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Books > History > World history > General

Sapiens - A Brief History Of Humankind (Paperback): Yuval Noah Harari Sapiens - A Brief History Of Humankind (Paperback)
Yuval Noah Harari 4
R345 R270 Discovery Miles 2 700 Save R75 (22%) Ships in 5 - 10 working days

What makes us brilliant? What makes us deadly? What makes us Sapiens? Yuval Noah Harari challenges everything we know about being human in the perfect read for these unprecedented times.

Earth is 4.5 billion years old. In just a fraction of that time, one species among countless others has conquered it: us.

In this bold and provocative book, Yuval Noah Harari explores who we are, how we got here and where we’re going.

‘I would recommend Sapiens to anyone who’s interested in the history and future of our species’ Bill Gates

‘Interesting and provocative… It gives you a sense of how briefly we’ve been on this Earth’ Barack Obama

First People - The Lost History Of The Khoisan (Paperback): Andrew Smith First People - The Lost History Of The Khoisan (Paperback)
Andrew Smith 1
R265 R212 Discovery Miles 2 120 Save R53 (20%) Ships in 5 - 10 working days

First people communities are the groups of huntergatherers and herders, representing the oldest human lineages in Africa, who migrated from as far as East Africa to settle across southern Africa, in what is now Namibia, Botswana and South Africa. These groups, known today as the Khoisan, are represented by the Bushmen (or San) and the Khoe (plural Khoekhoen).

In First People, archaeologist Andrew Smith examines what we know about southern Africa’s earliest inhabitants, drawing on evidence from excavations, rock art, the observations of colonial-era travellers, linguistics, the study of the human genome and the latest academic research.

Richly illustrated, First People is an invaluable and accessible work that reaches from the Middle and Late Stone Age to recent times, and explores how the Khoisan were pushed to the margins of history and society. Smith, who is an expert on the history and prehistory of the Khoisan, paints a knowledgeable and fascinating portrait of their land occupation, migration, survival strategies and cultural practices.

Colour, Class And Community - The Natal Indian Congress, 1971-1994 (Paperback): Ashwin Desai, Goolam Vahed Colour, Class And Community - The Natal Indian Congress, 1971-1994 (Paperback)
Ashwin Desai, Goolam Vahed
R375 R293 Discovery Miles 2 930 Save R82 (22%) Ships in 5 - 10 working days

Following a hiatus in the 1960s, the Natal Indian Congress (NIC) in South Africa was revived in 1971. In fascinating detail, Ashwin Desai and Goolam Vahed bring the inner workings of the NIC to life against the canvas of major political developments in South Africa during the 1970s and 1980s, and up to the first democratic elections in 1994.

The NIC was relaunched during the rise of the Black Consciousness Movement, which attracted a following among Indian university students, and whose invocation of Indians as Black led to a major debate about ethnic organisations such as the NIC. This debate persisted in the 1980s with the rise of the United Democratic Front and its commitment to non-racialism. The NIC was central to other major debates of the period, most significantly the lines drawn between boycotting and participating in government-created structures such as the Tri-Cameral Parliament. Despite threats of banning and incarceration, the NIC kept attracting recruits who encouraged the development of community organisations, such as students radicalised by the 1980s education boycotts and civic protests. Colour, Class and Community, The Natal Indian Congress, 1971—1994 details how some members of the NIC played dual roles, as members of a legal organisation and as allies of the African National Congress’ underground armed struggle.

Drawing on varied sources, including oral interviews, newspaper reports, and minutes of organisational meetings, this in-depth study tells a largely untold history, challenging existing narratives around Indian ‘cabalism’, and bringing the African and Indian political story into present debates about race, class and nation.

The World - A Family History (Hardcover): Simon Sebag Montefiore The World - A Family History (Hardcover)
Simon Sebag Montefiore
R965 R761 Discovery Miles 7 610 Save R204 (21%) Ships in 5 - 10 working days

From the master storyteller and internationally bestselling author – the story of humanity from prehistory to the present day, told through the one thing all humans have in common: family.

