Download or read book The Most Infamous Rulers in World History written by Hseham Amrahs and published by Mahesh Dutt Sharma. This book was released on 2024-01-03 with total page 148 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The rulers showcased within these pages hail from different corners of the globe and diverse periods of history. Whether ancient despots or more recent autocrats, their stories converge in a shared narrative of infamy. The preface serves as a guide and a curtain-raiser to the diverse panorama of rulers whose legacies, for better or worse, have left an indelible imprint on the course of human history. While the tales within may elicit shock, amusement, or even disbelief, they also offer an opportunity for historical reflection. As we witness the foibles of the past, we are prompted to consider the lessons they impart. The preface extends an invitation to approach these stories not only with curiosity but with a discerning eye, recognizing that the past serves as a teacher, cautioning us against the pitfalls of unchecked power and hubris.
Download or read book History s 9 Most Insane Rulers written by Scott Rank and published by Regnery History. This book was released on 2020-05-12 with total page 0 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Madness and Power. Can the insane rule? Can insanity be a leadership quality? Scott Rank says yes (well, sometimes) in this fascinating look at nine of history’s most notorious rulers, from the Roman emperor Caligula to the North Korean Communist dictator Kim Jong-il. Rank paints intimate portraits of these deeply flawed but powerful men, examining the role that madness played in their lives, the repercussions of their madness on history, and what their madness can tell us about the times in which they lived. In History’s 9 Most Insane Rulers, you will meet: • King Charles VI of France, who thought he was made of glass • Sultan Ibrahim I, who was driven mad by the sadistic succession battles of the Ottoman Empire • Caligula, who built temples to himself and whose reign highlighted the lethal tensions between the power of the new Imperial Rome and the prerogatives of the old Roman Republic • The Russian tsar who became known as Ivan “the Terrible” • King George III of Britain, who not only lost his American colonies, but lost his mind as well • Bavaria’s “Mad” King Ludwig II, who left the world richer for his fabulous fairy tale castles and his patronage of the composer Richard Wagner Insane rulers did not die off with the last of the mad monarchs who inherited their power. Rank also examines the rise to power of crazed modern rulers, such as Idi Amin, who began as a lowly army cook and rose to the presidency of Uganda, and Saparmurat Niyazov, who ruled Turkmenistan and promoted a bizarre cult of personality around himself. Both entertaining and illuminating, History’s 9 Most Insane Rulers is a must-read for anyone interested in the role insanity has played in history.
Download or read book Evil Roman Emperors written by Phillip Barlag and published by Rowman & Littlefield. This book was released on 2021-06-15 with total page 237 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Nero fiddled while Rome burned. As catchy as that aphorism is, it’s sadly untrue, even if it has a nice ring to it. The one thing Nero is well-known for is the one thing he actually didn’t do. But fear not, the truth of his life, his rule and what he did with unrestrained power, is plenty weird, salacious and horrifying. And he is not alone. Roman history, from the very foundation of the city, is replete with people and stories that shock our modern sensibilities. Evil Roman Emperors puts the worst of Rome’s rulers in one place and offers a review of their lives and a historical context for what made them into what they became. It concludes by ranking them, counting down to the worst ruler in Rome’s long history. Lucius Tarquinius Suburbus called peace conferences with warring states, only to slaughter foreign leaders; Commodus sold offices of the empire to the highest bidder; Caligula demanded to be worshipped as a god, and marched troops all the way to the ocean simply to collect seashells as “proof” of their conquest; even the Roman Senate itself was made up of oppressors, exploiters, and murderers of all stripes. Author Phillip Barlag profiles a host of evil Roman rulers across the history of their empire, along with the faceless governing bodies that condoned and even carried out heinous acts. Roman history, deviant or otherwise, is a subject of endless fascination. What’s never been done before is to look at the worst of the worst at the same time, comparing them side by side, and ranking them against one another. Until now.
Download or read book Lives of the Twelve Caesars written by Suetonius and published by Wordsworth Editions. This book was released on 1997 with total page 388 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This text by Suetonius, a Latin biographer, is a major source for the period from Julius Caesar to Domitian. It sets out a great range of aspects illuminating the emperors' characters, their habits - from table to bedchamber - their intrigues, loves and their deaths.
