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This is nonfiction commentary. Purchase includes a free trial membership in the publisher's book club where you can select from more than a million books without charge. Chapters: History of the Peloponnesian War, Anabasis, Indica, Periplus Ponti Euxini, Anabasis Alexandri. Source: Wikipedia. Free updates online. Not illustrated. Excerpt: The History of the Peloponnesian War is an account of the Peloponnesian War in Ancient Greece, fought between the Peloponnesian League (led by Sparta) and the Delian League (led by Athens). It was written by Thucydides, an Athenian general who served in the war. It is widely considered a classic and regarded as one of the earliest scholarly works of history. The History was divided into eight books by editors of later antiquity. Analyses of the History generally fall into one of two camps. On the one hand are those who view the work as an objective and scientific piece of history. The judgement of J. B. Bury reflects this traditional interpretation of the work: " severe in its detachment, written from a purely intellectual point of view, unencumbered with platitudes and moral judgements, cold and critical." A more recent interpretation, associated with reader-response criticism, argues that the History is better understood as a piece of literature than an objective record of the past. This view is embodied in the words of W. R. Connor, who describes Thucydides as "an artist who responds to, selects and skillfully arranges his material, and develops its symbolic and emotional potential." The former outlook views Thucydides as pathbreaking, modern, and philosophical, ahead of his time; the latter views the historian as closely connected with his historical and cultural context. Both interpretations are accepted by scholars, sometimes by the same scholar, and seem to capture the contradictory impulses and tensions within the History. Thucydides' History made a number of contributions to early h...More: http://booksllc.net/?id=382350 ... Read more

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Dual language, Greek and English. Fold out maps in rear of book. ... Read more

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Purchase of this book includes free trial access to www.million-books.com where you can read more than a million books for free.This is an OCR edition with typos.Excerpt from book:not many years since it ceased to be so. Nay even now among some of the barbarians, and especially those of Asia, prizes for boxing and wrestling are given, and they wear girdles when they contend for them. And in many other respects also one might show that the ancient Greeks lived in a manner similar to the barbarians of the present age.7. Of the cities, again, such as were founded most recently, and when there were now greater facilities of navigation, having greater abundance of wealth, they were built with walls on the very shores; and occupied isthmuses, with a view both to commerce and to security against their several neighbors: whereas the old ones, owing to the' long continuance of piracy, were built further off from the sea, both those in the islands and those on the mainlands ; (for they used to plunder one another, and all the rest who lived by the sea without being seamen) ; and even to the present day they are built inland.8. And the islanders especially were pirates, being Carians and Phoenicians. For it was these that had colonized most of the islands. And this is a proof of it:—When Delos was purified by the Athenians in the course of this war, and all the sepulchers of those who had died in the island were taken up, above half were found to be Carians; being known by the fashion of the arms buried with them, and by the manner in which they still bury. But when the navy of Minos was established, there were greater facilities of sailing to each other. For the malefactors in the islands were expelled by him, at the same time that he was colonizing most of them. And the men on the sea-coast, now making greater acquisition of wealth, led a more settled life; and some of them even surrounded themselves with walls, on the strength of growing richer than they ha... ... Read more

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Greatest of All Greek Historians
The greatest of all Greek historians was the Athenian general Thucydides (455-400 B.C.E.).Thucydides' classic work, "History Of The Peloponnesian War", provides us with the historical framework for 5th century Greece, a golden age of intellectual achievement and creativity rarely equaled in human history.This history is by far the best account of the bitter war between Athens and Sparta as well as the only surviving contemporary record of the rise of the Athenian empire.Thucydides as a master storyteller does not just cover the battle scenes; he records the great political speeches of Pericles, leader of Athens, and Lysander leader of Sparta with great acumen.He is recognized as the first historian to actually go and get eyewitness accounts, visit battlefieilds and research documents and records.This work took him over 20 years and it shows!

The lessons he teaches about imperial over reaching and unreasonable peace settlements are prescient today as they were during his times.President Woodrow Wilson, read this book on his voyage across the Atlantic to the Versailles Peace Conference and vociferously fought the other Allies in making unreasonable demands of the Germans.Wilson learned the dangers that the world would be placed in by backing the Germans into a corner politically and economically from Thucydides book.

As a graduate student in philosophy and history, I heartily recommend this timeless classic to anyone who is interested in political philosophy, and history.I also recommend you read it with David Cartwright's "A Historical Commentary On Thucydides."

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The History of the Peloponnesian War is an account of thePeloponnesian War in Ancient Greece, fought between thePeloponnesian League and the Delian League. It was writtenby Thucydides, an Athenian general who served in the war.It is widely considered a classic and regarded as one ofthe earliest scholarly works of history. The History wasdivided into eight books by editors of later antiquity. ... Read more

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From Chapter I:

"The State of Greece from the earliest Times to the Commencement of the Peloponnesian War THUCYDIDES, an Athenian, wrote the history of the war between the Peloponnesians and the Athenians, beginning at the moment that it broke out, and believing that it would be a great war and more worthy of relation than any that had preceded it. This belief was not without its grounds. The preparations of both the combatants were in every department in the last state of perfection; and he could see the rest of the Hellenic race taking sides in the quarrel; those who delayed doing so at once having it in contemplation. Indeed this was the greatest movement yet known in history, not only of the Hellenes, but of a large part of the barbarian world- I had almost said of mankind. For though the events of remote antiquity, and even those that more immediately preceded the war, could not from lapse of time be clearly ascertained, yet the evidences which an inquiry carried as far back as was practicable leads me to trust, all point to the conclusion that there was nothing on a great scale, either in war or in other matters. For instance, it is evident that the country now called Hellas had in ancient times no settled population; on the contrary, migrations were of frequent occurrence, the several tribes readily abandoning their homes under the pressure of superior numbers. Without commerce, without freedom of communication either by land or sea, cultivating no more of their territory than the exigencies of life required, destitute of capital, never planting their land (for they could not tell when an invader might not come and take it all away, and when he did come they had no walls to stop him), thinking that the necessities of daily sustenance could be supplied at one place as well as another, they cared little for shifting their habitation, and consequently neither built large cities nor attained to any other form of greatness. The richest soils were always most subject to this change of masters; such as the district now called Thessaly, Boeotia, most of the Peloponnese, Arcadia excepted, and the most

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The History of the Peloponnesian War is presented here in a high quality paperback edition. This popular classic work by Thucydides is in the English language. If you enjoy the works of Thucydides then we highly recommend this publication for your book collection. ... Read more