The Ghosts of Cannae, Robert L. OConnell
The Ghosts of Cannae, Robert L. OConnell
2 Rating(s)
List: $21.99 | Sale: $15.39
Club: $10.99

The Ghosts of Cannae
Hannibal and the Darkest Hour of the Roman Republic

Author: Robert L. O'Connell

Narrator: Alan Sklar

Unabridged: 13 hr 15 min

Format: Digital Audiobook Download

Publisher: Tantor Media

Published: 07/20/2010


Synopsis

Hannibal's battle plan at Cannae became the mother of all great battle strategies—the first battle of encirclement that has been imitated (often to disastrous effect) endlessly over the past two thousand years. In this brilliant, long-overdue, and beautifully written account, Robert L. O'Connell gives listeners an epic account of one of the most dramatic battles of antiquity. The Ghosts of Cannae is at once a book about a specific battle (the massive defeat of a huge but inexperienced Roman army in southern Italy by Hannibal in 216 BC) but also an interpretation of the larger course of the Second Punic War, as well as an assessment of the historical impact of Rome's storied rivalry with Carthage. What ties the book together is the fate of the survivors, their treatment by the authorities in Rome, and ultimately their vindication nearly two decades later, when they defeated Hannibal at the decisive battle of Zama in North Africa. With an unforgettable cast of heroes and villains, The Ghosts of Cannae is history at its finest.

About Robert L. O'Connell

Robert L. O'Connell worked as senior analyst at the U.S. Army Intelligence Agency's Foreign Science and Technology Center and was a contributing editor to MHQ: The Quarterly Journal of Military History. He is the author of Of Arms and Men: A History of War, Weapons, and Aggression and Soul of the
Sword: An Illustrated History of Weaponry and Warfare from Prehistory to the Present.


Reviews

Hannibal’s Ghost I’m off on a trip to Tunisia at the beginning of October, my first to the North African country. There are various reasons I want to go, among the uppermost is to stand among the stones of Carthage. Of course this is Roman Carthage, not the Punic city. That was completely oblitera......more

Goodreads review by Jim

This is nothing short of a superb history of the Second Punic War. It was nothing short of amazing to see Hannibal practically pick Rome apart with virtually no support or even permission from Carthage: His decades-long invasion was conducted mostly as a freebooting warlord who put together his own......more

Goodreads review by Myke

I singled out Cornwell's Waterloo for praise based on its accessibility. It's rare to find a straight-up military history that's designed to explain the basic concepts of maneuver warfare, order-of-battle, troop organization and accoutrement, and the details of military life to the lay reader. To do......more