Download or read book The Lost Battles written by Jonathan Jones and published by Vintage. This book was released on 2012-10-23 with total page 427 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: From one of Britain’s most respected and acclaimed art historians, art critic of The Guardian—the galvanizing story of a sixteenth-century clash of titans, the two greatest minds of the Renaissance, working side by side in the same room in a fierce competition: the master Leonardo da Vinci, commissioned by the Florentine Republic to paint a narrative fresco depicting a famous military victory on a wall of the newly built Great Council Hall in the Palazzo Vecchio, and his implacable young rival, the thirty-year-old Michelangelo. We see Leonardo, having just completed The Last Supper, and being celebrated by all of Florence for his miraculous portrait of the wife of a textile manufacturer. That painting—the Mona Lisa—being called the most lifelike anyone had ever seen yet, more divine than human, was captivating the entire Florentine Republic. And Michelangelo, completing a commissioned statue of David, the first colossus of the Renaissance, the archetype hero for the Republic epitomizing the triumph of the weak over the strong, helping to reshape the public identity of the city of Florence and conquer its heart. In The Lost Battles, published in England to great acclaim (“Superb”—The Observer; “Beguilingly written”—The Guardian), Jonathan Jones brilliantly sets the scene of the time—the politics; the world of art and artisans; and the shifting, agitated cultural landscape. We see Florence, a city freed from the oppressive reach of the Medicis, lurching from one crisis to another, trying to protect its liberty in an Italy descending into chaos, with the new head of the Republic in search of a metaphor that will make clear the glory that is Florence, and seeing in the commissioned paintings the expression of his vision. Jones reconstructs the paintings that Leonardo and Michelangelo undertook—Leonardo’s Battle of Anghiari, a nightmare seen in the eyes of the warrior (it became the first modern depiction of the disenchantment of war) and Michelangelo’s Battle of Cascina, a call to arms and the first great transfiguration of the erotic into art. Jones writes about the competition; how it unfolded and became the defining moment in the transformation of “craftsman” to “artist”; why the Florentine government began to fall out of love with one artist in favor of the other; and how—and why—in a competition that had no formal prize to clearly resolve the outcome, the battle became one for the hearts and minds of the Florentine Republic, with Michelangelo setting out to prove that his work, not Leonardo’s, embodied the future of art. Finally, we see how the result of the competition went on to shape a generation of narrative paintings, beginning with those of Raphael. A riveting exploration into one of history’s most resonant exchanges of ideas, a rich, fascinating book that gives us a whole new understanding of an age and those at its center.
Download or read book Lost Battles written by Philip Sabin and published by Bloomsbury Publishing. This book was released on 2015-02-05 with total page 527 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: From the author's introduction: Ancient battles seize the modern imagination. Far from being forgotten, they have become a significant aspect of popular culture, prompting a continuing stream of books, feature films, television programs and board and computer games... there is a certain escapist satisfaction in looking back to an era when conflicts between entire states turned on clear-cut pitched battles between formed armies, lasting just a few hours and spanning just a few miles of ground. These battles were still unspeakably traumatic and grisly affairs for those involved - at Cannae, Hannibal's men butchered around two and a half times as many Romans (out of a much smaller overall population) as there were British soldiers killed on the notorious first day of the Somme. However, as with the great clashes of the Napoleonic era, time has dulled our preoccupation with such awful human consequences, and we tend to focus instead on the inspired generalship of commanders like Alexander and Caesar and on the intriguing tactical interactions of units such as massed pikemen and war elephants within the very different military context of pre-gunpowder warfare. Lost Battles takes a new and innovative approach to the battles of antiquity. Using his experience with conflict simulation, Philip Sabin draws together ancient evidence and modern scholarship to construct a generic, grand tactical model of the battles as a whole. This model unites a mathematical framework, to capture the movement and combat of the opposing armies, with human decisions to shape the tactics of the antagonists. Sabin then develops detailed scenarios for 36 individual battles such as Marathon and Cannae, and uses the comparative structure offered by the generic model to help cast light on which particular interpretations of the ancient sources on issues such as army size fit in best with the general patterns observed elsewhere. Readers can use the model to experiment for themselves by re-fighting engagements of their choice, tweaking the scenarios to accord with their own judgment of the evidence, trying out different tactics from those used historically, and seeing how the battle then plays out. Lost Battles thus offers a unique dynamic insight into ancient warfare, combining academic rigor with the interest and accessibility of simulation gaming. This book includes access to a downloadable computer simulation where the reader can view the author's simulations as well create their own.
