Hannibal Barca was an extraordinary military leader and political reformer in the ancient world. His Carthaginian army's march with elephants over the Alps to attack rival Rome in 218 BCE is one of the most daring exploits in world history. Hannibal sacrificed his life to leadership and war, and became such a force in the world's imagination that centuries after his death, Roman mothers would scare their children by threatening, 'Hannibal is at the gates'. His sacrifice of self to a larger cause is still an inspiration today, and his battle plans are studied by modern students of conflict and...
Hannibal Barca was an extraordinary military leader and political reformer in the ancient world. His Carthaginian army's march with elephants over the...
For more than 2,000 years, plays, poetry, movies, and television have portrayed Cleopatra as an ambitious woman who used her beauty to seduce powerful men like Julius Caesar and Mark Antony in a ruthless attempt to increase her own power and wealth. But is this the real Cleopatra or one invented by male historians anxious to discredit an intelligent, competent woman who was the last great pharaoh of Egypt? In "Cleopatra", the true story reveals her to be a woman who used her great intelligence, imagination, personality, and indomitable drive in a tragic attempt to restore Egypt to the...
For more than 2,000 years, plays, poetry, movies, and television have portrayed Cleopatra as an ambitious woman who used her beauty to seduce powerful...
In the year 486 BCE, upon the death of his father, Darius I, Xerxes I became king of the Persian Empire. His kingdom, extending from present-day Afghanistan and Pakistan in the east to Egypt and Libya in the west, was the largest empire of the classical age. However, all was not well within the Persian Empire, with the provinces of Egypt and Babylon in a state of rebellion and the tiny city-states of Greece refusing Xerxes' rule. Set nearly 2,500 years ago, this story of the Greco-Persian Wars pits the mighty Persian Army, one of the largest the world had ever seen, in a war of conquest...
In the year 486 BCE, upon the death of his father, Darius I, Xerxes I became king of the Persian Empire. His kingdom, extending from present-day Afgha...
United States Arthur M., JR. Schlesinger Fred L. Israel
Whether spoken by Abraham Lincoln in 1865, Franklin D. Roosevelt in 1933, or John F. Kennedy in 1961, some of the most memorable and profound words in American history have been uttered by presidents in their inaugural addresses. My Fellow Citizens, destined to become a reference classic, presents vital moments in our nation's past by compiling every inaugural address given by each U.S. president after being sworn into office. The text, which captures the spirit and political climate of the times when each speech was delivered, begins with the first address from George Washington in 1789 and...
Whether spoken by Abraham Lincoln in 1865, Franklin D. Roosevelt in 1933, or John F. Kennedy in 1961, some of the most memorable and profound words in...
A Pulitzer Prize-winning historian recounts the tale of the unwanted president who ran afoul of Congress over Reconstruction and was nearly removed from office
Andrew Johnson never expected to be president. But just six weeks after becoming Abraham Lincoln's vice president, the events at Ford's Theatre thrust him into the nation's highest office.
Johnson faced a nearly impossible task--to succeed America's greatest chief executive, to bind the nation's wounds after the Civil War, and to work with a Congress controlled by the so-called Radical Republicans. Annette...
A Pulitzer Prize-winning historian recounts the tale of the unwanted president who ran afoul of Congress over Reconstruction and was nearly remo...
The judicious statesman who won victories abroad but suffered defeat at home, whose wisdom and demeanor served America well at a critical time
George Bush was a throwback to a different era. A patrician figure not known for eloquence, Bush dismissed ideology as "the vision thing." Yet, as Timothy Naftali argues, no one of his generation was better prepared for the challenges facing the United States as the Cold War ended. Bush wisely encouraged the liberalization of the Soviet system and skillfully orchestrated the reunification of Germany. And following Iraq's invasion of...
The judicious statesman who won victories abroad but suffered defeat at home, whose wisdom and demeanor served America well at a critical time
In ancient history, Darius I stands alone as an administrator with unparalleled insight into the workings of an empire. Under his leadership, the Persian Empire grew to be the largest and most powerful diplomatic and economic force in the world. After he cleverly seized the throne and quelled a series of revolts, Darius undertook a radical reorganization of the different peoples who inhabited the Iranian Plateau, instituting the practices of religious tolerance, widespread economic reform, and a fair system of law that would later be adopted by the generations that followed him in the Near...
In ancient history, Darius I stands alone as an administrator with unparalleled insight into the workings of an empire. Under his leadership, the Pers...