Download or read book The Great and the Terrible written by Joanne O'Sullivan and published by . This book was released on 2020 with total page 176 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: "This fun, quirky, and engaging fully illustrated history anthology features twenty-five amazing and terrifying rulers for middle grade readers to discover. We've heard of Alexander the Great. We've heard of Ivan the Terrible. But what was so Great about Alexander? What was so Terrible about Ivan? Spanning centuries of history in a culturally diverse framework-from ancient India to nineteenth-century Hawaii, and with a balanced focus on notorious women rulers as well as male, The Great and the Terrible takes a humorous look at some of the most glorious and notorious figures in history through the lens of the nicknames they're remembered by. While some of the characters mentioned here are more prominent in world history (Cyrus the Great introduced the world's first human rights charter), others are well known only within their own cultures. The Great and the Terrible gives middle-grade readers an opportunity to dip into the breadth of world history, sampling its cultural diversity and its stranger-than-fiction historical exploits, with a mix of the sensational and the serious. It helps to correct the imbalance in many history books that currently only focus on Western Civilization, shining the spotlight on achievements (and foibles) in many different cultures" --Amazon.com.
Download or read book I Claudius written by Robert Graves and published by Rosetta Books. This book was released on 2014-03-06 with total page 606 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: “One of the really remarkable books of our day”—the story of the Roman emperor on which the award-winning BBC TV series was based (The New York Times). Once a rather bookish young man with a limp and a stammer, a man who spent most of his time trying to stay away from the danger and risk of the line of ascension, Claudius seemed an unlikely candidate for emperor. Yet, on the death of Caligula, Claudius finds himself next in line for the throne, and must stay alive as well as keep control. Drawing on the histories of Plutarch, Suetonius, and Tacitus, noted historian and classicist Robert Graves tells the story of the much-maligned Emperor Claudius with both skill and compassion. Weaving important themes throughout about the nature of freedom and safety possible in a monarchy, Graves’s Claudius is both more effective and more tragic than history typically remembers him. A bestselling novel and one of Graves’ most successful, I, Claudius has been adapted to television, film, theatre, and audio. “[A] legendary tale of Claudius . . . [A] gem of modern literature.” —Publishers Weekly (starred review)
Download or read book Absolute Power written by C.S. Denton and published by Arcturus Publishing. This book was released on 2006-07-31 with total page 686 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: "Nearly all men can stand adversity, but if you want to test a man's character, give him power" -Abraham Lincoln Throughout history, all monarchs have lived with the strange dichotomy of simultaneously being human and more than human. In our time, when monarchies seem little more than tourist curiosities and democracy is taken for granted, it is easy to forget just how much power pre-democratic rulers once wielded. The rulers and holders of political power in this book were all possessed of vast - in many cases, absolute - power: power which was often exercised arbitrarily and unjustly. What unites the figures in this book is that they all, in one way or another, failed to live up to the extravagantly high hopes invested in them and, as a consequence, have been judged harshly by history. A few, such as George III, might have been remembered more kindly were it not for mental illness changing their status from that of hero to villain. Some, like Louis XVI, were unfairly transformed into monsters by hostile propaganda, while others, such as Peter the Great, have been both celebrated as heroes and denounced as tyrants, often in the same breath. Finally, there are those rulers who, like Caligula or Ivan the Terrible, may well fully deserve their evil reputations. Absolute Power is a study in how often rulers were carried away or overwhelmed by their exalted status, while a few were even driven over the edge into madness.
Download or read book Encyclopaedia Britannica written by Hugh Chisholm and published by . This book was released on 1910 with total page 1090 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This eleventh edition was developed during the encyclopaedia's transition from a British to an American publication. Some of its articles were written by the best-known scholars of the time and it is considered to be a landmark encyclopaedia for scholarship and literary style.
Download or read book Dictators and Tyrants written by Alan Axelrod and published by . This book was released on 1995 with total page 340 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Profiles the individuals who took history into their hands to gain control of a people, an empire or a state, from the pharoahs of ancient Egypt to Saddam Hussein in our own time
Download or read book First Kings of Europe written by Attila Gyucha and published by Cotsen Institute of Archaeology. This book was released on 2022 with total page 0 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: "This book is a copublication of The Cotsen Institute of Archaeology and The Field Museum"--Copyright page.
Download or read book The Worst Military Leaders in History written by John M. Jennings and published by Reaktion Books. This book was released on 2023-08-21 with total page 0 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Spanning countries and centuries, a “how-not-to” guide to leadership that reveals the most maladroit military commanders in history—now in paperback. For this book, fifteen distinguished historians were given a deceptively simple task: identify their choice for the worst military leader in history and then explain why theirs is the worst. From the clueless Conrad von Hötzendorf and George A. Custer to the criminal Baron Roman F. von Ungern-Sternberg and the bungling Garnet Wolseley, this book presents a rogues’ gallery of military incompetents. Rather than merely rehashing biographical details, the contributors take an original and unconventional look at military leadership in a way that appeals to both specialists and general readers alike. While there are plenty of books that analyze the keys to success, The Worst Military Leaders in History offers lessons of failure to avoid. In other words, this book is a “how-not-to” guide to leadership.