Download or read book Lost Christianities written by Bart D. Ehrman and published by Oxford University Press, USA. This book was released on 2005 with total page 324 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The early Christian Church was a chaos of contending beliefs. In Lost Christianities, Bart D. Ehrman offers a fascinating look at these early forms of Christianity and shows how they came to be suppressed, reformed, or forgotten. All of these groups insisted that they upheld the teachings of Jesus and his apostles, and they all possessed writings that bore out their claims, books reputedly produced by Jesus' own followers. Scrupulously researched and lucidly written, Lost Christianities is an eye-opening account of politics, power, and the clash of ideas among Christians in the decades before one group came to see its views prevail.
Download or read book Oathmark written by Joseph A. McCullough and published by Bloomsbury Publishing. This book was released on 2020-04-30 with total page 194 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Empires have fallen, and the land is broken. The great oathmarks that once stood as testaments to the allegiances and might of nations have crumbled into ruin. In this lost age, fealty and loyalty are as valuable as gold and as deadly as cold iron, and war is ever-present. Created by Joseph A. McCullough, designer of Frostgrave and Frostgrave: Ghost Archipelago, Oathmark is a mass-battle fantasy wargame that puts you in command of the fantasy army you've always wanted, whether a company of stalwart dwarves or a mixed force with proud elves, noble men, and wild goblins standing shoulder-to-shoulder in the battle-line. Fight through an integrated campaign system and develop your realms from battle to battle, adding new territories, recruiting new troop types, and growing to eclipse your rivals... or lose what you fought so hard to gain and fall as so many would-be emperors before you.
Download or read book Battles Lost and Won written by Hanson Weightman Baldwin and published by Robson Books Limited. This book was released on 2000-06 with total page 552 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This text by a Pulitzer prize-winning military writer, evaluates 11 crucial battles of World War II. They represent a cross-section, from the Battle of Britain and the airborne invasion of Crete to Okinawa and the D Day landings, combining dramatic immediacy with the wisdom of hindsight.
Download or read book Losing Battles written by Eudora Welty and published by Vintage. This book was released on 2011-07-20 with total page 449 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Three generations of Granny Vaughn's descendants gather at her Mississippi home to celebrate her 90th birthday. Possessed of the true storyteller's gift, the members of this clan cannot resist the temptation to swap tales.
Download or read book Germany s Defeat in the First World War written by Mark D. Karau and published by Bloomsbury Publishing USA. This book was released on 2015-05-12 with total page 276 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: A noted World War I scholar examines the critical decisions and events that led to Germany's defeat, arguing that the German loss was caused by collapse at home as well as on the front. Much has been written about the causes for the outbreak of World War I and the ways in which the war was fought, but few historians have tackled the reasons why the Germans, who appeared on the surface to be winning for most of the war, ultimately lost. This book, in contrast, presents an in-depth examination of the complex interplay of factors—social, cultural, military, economic, and diplomatic—that led to Germany's defeat. The highly readable work begins with an examination of the strengths and weaknesses of the two coalitions and points out how the balance of forces was clearly on the side of the Entente in a long and drawn-out war. The work then probes the German plan to win the war quickly and the resulting campaigns of August and September 1914 that culminated in the devastating defeat in the First Battle of the Marne. Subsequent chapters discuss the critical factors and decisions that led to Germany's loss, including the British naval blockade, the role of economic factors in maintaining a consensus for war, and the social impact of material deprivation.
Download or read book Tell Them of Battles Kings and Elephants written by Mathias Énard and published by New Directions Publishing. This book was released on 2019-10-29 with total page 152 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Michelangelo’s adventure in Constantinople, from the “mesmerizing” (New Yorker) and “masterful” (Washington Post) author of Compass In 1506, Michelangelo—a young but already renowned sculptor—is invited by the sultan of Constantinople to design a bridge over the Golden Horn. The sultan has offered, along with an enormous payment, the promise of immortality, since Leonardo da Vinci’s design was rejected: “You will surpass him in glory if you accept, for you will succeed where he has failed, and you will give the world a monument without equal.” Michelangelo, after some hesitation, flees Rome and an irritated Pope Julius II—whose commission he leaves unfinished—and arrives in Constantinople for this truly epic project. Once there, he explores the beauty and wonder of the Ottoman Empire, sketching and describing his impressions along the way, as he struggles to create what could be his greatest architectural masterwork. Tell Them of Battles, Kings, and Elephants—constructed from real historical fragments—is a thrilling page-turner about why stories are told, why bridges are built, and how seemingly unmatched fragments, seen from the opposite sides of civilization, can mirror one another.
