The object of this book is to introduce readers to a whole range of military history which has all the drama, dangers, horrors & excitement that we associate with Stalingrad or the Somme. Battles are acute moments of history whenever & wherever they have been fought. Through them we can understand how warfare & world history have evolved. Choosing just one hundred battles from recorded human history is a challenge. Not just because it is necessary to cover almost 6, 000 years of history, but because men have fought each other almost continuously for millennia. Anyone who knows anything about the history of war may be disappointed at what has had to be left out. However, each of the 100 memorable battles described shows both how the nature of armed combat has changed over human history, & also how, despite changes in technology, organisation or ideas, many things have remained the same. It is an old adage that you can win a battle but lose a war. The battles featured here almost always resulted in victory for one side or another, but the victor did not necessarily win the war. Some battles are decisive in that broader historical sense, others are not. The further back in time, the more likely it is that an enemy could be finished off in one blow. The wars of the modern age, between major states, have involved repeated battles until one side was battered into submission. Some of the great generals of the recent past
- Napoleon, Robert E Lee, Erich von Manstein
- have been on the losing side but are remembered nonetheless for their generalship. Some on the winning side have all but disappeared from the history books or from public memory. Equally, in many battles, the issue is not victory or defeat, but what the battle can tell us about the history of warfare itself. New weapons, new tactics, new ways of organising armed forces can have a sudden impact on the outcome of a battle. But so too can leadership, or the effects of a clever deception, or raw courage. That is why the book has been divided up into clear themes which apply equally to the battles of the ancient world as they do to the battles of today. As Professor Richard Overy laments: ” Battle is not a game to plug into a computer but a piece of living history, messy, bloody & real. That, at least, has not changed in 6, 000 years.”

...

A soldier falls asleep on duty & is threatened with being court-martialled. An officer lies in mud, fighting for his life & the life of his men. A young man walks across Waterloo Bridge, explosives in his rucksack, heart pounding. In this powerfully moving book, Faulks shows us the true face of war. These are stories of death & survival, of hope & despair, & of ordinary people whose lives will never be the same again. Selected from the books Birdsong, A Possible Life & A Week in December by Sebastian Faulks VINTAGE MINIS: GREAT MINDS. BIG IDEAS. LITTLE BOOKS.A series of short books by the world`s greatest writers on the experiences that make us human. ...

War is one of the greatest human evils. It has ruined livelihoods, provoked unspeakable atrocities & left countless millions dead. It has caused economic chaos & widespread deprivation. & the misery it causes poisons foreign policy for future generations. But, argues bestselling historian Ian Morris, in the very long term, war has in fact been a good thing. In his trademark style combining inter-disciplinary insights, scientific methods & fascinating stories, Morris shows that, paradoxically, war is the only human invention that has allowed us to construct peaceful societies. Without war, we would never have built the huge nation-states which now keep us relatively safe from random acts of violence, & which have given us previously unimaginable wealth. It is thanks to war that we live longer & more comfortable lives than ever before. & yet, if we continue waging war with ever-more deadly weaponry, we will destroy everything we have achieved; so our struggles to manage warfare make the coming decades the most decisive in the history of our civilisation. In War: What Is It Good For? Morris brilliantly dissects humanity`s history of warfare to draw startling conclusions about our future. ...

An explosive action-adventure novel created by will.i.am & renowned futurist Brian David Johnson. Wizards are real, robots from the future are here, & the fate of our world rests in the hands of one unsuspecting teenager. When a young man breaks into her home claiming her life is in danger, Ada Luring`s world changes forever. Geller is a wizard, on the run from his father`s hidden clan who want to kill Ada & her mother. Sara Luring is the scientist who will create the first robot, the wizards` age-old foes. But a robot has travelled back in time to find Ada, & will lay everything on the line to protect her, as she may just be the key to preventing the earth`s destruction in the future. Ada, Geller & the robots must learn to work together to change the past & secure the future. But they don`t have much time before a mysterious enemy launches its attack on Earth... ...

The peaceful realm of Azeroth stands on the brink of war as its civilization faces a fearsome race of invaders: orc warriors fleeing their dying home to colonize another. As a portal opens to connect the two worlds, one army faces destruction & the other faces extinction. From opposing sides, two heroes are set on a collision course that will decide the fate of their family, their people & their home. So begins a spectacular saga of power & sacrifice in which war has many faces, & everyone fights for something. ...

Warduff is down at the harbour one day when he notices something amiss. The penguins have been plundered by a posse of pelican pirates & have returned from their fishing trip empty handed! Warduff must come up with a brilliant plan to outwit the pirates, or they might never eat fish again! ...