We begin with the footsteps of a family walking along a beach 950,000 years ago. From here, Montefiore takes us on an exhilarating epic journey through the families that have shaped our world: the Caesars, Medicis and Incas, Ottomans and Mughals, Bonapartes, Habsburgs and Zulus, Rothschilds, Rockefellers and Krupps, Churchills, Kennedys, Castros, Nehrus, Pahlavis and Kenyattas, Saudis, Kims and Assads.

A rich cast of complex characters form the beating heart of the story. Some are well-known leaders, from Alexander the Great, Attila, Ivan the Terrible and Genghis Khan to Hitler, Thatcher, Obama, Putin and Zelensky. Some are creative, from Socrates, Michelangelo and Shakespeare to Newton, Mozart, Balzac, Freud, Bowie and Tim Berners-Lee. Others are lesser-known: Hongwu, who began life as a beggar and founded the Ming dynasty; Kamehameha, conqueror of Hawaii; Zenobia, Arab empress who defied Rome; King Henry of Haiti; Lady Murasaki, first female novelist; Sayyida al-Hurra, Moroccan pirate-queen. Here are not just conquerors and queens but prophets, charlatans, actors, gangsters, artists, scientists, doctors, tycoons, lovers, wives, husbands and children.

This is world history on the most grand and intimate scale – spanning centuries, continents and cultures, and linking grand themes of war, migration, plague, religion, medicine and technology to the people at the centre of the human drama.

As spellbinding as fiction, The World captures the story of humankind in all its joy, sorrow, romance, ingenuity and cruelty in a ground-breaking, single narrative that will forever shift the boundaries of what history can achieve.

Handbook To The Iron Age - The Archaeology Of Pre-Colonial Farming Societies In Southern Africa (Hardcover): Thomas N Huffman Handbook To The Iron Age - The Archaeology Of Pre-Colonial Farming Societies In Southern Africa (Hardcover)
Thomas N Huffman
R365 R285 Discovery Miles 2 850 Save R80 (22%) Ships in 5 - 10 working days

This detailed Handbook to the Iron Age covers the last 2,000 years in Southern Africa.

The first part of the book outlines essential topics such as settlement organization, stonewalled patterns, ritual residues, long-distance trade, and ancient mining. Part two presents a comprehensive culture-history sequence through ceramic analyses, showing distributions, stylistic types, and characteristic pieces. The final section reviews and updates the main debates about black prehistory, including migration vs. diffusion, the role of cattle, the origins of Mapungubwe, the rise and fall of Great Zimbabwe, as well as the archaeology of the Venda, the Sotho-Tswana, and the Nguni speakers.

Handbook to the Iron Age is an abundantly illustrated study that is accessible to a wide range of people interested in African prehistory.

Doom - The Politics Of Catastrophe (Paperback): Niall Ferguson Doom - The Politics Of Catastrophe (Paperback)
Niall Ferguson
R340 R269 Discovery Miles 2 690 Save R71 (21%) Ships in 3 - 5 working days

A provocative, original and compelling history of catastrophes and their consequences.

Disasters are by their very nature hard to predict. Pandemics, like earthquakes, wildfires, financial crises and wars, are not normally distributed; there is no cycle of history to help us anticipate the next catastrophe. But when disaster strikes, we ought to be better prepared than the Romans were when Vesuvius erupted or medieval Italians when the Black Death struck. We have science on our side, after all. Yet the responses of a number of devloped countries to a new pathogen from China were badly bungled. Why?

The facile answer is to blame poor leadership. While populist rulers have certainly performed poorly in the face of the pandemic, more profund problems have been exposed by COVID-19. Only when we understand the central challenge posed by disaster in history can we see that this was also a failure of an administrative state and of economic elites that had grown myopic over much longer than just a few years. Why were so many Cassandras for so long ignored? Why did only some countries learn the right lessons from SARS and MERS? Why do appeals to 'the science' often turn out to be mere magical thinking?

Drawing from multiple disciplines, including history, economics and network science, Doom: The Politics Of Catastrophe is a global post mortem for a plague year. Drawing on preoccupations that have shaped his books for some twenty years, Niall Ferguson describes the pathologies that have done us so much damage: from imperial hubris to bureaucratic sclerosis and online schism. COVID-19 was a test failed by countries who must learn some serious lessons from history if they are to avoid the doom of irreversible decline.

