Attila the Hun
- godless barbarian & near-mythical warrior king
- has become a byword for mindless ferocity. His brutal attacks smashed through the frontiers of the Roman empire in a savage wave of death & destruction. His reign of terror shattered an imperial world that had been securely unified by the conquests of Julius Caesar five centuries before. This book goes in search of the real Attila the Hun. For the first time it reveals the history of an astute politician & first-rate military commander who brilliantly exploited the strengths & weaknesses of the Roman empire. We ride with Attila & the Huns from the windswept steppes of Kazakhstan to the opulent city of Constantinople from the Great Hungarian Plain to the fertile fields of Champagne in France. Challenging our own ideas about barbarians & Romans imperialism & civilisation terrorists & superpowers this is the absorbing story of an extraordinary & complex individual who helped to bring down an empire & forced the map of Europe to be redrawn forever.