Ancient

A new age has dawned for Rome. Following the brief reign of Emperor Nerva, Marcus Ulpius Trajan inherits the mantle of Caesar. A revered general and statesman, the senate a people of Rome greet his rise with an optimism not seen since the reign of Vespasian.

A New York Times-bestselling historian charts how and why societies from ancient Greece to the modern era chose to utterly destroy their foes, and warns that similar wars of obliteration are possible in our time....

Get to know one of history’s most impressive generals from the political and military conflicts that defined his adolescence to the battles that made him famous. These 15 lectures will paint a portrait of not only Hannibal, but also his enemies and allies....

In this, the first prose history in European civilization, Herodotus describes the growth of the Persian Empire with force, authority, and style....

Julius Caesar is one of the most famous figures of the ancient Roman world. A skillful general and leading politician of the late Roman Republic, he secured a 10-year proconsular command in the province of Gaul, during which he accumulated both wealth and power....

Until the publication of this captivating biography, no such volume on Trajan's life has been tailored to the general listener. The unique book illuminates a neglected period of ancient Roman history....

David A. Guenther examines Macedonian warrior king Alexander's 332 BC siege of the island city of Tyre, an impregnable fortress and key to unlocking Phoenician and Persian power in the Near East.

In the thirteenth century BC, a quarter of a century before the Trojan War, seven Greek warrior heroes went against the Greek city of Thebes to restore one of their number to the throne of his father, the famous King Oedipus....

The myths surrounding Sparta are as old as the city itself. Even in antiquity, Sparta was a unique society, considered an enigma. The Spartans' often bizarre rules and practices have the capacity to horrify as much they do to fascinate us today....

Hundred Years War expert Professor Anne Curry presents an overview of the Hundred Years War, the longest-running and the most significant conflict in western Europe in the later Middle Ages....

A riveting account of ancient Rome's imperial bodyguard, the select band of soldiers who wielded the power to make - or destroy - the emperors they served....

From classicist James Romm comes a thrilling deep dive into the last decades of ancient Greek freedom leading up to Alexander the Great’s destruction of Thebes - and the saga of the greatest military corps of the age, the Theban Sacred Band, a unit composed of 150 pairs of male lovers....

Aurelian saved the Roman Empire from foreign invasion and collapse, earning him the title Restorer of the World from a grateful Senate. This is his story as restorer of the world....

Who was Rome's greatest general, statesman, and nation-builder: Caesar or Pompey?

In Mortal Republic, prize-winning historian Edward J. Watts offers a new history of the fall of the Roman Republic that explains why Rome exchanged freedom for autocracy. Listen to learn more....