The Power Of Strangers - The Benefits Of Connecting In A Suspicious World (Hardcover): Joe Keohane The Power Of Strangers - The Benefits Of Connecting In A Suspicious World (Hardcover)
Joe Keohane
R405 R320 Discovery Miles 3 200 Save R85 (21%) Ships in 3 - 5 working days

An interrogation of why we don't talk to strangers, what happens when we do, and why it affects everything from the rise and fall of nations to personal health and wellbeing, in the tradition of Susan Cain's Quiet and Rutger Bregman's Humankind.

When was the last time you spoke to a stranger? In our cities, we stand in silent buses and tube carriages, barely acknowledging one another. Online, we retreat into silos and carefully curate who we interact with. But while we often fear strangers, or blame them for the ills of society, history and science show us that they are actually our solution. Throughout human history, our attitude to the stranger has determined the fate and wellbeing of both nations and individuals. A raft of new science confirms that the more we open ourselves up to encounters with those we don't know, the healthier we are.

In The Power of Strangers, with the help of sociologists, psychologists, neuroscientists, theologians, philosophers, political scientists and historians, Joe Keohane learns how we're wired to sometimes fear, distrust and even hate strangers, and discovers what happens to us when we indulge those biases. At the same time, he digs into a growing body of cutting-edge research on the surprising social and psychological benefits that come from talking to strangers; how even passing interactions can enhance empathy, happiness, and cognitive development, ease loneliness and isolation, and root us in the world, deepening our sense of belonging.

Warm, erudite and profound, this deeply researched book will make you reconsider how you perceive and approach strangers: paradoxically, strangers can help us become more fully ourselves.

50 people who stuffed up the world (Paperback): Alexander Parker, Tim Richman, Zapiro 50 people who stuffed up the world (Paperback)
Alexander Parker, Tim Richman, Zapiro
R100 R78 Discovery Miles 780 Save R22 (22%) Ships in 5 - 10 working days

Who are the greatest villains, the direst leaders and most offensive personalities to have spread their regrettable influence throughout the modern world? Be it through politics, war, sport, culture or just their general idiocy? Well, take your pick… From Adolf to Zuckerberg – via Mao and Mountbatten, OJ and Osama – 50 People Who Stuffed Up The World is filled with the nastiest names from the 20th century and beyond. These are men of infamy (and a handful of women) who have steered our good ship Humanity towards the World-War-fighting, smart-phone-tapping age we are mired in today, be it through their totalitarian visions of global dominance (Stalin, King Leopold II), ruinous warmongering (Hideki Tojo, George W Bush) or tragic megalomania (Idi Amin, Saddam Hussein). But the obvious political despots and historical heavy-hitters are just the half of it; there’s also the archetypal modern terrorist (Carlos the Jackal), the man behind the global obesity epidemic (Ancel Keys), the clothes-less emperor of modern art (Charles Saatchi), the world’s most notorious drug baron (Pablo Escobar), the father of the A-bomb (Robert Oppenheimer), architects of a failed social experiments (DF Malan & HF Verwoerd), the less expected sports villains (Lance Armstrong, Diego Maradona), the talentless icons of modern celebrity-dom (Kim Kardashian, Justin Bieber) and our current surreal car-crash-in-motion (Donald Trump, of course). The result is a book with global appeal that is part popular history, part social commentary, and all entertainment.

Capitalism (Hardcover, 2nd edition): Paul Bowles Capitalism (Hardcover, 2nd edition)
Paul Bowles
R4,057 Discovery Miles 40 570 Ships in 12 - 17 working days

Capitalism stands unrivalled as the most enduring economic system of our times. Since the collapse of the Soviet bloc the world has become a new stage for capital, and yet despite this dominance capitalism is still not widely understood. It remains a subject of enduring interest that is discovered and rediscovered over time by each successive generation of students. Exploring the life of this world-shaping system and the writings of leading thinkers, this study also now takes into account recent developments, including the impact of the Global Financial Crisis and the complexities of China's political economy. Paul Bowles addresses these key questions: - what are the central, unchanging features of capitalism? - how does capitalism vary from place to place and over time? - does capitalism improve our lives? - is capitalism a system which is 'natural' and 'free'? Or is it unjust and unstable? - what about today's global capitalism? - will capitalism destroy or liberate us? This updated edition of a classic text is now supported by a comprehensive documents section, chronology and who's who, as well as a new colour plate section. It offers a concise, lucid and thought-provoking introduction for undergraduate students or anyone with an interest in this most pervasive, long lasting and adaptable yet crisis-ridden of economic systems.