Download or read book History Wars written by Edward T. Linenthal and published by Macmillan + ORM. This book was released on 1996-08-15 with total page 306 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: From the "taming of the West" to the dropping of the atomic bomb on Hiroshima, the portrayal of the past has become a battleground at the heart of American politics. What kind of history Americans should read, see, or fund is no longer merely a matter of professional interest to teachers, historians, and museum curators. Everywhere now, history is increasingly being held hostage, but to what end and why? In History Wars, eight prominent historians consider the angry swirl of emotions that now surrounds public memory. Included are trenchant essays by Paul Boyer, John W. Dower, Tom Engelhardt, Richard H. Kohn, Edward Linenthal, Micahel S. Sherry, Marilyn B. Young, and Mike Wallace.
Download or read book Battles of the Red River War written by J. Brett Cruse and published by Texas A&M University Press. This book was released on 2017-08-03 with total page 274 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Battles of the Red River War unearths a long-buried record of the collision of two cultures. In 1874, U.S. forces led by Col. Ranald S. Mackenzie carried out a surprise attack on several Cheyenne, Comanche, and Kiowa bands that had taken refuge in the Palo Duro Canyon of the Texas panhandle and destroyed their winter stores and horses. After this devastating loss, many of these Indians returned to their reservations and effectively brought to a close what has come to be known as the Red River War, a campaign carried out by the U.S. Army during 1874 as a result of Indian attacks on white settlers in the region. After this operation, the Southern Plains Indians would never again pose a coherent threat to whites’ expansion and settlement across their ancestral homelands. Until now, the few historians who have undertaken to tell the story of the Red River War have had to rely on the official records of the battles and a handful of extant accounts, letters, and journals of the U.S. Army participants. Starting in 1998, J. Brett Cruse, under the auspices of the Texas Historical Commission, conducted archeological investigations at six battle sites. In the artifacts they unearthed, Cruse and his teams found clues that would both correct and complete the written records and aid understanding of the Indian perspectives on this clash of cultures. Including a chapter on historiography and archival research by Martha Doty Freeman and an analysis of cartridges and bullets by Douglas D. Scott, this rigorously researched and lavishly illustrated work will commend itself to archeologists, military historians and scientists, and students and scholars of the Westward Expansion.
Download or read book Midway Inquest written by Dallas W. Isom and published by Indiana University Press. This book was released on 2007-07-19 with total page 442 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Midway, the most famous naval battle in American history, has been the subject of many excellent books. However, none satisfactorily explain why the Japanese lost that battle, given their overwhelming advantage in firepower. While no book may ever silence debate on the subject, Midway Inquest answers the central mystery of the battle. Why could the Japanese not get a bomber strike launched against the American carrier force before being attacked and destroyed by American dive bombers from the Enterprise and Yorktown? Although it is well known that the Japanese were unable to launch an immediate attack because their aircraft were in the process of changing armament, why wasn't the rearming operation reversed and an attack launched before the American planes arrived? Based on extensive research in Japanese primary records, Japanese literature on the battle, and interviews with over two dozen Japanese veterans from the carrier air groups, this book solves the mystery at last.
Download or read book The Battles of Tolkien written by David Day and published by Pyramid. This book was released on 2016-10-20 with total page 184 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The perfect Father's Day gift Tolkien's works are punctuated by dramatic and explosive battles. Men versus Orcs, Elves versus Sauron, Goblins versus Dwarves - the history of Middle-earth has seen some of the greatest characters pitted against each other time and time again. From the iconic battle of Helm's Deep to the Destruction of Isengard, The Battles of Tolkien analyzes each battle in depth, with clear maps showing the lay of the land, and exactly how and where the armies attacked. This is essential reading for anyone who loves Tolkien's works and wants to explore the wars within them. This work is unofficial and is not authorized by the Tolkien Estate or HarperCollins Publishers.
Download or read book Success Without Victory written by Jules Lobel and published by NYU Press. This book was released on 2006-02 with total page 331 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: An examination of how some legal issues are losing cases - but that's okay because advances are still possible.