Ware in 1896 in a fascinating series of reproductions of old Ordnance Survey plans in the Alan Godfrey Editions, ideal for anyone interested in the history of their neighbourhood or family. The map is double-sided with part of the town shown on the reverse. At the top of the main map are the River Lea & the housing estates spread across its bank. Below are rural areas with the estates of Chadwell House, Limekiln Farm, Highfields, Presdales & Amwellbury Farm. Post Wood stretches from Presdales close to the centre of the map down to Amwellbury in the bottom right corner; on the right side of the map are the chalk pits, a reminder that Ware was an industrial town. On the reverse is the remaining of part of the Ware map. From the centre of the map stretching to the far right, the sheer volume of malthouses & maltkilns gives evidence to the town’s primary industry. Within the town itself features include St. Mary`s church, Collett Hall, Christ Church School & the Infirmary with an infectious diseases wing, etc. The map

Includes:: an introduction to Ware`s history by Alan Godfrey. About the Alan Godfrey Editions of the 25” OS Series: Selected towns in Great Britain & Ireland are covered by maps showing the extent of urban development in the last decades of the 19th & early 20th century. The plans have been taken from the Ordnance Survey mapping & reprinted at about 15 inches to one mile (1:4, 340). On the reverse most maps have historical notes & many also include extracts from contemporary directories. Most maps cover about one mile (1.6kms) north/south, one & a half miles (2.4kms) across; adjoining sheets can be combined to provide wider coverage.FOR MORE INFORMATION & A COMPLETE LIST OF ALL AVAILABLE TITLES PLEASE CLICK ON THE SERIES LINK.

...

Topographical survey of Belgium at 1:20, 000 from Nationaal Geografisch Instituut / Institut Géographique National, the country’s national survey organization. Each 20K map covers one quarter of the corresponding 1:50, 000 map (with adjustments in the border & coastal areas). The maps provide all the information expected of topographic mapping at this scale & in addition have an unusually large amount of vegetation and/or land use information (different types of woodlands, gardens, orchards, heath, etc). The maps have a 1-km UTM grid, with margin ticks for latitude & longitude at intervals of 1`. Map legend & a glossary of terms used on the maps include English. Stanfords keeps as regular stock 20K maps for the World War I battlefields around the Ypres, Messines & Passchendaele, & for the area of the Battle of Waterloo. The 1:20, 000 survey covers the whole of Belgium & maps for other regions can be supplied as special orders. To see the list of titles in this series please click on the series link.PLEASE NOTE: the Long-Distance Footpaths Map of Belgium at 1:300, 000 which shows the division of Belgium into the 50K survey sheets can also be used to see in more detail coverage by the 20K maps. ...

Topographical survey of Belgium at 1:20, 000 from Nationaal Geografisch Instituut / Institut Géographique National, the country’s national survey organization. Each 20K map covers one quarter of the corresponding 1:50, 000 map (with adjustments in the border & coastal areas). The maps provide all the information expected of topographic mapping at this scale & in addition have an unusually large amount of vegetation and/or land use information (different types of woodlands, gardens, orchards, heath, etc). The maps have a 1-km UTM grid, with margin ticks for latitude & longitude at intervals of 1`. Map legend & a glossary of terms used on the maps include English. Stanfords keeps as regular stock 20K maps for the World War I battlefields around the Ypres, Messines & Passchendaele, & for the area of the Battle of Waterloo. The 1:20, 000 survey covers the whole of Belgium & maps for other regions can be supplied as special orders. To see the list of titles in this series please click on the series link.PLEASE NOTE: the Long-Distance Footpaths Map of Belgium at 1:300, 000 which shows the division of Belgium into the 50K survey sheets can also be used to see in more detail coverage by the 20K maps. ...

Topographical survey of Belgium at 1:50, 000 from the country’s national survey organization, Nationaal Geografisch Instituut / Institut Géographique National. Contour interval varies according to the terrain, from 2.5 metres in the coastal areas to 10 metres in the Ardennes. The maps provide all the information expected of topographic mapping at this scale & in addition have an unusually large amount of vegetation and/or land use information (different types of woodlands, gardens, orchards, heath, etc). Each standard sheet covers Approx. 32 x 20 km / 20 x 12 miles, with larger maps published for the border or coastal areas. The maps have a 1-km UTM grid, with margin ticks for latitude & longitude at intervals of 1`. Map legend & a glossary of terms used on the maps include English.PLEASE NOTE: the Long-Distance Footpaths Map of Belgium at 1:300, 000 is overprinted with the grid for the 1:50, 000 topographic survey, showing the exact coverage of each sheet. Stanfords keeps as regular stock 50K maps for the World War I battlefields around the Ypres, Messines & Passchendaele, & for the area of the Battle of Waterloo. Maps for other regions can be supplied as special orders – to see the list of all the titles in this series please click on the series link. ...