The Wager - A Tale Of Shipwreck, Mutiny And Murder (Hardcover): David Grann The Wager - A Tale Of Shipwreck, Mutiny And Murder (Hardcover)
David Grann
R830 R646 Discovery Miles 6 460 Save R184 (22%) Ships in 10 - 15 working days

From the author of Killers of the Flower Moon, a page-turning story of shipwreck, survival, and savagery, culminating in a court martial that reveals a shocking truth. The powerful narrative reveals the deeper meaning of the events on The Wager, showing that it was not only the captain and crew who ended up on trial, but the very idea of empire.

On January 28, 1742, a ramshackle vessel of patched-together wood and cloth washed up on the coast of Brazil. Inside were thirty emaciated men, barely alive, and they had an extraordinary tale to tell. They were survivors of His Majesty’s Ship the Wager, a British vessel that had left England in 1740 on a secret mission during an imperial war with Spain. While the Wager had been chasing a Spanish treasure-filled galleon known as “the prize of all the oceans,” it had wrecked on a desolate island off the coast of Patagonia. The men, after being marooned for months and facing starvation, built the flimsy craft and sailed for more than a hundred days, traversing nearly 3,000 miles of storm-wracked seas. They were greeted as heroes.

But then ... six months later, another, even more decrepit craft landed on the coast of Chile. This boat contained just three castaways, and they told a very different story. The thirty sailors who landed in Brazil were not heroes – they were mutineers. The first group responded with countercharges of their own, of a tyrannical and murderous senior officer and his henchmen. It became clear that while stranded on the island the crew had fallen into anarchy, with warring factions fighting for dominion over the barren wilderness. As accusations of treachery and murder flew, the Admiralty convened a court martial to determine who was telling the truth. The stakes were life-and-death—for whomever the court found guilty could hang.

The Wager is a grand tale of human behavior at the extremes told by one of our greatest nonfiction writers. Grann’s recreation of the hidden world on a British warship rivals the work of Patrick O’Brian, his portrayal of the castaways’ desperate straits stands up to the classics of survival writing such as The Endurance, and his account of the court martial has the savvy of a Scott Turow thriller. As always with Grann’s work, the incredible twists of the narrative hold the reader spellbound.

Straits - Beyond the Myth of Magellan (Hardcover): Felipe Fernandez-Armesto Straits - Beyond the Myth of Magellan (Hardcover)
Felipe Fernandez-Armesto
R808 Discovery Miles 8 080 In Stock
A Short History of South Africa (Paperback): Gail Nattrass A Short History of South Africa (Paperback)
Gail Nattrass
R260 R208 Discovery Miles 2 080 Save R52 (20%) Ships in 5 - 10 working days

In A Short History of South Africa, Gail Nattrass, historian and educator, presents the reader with a brief, general account of South Africa’s history, from the very beginning to the present day, from the first evidence of hominid existence, early settlement pre-and post-European arrival and the warfare through the 18th and 19th centuries that lead to the eventual establishment of modern South Africa.

This readable and thorough account, illustrated with maps and photographs, is a culmination of a lifetime of researching and teaching the broad spectrum of South African history, collecting stories, taking students on tours around the country, and working with distinguished historians.

Nattrass’s passion for her subject shines through, whether she is elucidating the reader on early humans in the cradle of humankind, or the tumultuous twentieth-century processes that shaped the democracy that is South Africa today. A must for all those interested in South Africa, within the country and abroad.

