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Books > Humanities > History > World history > 1500 to 1750
The fifteenth century experienced the longest and bloodiest series
of civil wars in British history. The crown of England changed
hands violently five times as the great families of England fought
to the death for the right to rule. Some of the greatest heroes and
villains in history were thrown together in these chaotic years.
Yet efforts were made to maintain some semblance of peace and
order, as chivalry was reborn, the printing press arrived, and the
Renaissance began to flourish. Following on from Dan Jones's
bestselling The Plantagenets, The Hollow Crown is a vivid and
engrossing history of these turbulent times.
The War for the New World
The Seven Years War as it was fought in the New World has always
fascinated students of military history. Its stage-the wilderness
of the American north-east, at a time when its vast forests and
lakes were sparsely populated by settlers from Britain and France
and ever threatened by the fierce indigenous Indian tribes, each
with its particular loyalty or enmity-conjures a drama of colour
and romance which has found its way into fiction and the cinema.
Yet this was a brutal contest-often fought with little mercy-and
one which despite its intimacy was fought for the highest of
stakes-the dominance of continental America and the premiership of
world power. Here is the story of that confrontation-from burning
cabins and stockades to massacre. From lightning raids by daring
forest rangers to the storming of besieged fortresses and cities.
This is the French and Indian War-an account of how the New World
became a mostly English speaking one and how France lost its
opportunity to be the dominant world power of the eighteenth and
nineteenth centuries.
This is the full text of Sir Thomas Borwne 's classic work edited
by Wilkins.
Selena Axelrod Winsnes has been engaged, since 1982, in the
translation into English, and editing of Danish language sources to
West African history, sources published from 1697 to 1822, the
period during which Denmark-Norway was an actor in the
Transatlantic Slave Trade. It comprises five major books written
for the Scandinavian public. They describe all aspects of life on
the Gold Coast Ghana], the Middle Passage and the Danish Caribbean
islands US Virgin Islands], as seen by five different men. Each had
his own agenda and mind-set, and the books, both singly and
combined, hold a wealth of information - of interest both to
scholars and lay readers. They provide important insights into the
cultural baggage the enslaved Africans carried with them to the
America's. One of the books, L.F.Rmer's A Reliable Account of the
Coast of Guinea was runner-up for the prestigious international
texts prize awarded by the U.S. African Studies Association. Selena
Winsnes lived in Ghana for five years and studied at the University
of Ghana, Legon. Her mother tongue is English; and, working
free-lance, she resides premanently in Norway with her husband,
four children and eight grandchildren. In 2008, she was awarded an
Honorary Doctor of Letters for distinguished scholarship by the
University of Ghana, Legon.
Eight years before the Boston Tea Party and ten years before
Lexington and Concord, the first shots in the American Revolution
were fired in Mercersburg, Pennsylvania, in 1765. Known as the
Smith Rebellion, this crucial turning point in American history set
the stage for modern American politics.
In this history, author Karen Ramsburg tells the enlightening
story of this uprising on the Pennsylvania frontier and
definitively shows how it laid the groundwork for the political
maneuverings of today. Ramsburg dips back into history and reveals
how a simple act of self-defense became the spark that created our
nation and developed the first battle in a long, continuous class
war still ongoing today.
Fearful that illegal trade goods, such as tomahawks, scalping
knives, and gun powder, were being transported to Fort Pitt to
rearm the Indians and renew Pontiac's War against the frontiersmen,
Justice William Smith and his cousin James Smith, a.k.a. Black Boy
Jimmy, believed they had a right to stop it. The ensuing rebellion
led to a definition of government as a contract between all men to
reject some of their natural rights in favor of a framework that
would secure each man's rights to life, liberty, and property.
In this book on early modern diplomacy, Jan Hennings explores the
relationship between European powers and Russia beyond the
conventional East-West divide from the Peace of Westphalia to the
reign of Peter the Great. He examines how, at a moment of new
departure in both Europe and Russia, the norms shaping diplomatic
practice emerged from the complex relations and direct encounters
within the world of princely courts rather than from incompatible
political cultures. He makes clear the connections between dynastic
representation, politics and foreign relations, and shows that
Russia, despite its perceived isolation and cultural
distinctiveness, participated in the developments and
transformations that were taking place more broadly in diplomacy.
The central themes of this study are the interlocking
manifestations of social hierarchy, monarchical honour and
sovereign status in both text and ritual. Related issues of
diplomatic customs, institutional structures, personnel,
negotiation practice, international law, and the question of
cultural transfer also figure prominently.
This book is a collection of essays on Ottoman history, focusing on
how sultans of the Ottoman Empire were viewed by the public.
This colorful history of a powerful family brings the world they
lived in--the glittering Rome of the Italian Renaissance--to life
and is "simply unputdownable" (New York Times Book Review). The
name Borgia is synonymous with the corruption, nepotism, and greed
that were rife in Renaissance Italy. The powerful, voracious
Rodrigo Borgia, better known to history as Pope Alexander VI, was
the central figure of the dynasty. Two of his seven papal offspring
also rose to power and fame--Lucrezia Borgia, his daughter, whose
husband was famously murdered by her brother, and that brother,
Cesare, who served as the model for Niccolo Machiavelli's The
Prince. Notorious for seizing power, wealth, land, and titles
through bribery, marriage, and murder, the dynasty's dramatic rise
from its Spanish roots to its occupation of the highest position in
Renaissance society forms a gripping tale. Erudite, witty, and
always insightful, Hibbert removes the layers of myth around the
Borgia family and creates a portrait alive with his superb sense of
character and place.
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The High Ones
(Hardcover)
Robert Scheige; Cover design or artwork by Robin E Vuchnich
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R610
Discovery Miles 6 100
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Ships in 10 - 15 working days
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"Explores colonial Spanish-Apache relations in the Southwest
borderlands"
More than two centuries after the Coronado Expedition first set
foot in the region, the northern frontier of New Spain in the late
1770s was still under attack by Apache raiders. Mark Santiago's
gripping account of Spanish efforts to subdue the Apaches
illuminates larger cultural and political issues in the colonial
period of the Southwest and northern Mexico. To persuade the
Apaches to abandon their homelands and accept Christian
"civilization," Spanish officials employed both the mailed fist of
continuous war and the velvet glove of the reservation system.
"Hostiles" captured by the Spanish would be deported, while Apaches
who agreed to live in peace near the Spanish presidios would
receive support. Santiago's history of the deportation policy
includes vivid descriptions of "colleras," the chain gangs of
Apache prisoners of war bound together for the two-month journey by
mule and on foot from the northern frontier to Mexico City. The
book's arresting title, "The Jar of Severed Hands," comes from a
1792 report documenting a desperate break for freedom made by a
group of Apache prisoners. After subduing the prisoners and killing
twelve Apache men, the Spanish soldiers verified the attempted
breakout by amputating the left hands of the dead and preserving
them in a jar for display to their superiors.
Santiago's nuanced analysis of deportation policy credits both
the Apaches' ability to exploit the Spanish government's dual
approach and the growing awareness on the Spaniards' part that the
peoples they referred to as Apaches were a disparate and complex
assortment of tribes that could not easily be subjugated. "The Jar
of Severed Hands" deepens our understanding of the dynamics of the
relationship between Indian tribes and colonial powers in the
Southwest borderlands.
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