Download or read book Rulers Religion and Riches written by Jared Rubin and published by Cambridge University Press. This book was released on 2017-02-16 with total page 297 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This book seeks to explain the political and religious factors leading to the economic reversal of fortunes between Europe and the Middle East.
Download or read book Stalin s Genocides written by Norman M. Naimark and published by Princeton University Press. This book was released on 2010-07-19 with total page 176 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The chilling story of Stalin’s crimes against humanity Between the early 1930s and his death in 1953, Joseph Stalin had more than a million of his own citizens executed. Millions more fell victim to forced labor, deportation, famine, bloody massacres, and detention and interrogation by Stalin's henchmen. Stalin's Genocides is the chilling story of these crimes. The book puts forward the important argument that brutal mass killings under Stalin in the 1930s were indeed acts of genocide and that the Soviet dictator himself was behind them. Norman Naimark, one of our most respected authorities on the Soviet era, challenges the widely held notion that Stalin's crimes do not constitute genocide, which the United Nations defines as the premeditated killing of a group of people because of their race, religion, or inherent national qualities. In this gripping book, Naimark explains how Stalin became a pitiless mass killer. He looks at the most consequential and harrowing episodes of Stalin's systematic destruction of his own populace—the liquidation and repression of the so-called kulaks, the Ukrainian famine, the purge of nationalities, and the Great Terror—and examines them in light of other genocides in history. In addition, Naimark compares Stalin's crimes with those of the most notorious genocidal killer of them all, Adolf Hitler.
Download or read book History of the Empire From the Death of Marcus written by Herodian and published by Good Press. This book was released on 2020-12-08 with total page 171 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: History of the Empire from the Death of Marcus by Herodian is about Roman history after the rule of Marcus Aurelius in which there were battles over the frontier and the coexistence of a wide variety of cultures. Herodian writes that the events described in his history occurred during his lifetime. Photius (Codex 99) gives an outline of the contents of this work and passes a flattering encomium on the style of Herodian, which he describes as clear, vigorous, agreeable, and preserving a happy medium between an utter disregard of art and elegance and a profuse employment of the artifices and prettinesses which were known under the name of Atticism.
Download or read book Ten Caesars written by Barry Strauss and published by Simon & Schuster. This book was released on 2020-03-03 with total page 432 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Bestselling classical historian Barry Strauss delivers “an exceptionally accessible history of the Roman Empire…much of Ten Caesars reads like a script for Game of Thrones” (The Wall Street Journal)—a summation of three and a half centuries of the Roman Empire as seen through the lives of ten of the most important emperors, from Augustus to Constantine. In this essential and “enlightening” (The New York Times Book Review) work, Barry Strauss tells the story of the Roman Empire from rise to reinvention, from Augustus, who founded the empire, to Constantine, who made it Christian and moved the capital east to Constantinople. During these centuries Rome gained in splendor and territory, then lost both. By the fourth century, the time of Constantine, the Roman Empire had changed so dramatically in geography, ethnicity, religion, and culture that it would have been virtually unrecognizable to Augustus. Rome’s legacy remains today in so many ways, from language, law, and architecture to the seat of the Roman Catholic Church. Strauss examines this enduring heritage through the lives of the men who shaped it: Augustus, Tiberius, Nero, Vespasian, Trajan, Hadrian, Marcus Aurelius, Septimius Severus, Diocletian, and Constantine. Over the ages, they learned to maintain the family business—the government of an empire—by adapting when necessary and always persevering no matter the cost. Ten Caesars is a “captivating narrative that breathes new life into a host of transformative figures” (Publishers Weekly). This “superb summation of four centuries of Roman history, a masterpiece of compression, confirms Barry Strauss as the foremost academic classicist writing for the general reader today” (The Wall Street Journal).
Download or read book Top 10 Worst Ruthless Warriors written by Fiona Macdonald and published by Sandy Creek. This book was released on 2013 with total page 32 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt:
Download or read book Julius Caesar written by William Shakespeare and published by Akasha Classics. This book was released on 2010-02-12 with total page 136 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: What actions are justified when the fate of a nation hangs in the balance, and who can see the best path ahead? Julius Caesar has led Rome successfully in the war against Pompey and returns celebrated and beloved by the people. Yet in the senate fears intensify that his power may become supreme and threaten the welfare of the republic. A plot for his murder is hatched by Caius Cassius who persuades Marcus Brutus to support him. Though Brutus has doubts, he joins Cassius and helps organize a group of conspirators that assassinate Caesar on the Ides of March. But, what is the cost to a nation now erupting into civil war? A fascinating study of political power, the consequences of actions, the meaning of loyalty and the false motives that guide the actions of men, Julius Caesar is action packed theater at its finest.