The Webs of Humankind - A World History (Paperback): J.R. McNeill The Webs of Humankind - A World History (Paperback)
J.R. McNeill
R3,566 Discovery Miles 35 660 Ships in 12 - 17 working days

A leader in the field presents a cohesive narrative of world history that effectively addresses the main challenge of the introductory survey: how to navigate beginning students through the vast detail of the subject. McNeill uses connective webs-along which trade, religious beliefs, technologies, pathogens and much more travelled-to organise details and keep the big picture in view. Students emerge with clear takeaways and a strong sense of the basic dynamics of world history. Together with digital resources that amplify the webs approach and highlight diverse types of evidence, John McNeill's The Webs of Humankind offers a clear and effective teaching tool for the world history survey course.

Future Stories - A user's guide to the future (Paperback): David Christian Future Stories - A user's guide to the future (Paperback)
David Christian
R350 R280 Discovery Miles 2 800 Save R70 (20%) In Stock

'David Christian's approach to understanding history can help all of us learn to prepare for the future' - Bill Gates A user's guide to the future: from the algorithms in DNA to why time is like a cocktail glass, interstellar migrations, transhumanism, the fate of the galaxy, and the last black hole... Every second of our lives - whether we're looking both ways before crossing the street, celebrating the birth of a baby, or moving to a new city - we must cope with an unknowable future. How do we do this? And how do we, like most living organisms, manage this impossible challenge quite well (at least most of the time)? David Christian, historian and bestselling author of Origin Story, is renowned for pioneering the emerging discipline of Big History, which surveys the whole of the past. But with Future Stories, he casts his sharp analytical eye forward, offering an introduction to the strange world of the future, and a guide to what we think we know about it at all scales, from the predictive mechanisms of single-celled organisms and tomato plants to the merging of colossal galaxies billions of years from now. Drawing together science, history and philosophy from a huge range of places and times, Christian explores how we prepare for uncertain futures, including the future of human evolution, artificial intelligence, interstellar travel, and more. By linking the study of the past much more closely to the study of the future, we can begin to imagine what the world will look like in the next hundred years and consider solutions to the biggest challenges facing us all.

The Power Of Strangers - The Benefits Of Connecting In A Suspicious World (Paperback): Joe Keohane The Power Of Strangers - The Benefits Of Connecting In A Suspicious World (Paperback)
Joe Keohane
R265 R212 Discovery Miles 2 120 Save R53 (20%) In Stock

When was the last time you spoke to a stranger? In our cities, we barely acknowledge one another on public transport, even as rates of loneliness skyrocket. Online, we carefully curate who we interact with. In our politics, we are increasingly consumed by a fear of people we've never met. But what if strangers, long believed to be the cause of many of our problems, were actually the solution? In The Power of Strangers, Joe Keohane discovers the surprising benefits that come from talking to strangers, examining how even passing interactions can enhance empathy, happiness and cognitive development, ease loneliness and isolation, and root us in the world, deepening our sense of belonging. Warm, witty, erudite and profound, this deeply researched book will make you reconsider how you perceive and approach strangers, showing you how talking to strangers isn't just not a way to live, it's a way to survive.

Worlds Together, Worlds Apart - A History of the World from the Beginnings of Humankind to the Present (Paperback, Sixth... Worlds Together, Worlds Apart - A History of the World from the Beginnings of Humankind to the Present (Paperback, Sixth Edition)
Jeremy Adelman, Elizabeth Pollard, Robert Tignor
R3,573 Discovery Miles 35 730 Ships in 12 - 17 working days

Worlds Together, Worlds Apart provides a compelling chronological foundation for world history. A global story frames each chapter, making thousands of years of history less daunting for students and instructors. New lead authors and master teachers, Jeremy Adelman and Elizabeth Pollard, distill cutting-edge scholarship with a focus on introductory students. By supporting students in making comparisons and connections across the narrative, primary sources, images, maps, and in the text and online resources, Worlds Together is global history's most effective teaching tool.