Download or read book World War II Battles and Leaders written by Charles Wills and published by DK Children. This book was released on 2004 with total page 0 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Beginning with an overview of the causes of the war and continuing with year-by-year chronology, looks at the major clashes of World War II and their results.
Download or read book The Allure of Battle written by Cathal Nolan and published by Oxford University Press. This book was released on 2017-01-02 with total page 729 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: History has tended to measure war's winners and losers in terms of its major engagements, battles in which the result was so clear-cut that they could be considered "decisive." Cannae, Konigsberg, Austerlitz, Midway, Agincourt-all resonate in the literature of war and in our imaginations as tide-turning. But these legendary battles may or may not have determined the final outcome of the wars in which they were fought. Nor has the "genius" of the so-called Great Captains - from Alexander the Great to Frederick the Great and Napoleon - play a major role. Wars are decided in other ways. Cathal J. Nolan's The Allure of Battle systematically and engrossingly examines the great battles, tracing what he calls "short-war thinking," the hope that victory might be swift and wars brief. As he proves persuasively, however, such has almost never been the case. Even the major engagements have mainly contributed to victory or defeat by accelerating the erosion of the other side's defences. Massive conflicts, the so-called "people's wars," beginning with Napoleon and continuing until 1945, have consisted of and been determined by prolonged stalemate and attrition, industrial wars in which the determining factor has been not military but matériel. Nolan's masterful book places battles squarely and mercilessly within the context of the wider conflict in which they took place. In the process it help corrects a distorted view of battle's role in war, replacing popular images of the "battles of annihilation" with somber appreciation of the commitments and human sacrifices made throughout centuries of war particularly among the Great Powers. Accessible, provocative, exhaustive, and illuminating, The Allure of Battle will spark fresh debate about the history and conduct of warfare.
Download or read book Battles that Changed History written by DK and published by Dorling Kindersley Ltd. This book was released on 2018-09-06 with total page 258 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Discover the stories behind more than 90 of the world's most significant battles in this lavishly illustrated history book. The most important battles ever to take place are brought to life in the most spectacular way. From the brutal battle of Gettysburg to the epic air-sea battle of Midway, find out how fateful decisions led to glorious victories and crushing defeats. Journey through the battlefields of history and follow the key developments of World War I, World War II, the Cold War and more in unprecedented visual detail. Using maps, paintings, artefacts, and photographs, Battles That Changed History is a guided tour of every major conflict in history. Explore the stories behind more than 90 important battles and discover how pivotal moments and tactical decisions have altered the course of history. From medieval clashes and great naval conflicts to the era of high-tech air battles, key campaigns are illustrated and analysed in detail. Learn incredible facts about the weapons, armour, soldiers, and military strategies behind some of the greatest battles ever. This reference book includes profiles of famous military leaders like Alexander the Great, Napoleon, and Rommel. See how kingdoms and empires have been won and lost on the battlefield. Go into the thick of combat at the Great Siege of Malta, the Battle of Stalingrad, and the icy waters of Dunkirk. It is the ultimate guide to the history of military conflict. Relive 3,000 Years of World-Changing Combat This stunning coffee table book from DK Books is a visual treat for history buffs, old and young. It includes a foreword from award-winning writer, TV presenter and historian, Sir Tony Robinson whose TV credits include Time Team, Blackadder,and The Worst Jobs in History. From the ancient world to the nuclear war, each chapter of this military history book brings the key battles of the era to life: - Before 1000CE: Includes Thermopylae and the Battle of Red Cliffs. - 1000 - 1500: Includes the Battle of Agincourt and Fall of Constantinople. - 1500 - 1700: Includes the Battle of Breitenfeld and Siege of Vienna. - 1700 - 1900: Includes the Battle Waterloo and Gettysburg. - 1900 - Present: Includes Dunkirk and Operation Desert Storm.
Download or read book Carnage and Culture written by Victor Davis Hanson and published by Anchor. This book was released on 2007-12-18 with total page 546 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Examining nine landmark battles from ancient to modern times--from Salamis, where outnumbered Greeks devastated the slave army of Xerxes, to Cortes’s 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–the tradition of dissent, the value placed on inventiveness and adaptation, the concept of citizenship–which have consistently produced superior arms and soldiers. Offering riveting battle narratives and a balanced perspective that avoids simple triumphalism, Carnage and Culture demonstrates how armies cannot be separated from the cultures that produce them and explains why an army produced by a free culture will always have the advantage.
