
By: J. C. Sharman
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The Napoleonic Wars
- By: Alexander Mikaberidze
- Narrated by: Steven Crossley
- Length: 35 hrs and 10 mins
- Unabridged
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Overall4.5 out of 5 stars 400
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Performance4.5 out of 5 stars 324
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Story4.5 out of 5 stars 321
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.
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2 out of 5 stars
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No description of battles
- By John Gaston on 01-15-21
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The Fall of the Roman Empire
- A New History of Rome and the Barbarians
- By: Peter Heather
- Narrated by: Allan Robertson
- Length: 21 hrs and 43 mins
- Unabridged
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Overall4 out of 5 stars 484
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Performance4.5 out of 5 stars 433
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Story4.5 out of 5 stars 431
The death of the Roman Empire is one of the perennial mysteries of world history. Now, in this groundbreaking book, Peter Heather proposes a stunning new solution: Centuries of imperialism turned the neighbors Rome called barbarians into an enemy capable of dismantling an Empire that had dominated their lives for so long. A leading authority on the late Roman Empire and on the barbarians, Heather relates the extraordinary story of how Europe's barbarians, transformed by centuries of contact with Rome on every possible level, eventually pulled the empire apart.
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1 out of 5 stars
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A New HIstory but not a better history
- By Mario on 03-28-14
By: Peter Heather
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Frederick the Great
- A Military History
- By: Dennis Showalter
- Narrated by: Joe Barrett
- Length: 13 hrs and 31 mins
- Unabridged
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Overall4 out of 5 stars 66
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Performance4.5 out of 5 stars 55
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Story4.5 out of 5 stars 55
Frederick the Great is one of history's most important leaders. Famed for his military successes and domestic reforms, his campaigns were a watershed in the history of Europe, securing Prussia's place as a continental power and inaugurating a new pattern of total war that was to endure until 1916. However, much myth surrounds this enigmatic man's personality and his role as politician, warrior, and king.
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2 out of 5 stars
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Thrashed insensibly by over writing
- By Jeff Lacy on 09-27-20
By: Dennis Showalter
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Powers and Thrones
- A New History of the Middle Ages
- By: Dan Jones
- Narrated by: Dan Jones
- Length: 24 hrs and 25 mins
- Unabridged
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Overall4.5 out of 5 stars 1,662
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Performance5 out of 5 stars 1,434
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Story5 out of 5 stars 1,428
When the once-mighty city of Rome was sacked by barbarians in 410 and lay in ruins, it signaled the end of an era—and the beginning of a thousand years of profound transformation. In a gripping narrative bursting with big names—from St Augustine and Attila the Hun to the Prophet Muhammad and Eleanor of Aquitaine—Dan Jones charges through the history of the Middle Ages. Powers and Thrones takes listeners on a journey through an emerging Europe, the great capitals of late Antiquity, as well as the influential cities of the Islamic West.
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5 out of 5 stars
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Hard to take a break from it!
- By Mariano's Music on 12-09-21
By: Dan Jones
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Philip and Alexander
- Kings and Conquerors
- By: Adrian Goldsworthy
- Narrated by: Neil Dickson
- Length: 20 hrs and 36 mins
- Unabridged
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Overall5 out of 5 stars 457
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Performance5 out of 5 stars 394
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Story5 out of 5 stars 393
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.
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4 out of 5 stars
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Horrible narrator
- By Anonymous User on 01-05-21
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The Byzantine Empire
- By: Charles Oman
- Narrated by: Charlton Griffin
- Length: 9 hrs and 22 mins
- Unabridged
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Overall4.5 out of 5 stars 53
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Performance4.5 out of 5 stars 46
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Story4.5 out of 5 stars 47
The Byzantine Empire survived as a self-contained political entity longer than any other in the history of Christianity. This history by Charles Oman is a catalog of good, bad, and indifferent emperors who either pushed Byzantine Civilization to new heights or savagely drove it to defeat and dissolution. It is a strange tale populated by some of the most interesting men and women who have ever lived.
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4 out of 5 stars
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adequate good book. great reader
- By Felisa Kay on 01-30-21
By: Charles Oman
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In God's Path
- The Arab Conquests and the Creation of an Islamic Empire
- By: Robert G. Hoyland
- Narrated by: Peter Ganim
- Length: 9 hrs and 54 mins
- Unabridged
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Overall4 out of 5 stars 233
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Performance4 out of 5 stars 203
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Story4 out of 5 stars 205
In just over a hundred years - from the death of Muhammad in 632 to the beginning of the Abbasid Caliphate in 750 - the followers of the Prophet swept across the whole of the Middle East, North Africa, and Spain. Their armies threatened states as far flung as the Franks in Western Europe and the Tang Empire in China. The conquered territory was larger than the Roman Empire at its greatest expansion, and it was claimed for the Arabs in roughly half the time.
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4 out of 5 stars
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Islamic conquest history from the outside
- By SAMA on 01-22-15
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Napoleon
- A Concise Biography
- By: David A. Bell
- Narrated by: Paul Heitsch
- Length: 4 hrs and 30 mins
- Unabridged
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Overall4.5 out of 5 stars 194
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Performance4.5 out of 5 stars 166
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Story4.5 out of 5 stars 165
David Bell emphasizes the astonishing sense of human possibility that Napoleon represented. Bell emphasizes the importance of the French Revolution in understanding Napoleon's career. The revolution made possible the unprecedented concentration of political authority that Napoleon accrued. Without the political changes brought about by the revolution, Napoleon could not have fought his wars. Without the wars, he could not have seized and held onto power. Though his virtual dictatorship betrayed the ideals of liberty and equality, his life and career were revolutionary.
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5 out of 5 stars
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Perfect introduction to Napoleon
- By DJP on 10-17-20
By: David A. Bell
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The Savior Generals
- How Five Great Commanders Saved Wars That Were Lost - From Ancient Greece to Iraq
- By: Victor Davis Hanson
- Narrated by: Bob Souer
- Length: 10 hrs and 24 mins
- Unabridged
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Overall4.5 out of 5 stars 344
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Performance4.5 out of 5 stars 307
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Story4.5 out of 5 stars 306
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.
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4 out of 5 stars
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A good history book tells about human nature.
- By Doruk Denkel on 03-03-20