British Manufacturing Industries: Metallic Mining and Colliers; Coal; Building Stones; Explosive Compounds (Classic Reprint)... British Manufacturing Industries: Metallic Mining and Colliers; Coal; Building Stones; Explosive Compounds (Classic Reprint) (Paperback)
G. Phillips Bevan
R444 R392 Discovery Miles 3 920 Save R52 (12%) Ships in 12 - 17 working days
Columbus and the Quest for Jerusalem - How Religion Drove the Voyages That Led to America (Paperback): Carol Delaney Columbus and the Quest for Jerusalem - How Religion Drove the Voyages That Led to America (Paperback)
Carol Delaney
R554 R460 Discovery Miles 4 600 Save R94 (17%) Ships in 10 - 15 working days

"One of the 100 best books of the year." --"The Times Literary Supplement"
Five hundred years after he set sail, Columbus is still a controversial figure in history. Debates portray him either as the hero in the great drama of discovery or as an avaricious glory hunter and ruthless destroyer of indigenous cultures. In "Columbus and the Quest for Jerusalem," Carol Delaney offers a radically new interpretation of the man and his mission, claiming that the true motivation for his voyages is still widely unknown.
Delaney argues that Columbus was inspired to find a western route to the Orient "not only "to obtain vast sums of gold for the Spanish Crown "but primarily "to fund a new crusade to take Jerusalem from the Muslims before the end of the world--a goal that sustained him until the day he died. Drawing from oft-ignored sources, some from Columbus's own hand, Delaney depicts her subject as a thoughtful interpreter of the native cultures that he and his men encountered, and tells the tragic story of how his initial attempts to establish good relations with the natives turned badly sour. Showing Columbus in the context of his times rather than through the prism of present-day perspectives on colonial conquests reveals a man who was neither a greedy imperialist nor a quixotic adventurer, but a man driven by an abiding religious passion. "Columbus and the Quest for Jerusalem "is not an apologist's take, but a clear-eyed, thought-provoking, and timely reappraisal of the man and his legacy.

Fake Heroes - Ten False Icons And How They Altered The Course Of History (Hardcover): Otto English Fake Heroes - Ten False Icons And How They Altered The Course Of History (Hardcover)
Otto English
R475 R380 Discovery Miles 3 800 Save R95 (20%) Ships in 5 - 10 working days

From the author of Fake History, Otto English, comes a shocking yet hilarious look at ten of the greatest liars from our past, examining these previously unquestioned idols and exposing what they were trying to hide.

Was Che Guevara really a revolutionary hero? Should Mother Teresa be honoured as a saint? Is Henry V actually England's greatest king? And why does JFK's legend continue to grow?

Having exposed some of the greatest lies ever told in Fake History, journalist Otto English turns his attention to some of history's biggest (and most beloved) figures.

Whether it's virtuous leaders in just wars, martyrs sacrificing all for a cause, or innovators changing the world for the better, down the centuries supposedly great men and women have risen to become household names, saints and heroes. But just how deserving are they of their reputations?

Exploring everything from Captain Scott's reckless hunt for glory and Andy Warhol's flagrant thievery to Coco Chanel's murky Nazi past, Otto English dives into the hidden lives of some of history's most recognisable names. Scrutinising figures from the worlds of art, politics, business, religion and royalty, he brings to light the murkier truths they would rather have kept buried away, at the same time as celebrating the unsung heroes lost to time.

Fake Heroes exposes the truth of the past and helps us understand why that matters today.

Dominion - How the Christian Revolution Remade the World (Paperback): Tom Holland Dominion - How the Christian Revolution Remade the World (Paperback)
Tom Holland
R619 R485 Discovery Miles 4 850 Save R134 (22%) Ships in 10 - 15 working days
Patterns of World History, Volume Two: From 1400 (Paperback, 4th ed.): Peter von Sivers, Charles A Desnoyers, George B Stow Patterns of World History, Volume Two: From 1400 (Paperback, 4th ed.)
Peter von Sivers, Charles A Desnoyers, George B Stow
R2,170 Discovery Miles 21 700 Ships in 10 - 15 working days
Secret History of the West (Paperback): Nicholas Hagger Secret History of the West (Paperback)
Nicholas Hagger
R577 Discovery Miles 5 770 In Stock

