I first became interested in Byzantium in high school, when I read Edward Gibbonās Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire, and Iāve been interested in Byzantine subjects ever since. Iāve traveled to almost every country that was once part of the Byzantine Empire, all around the Mediterranean seaboard. Iāve written ten books and many articles on Byzantine politics, Byzantine scholarship, Byzantine literature, the Byzantine economy, the Byzantine army, Byzantine religion, and Byzantine art (with my wife, a Byzantine art historian). Itās such an enormous field, spanning thirteen centuries, three continents, and Greek, Roman, Christian, and many other cultures, that thereās always something new, surprising, and marvelous to discover.
If you want a comprehensive reference work on Byzantium, this is much the best, with short articles on every aspect of Byzantine civilization that you can think of and on many aspects that you wouldnāt have thought of. Kazhdan, who emigrated from Russia to America, was the most learned of recent Byzantinists and was interested in almost everything about his chosen field. Although a great many scholars contributed to this dictionary, Kazhdanās point of view and profound erudition influenced almost every article.
Anyone interested in Byzantium (and some readers who hadnāt realized that they would be interested) will spend hours looking through these three volumes and will consider those hours well spent.
The Oxford Dictionary of Byzantium is the most comprehensive dictionary available on Byzantine civilization. It features more than 5,000 entries written by an international group of eminent Byzantinists covering all aspects of life in the Byzantine world. Major entries treat such topics such as agriculture, art, literature, and politics, whilte shorter entries examine topics that relate to Byzantium, such as the history of Kiev and personalities of ancient and biblical history. It is truly interdisciplinary with entries on patriarchy and emperors sitting alongside those on surgery and musical instruments. Each article is followed by a bibliography, and numerous maps, tables,ā¦
I am a retired professor, was raised in a refugee camp, one of a family of 9 living in one tent. studied in Palestine, Egypt, Germany, and America, have Ph.D. in economics; scholarships financed my education journey. I lived a life no human has lived or can live, because some of the times I lived had come and gone and cannot come back again. I taught at 11 universities on 4 continents, published 60 books in Arabic and English: books on economics, politics, culture, history, conflict resolution, philosophy, racism, novels, and poetry. True intellectuals cannot stay in one area because issues that shape mankind's history and manās destiny are interconnected.
A History of Knowledge is a treasure that invites everyone to explore and enjoy. It recounts the history of human progress from primitive times to the 21st century. Van Doren covers the history of ideas, inventions, civilizations, ideologies, and issues of justice, war, and slavery. Almost no famous thinker, emperor, philosopher, inventor, or artist is not mentioned, and his contribution examined.These are two of my favorite quotations; āOur fathers started the revolution, and we are still living it. We could not stop it even if we wanted to.ā āThe rich are never rich enough... to have enough is simply to be content with what you have. When wanting comes first, you can never have enough. If contentment is placed first, it does not matter how much you have.ā
A one-voume reference to the history of ideas that is a compendium of everything that humankind has thought, invented, created, considered, and perfected from the beginning of civilization into the twenty-first century. Massive in its scope, and yet totally accessible, A HISTORY OF KNOWLEDGE covers not only all the great theories and discoveries of the human race, but also explores the social conditions, political climates, and individual men and women of genius that brought ideas to fruition throughout history.
"Crystal clear and concise...Explains how humankind got to know what it knows."
Clifton Fadiman
Selected by the Book-of-the-Month Club and theā¦
Iām a British scholar ā a former university lecturer, many moons ago ā now living in rural southern Greece. In fact, I have Greek as well as UK citizenship, which really pleases me because Iāve loved Greece and things Greek since boyhood. I started to learn ancient Greek at the age of ten! Iāve written over fifty books, mostly on ancient Greek history and philosophy, including many volumes of translations from ancient Greek. But Iāve also written childrenās fiction in the form of gamebooks, a biography, a book on hypnosis, a retelling of the Greek myths (with my wife Kathryn) ... Iāll stop there!
This is an outstanding short introduction to Greek history ā with a really neat gimmick. Instead of writing a standard kind of history, Cartledge picks on the eleven most prominent cities of ancient Greece and writes up their story in about ten or twelve pages. But the chapters are also organized chronologically, so that the first two cities, Cnossos and Mycenae, illustrate Greek prehistory. Then we move on to the Archaic Period (four places, including Sparta), then the Classical Period (three, including Athens), and then the Hellenistic period (one: Alexandria, the greatest city in the world before Rome). He ends with a leap into late antiquity and the eastern Roman empire with Byzantium. Iām always on the lookout for books that can turn people on to Greek history, get them to share my (and Cartledgeās) passion: this one does it brilliantly.
The contribution of the Ancient Greeks to modern western culture is incalculable. In the worlds of art, architecture, myth, literature, and philosophy, the world we live in would be unrecognizably different without the formative influence of Ancient Greek models.
Ancient Greek civilization was defined by the city - in Greek, the polis, from which we derive 'politics'. It is above all this feature of Greek civilization that has formed its most enduring legacy, spawning such key terms as aristocracy, oligarchy, tyranny and - last but by no means least - democracy.
This stimulating Very Short Introduction to Ancient Greece takesā¦
My interest in the ancient Near East began when I was about 8 years old. One day, when couldnāt find anything to do, I started paging through a book on Assyrian art that I found in one of my parentsā bookcases. I was hooked. I wanted to know what made those mysterious ancients tick. How did they understand the world they inhabited? How did they live? What made them fight so hard and so often? I became an Assyriologist in order to answer those questions, and Iāve been working toward that goal ever since.
The atlas introduces the reader to Near Eastern geography, history, and culture, and it complements the other books included here. Roaf maps (literally and figuratively) the various cultures of the Near East during ancient times. His commentary is interesting and the maps beautifully produced, easy to interpret, and accurate. They cover a wide range of data including climate and environment, natural resources, linguistic and cultural information, trade routes, and the territories of different polities. Take some time to explore the atlas; you will not regret it.
An exploration into the geography, history, archaeology and anthropology of the Near East from pre-history to 330 BC. Coverage includes early farming, the move towards civilization, the urban explosion, warring states, trade, international empires and conquerors from East and West.