Contrary to popular belief, Western civilisation as we know it today is not the end result of steady progress. For over half a millennium revolution has succeeded revolution like a succession of tidal waves. At one level this book is a chronological narrative of these revolutions, from the Renaissance to the Russian. It shows how Utopian visions of ideal societies end in massacres and the guillotine, and therefore appeals to and challenges both left and right. At a second level it offers a new and original theory of why revolutions happen. An idealist has a vision, which others state in intellectual terms. This becomes corrupted by a political regime, and results in physical repression. The unique approach that The Secret History takes is that this vision has never been part of Establishment thought or practice. Indeed it usually has its roots in ideas and influences that have hitherto been unexpressed, "secret." But all these ideas have a common thread. They can be traced back to the heretical sects - Gnostics, Templars, Cathars and Rosicrucians - and secret organizations such as the mysterious Priory of Sion. Their influence powered the Protestant Revolution, which in turn provided the ideological foundations of the English, American, French and Russian revolutions. Factions within Freemasonry and families such as the Rothschilds have figured prominently in all these upheavals. They add up to a tide of world revolution that is reaching high water mark in our own time, as Hagger has shown in the companion volume to this work, The Syndicate: The Story of the Coming World Government.

The U.S. Territories (Paperback): Monika Davies The U.S. Territories (Paperback)
Monika Davies
R318 R264 Discovery Miles 2 640 Save R54 (17%) Ships in 10 - 15 working days
Pathogenesis - How infectious diseases shaped human history (Paperback): Jonathan Kennedy Pathogenesis - How infectious diseases shaped human history (Paperback)
Jonathan Kennedy
R395 R316 Discovery Miles 3 160 Save R79 (20%) Ships in 5 - 10 working days

'Thrilling and eye-opening' Lewis Dartnell 'Unpicks everything we thought we knew... Mind blowing' Cal Flyn 'A revelation' Sathnam Sanghera Humans did not make history - we played host. According to the accepted narrative of progress, a few great humans have bent the arc of history. But in this revelatory book, Dr Jonathan Kennedy argues that germs have done more to shape humanity at every stage, from the first success of Homo sapiens over the equally intelligent Neanderthals to the fall of Rome and the rise of Islam. How did an Indonesian volcano help cause the Black Death, setting Europe on the road to capitalism? How could 168 men extract the largest ransom in history from an opposing army of eighty thousand? And why did the Industrial Revolution lead to the birth of the modern welfare state? The latest science reveals that infectious diseases are not just something that happens to us, but a fundamental part of who we are. Indeed, the only reason humans don't lay eggs is that a virus long ago inserted itself into our DNA, and there are as many bacteria in your body as there are human cells. We have been thinking about the survival of the fittest all wrong: evolution is not simply about human strength and intelligence, but about how we live and thrive in a world dominated by microbes. By exploring the startling intimacy of our relationship with infectious diseases, Kennedy shows how they have been responsible for some of the seismic revolutions of the past 50,000 years. Provocative and brimming with insight, Pathogenesis transforms our understanding of the human story, revealing how the crisis of a pandemic can offer vital opportunities for change.

The Silk Roads - A New History of the World (Hardcover): Peter Frankopan The Silk Roads - A New History of the World (Hardcover)
Peter Frankopan 1
R1,095 R878 Discovery Miles 8 780 Save R217 (20%) Ships in 9 - 15 working days

The No. 1 Sunday Times and international bestseller - a major reassessment of world history in light of the economic and political renaissance in the re-emerging east For centuries, fame and fortune was to be found in the west - in the New World of the Americas. Today, it is the east which calls out to those in search of adventure and riches. The region stretching from eastern Europe and sweeping right across Central Asia deep into China and India, is taking centre stage in international politics, commerce and culture - and is shaping the modern world. This region, the true centre of the earth, is obscure to many in the English-speaking world. Yet this is where civilization itself began, where the world's great religions were born and took root. The Silk Roads were no exotic series of connections, but networks that linked continents and oceans together. Along them flowed ideas, goods, disease and death. This was where empires were won - and where they were lost. As a new era emerges, the patterns of exchange are mirroring those that have criss-crossed Asia for millennia. The Silk Roads are rising again. A major reassessment of world history, The Silk Roads is an important account of the forces that have shaped the global economy and the political renaissance in the re-emerging east.

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