The Spartans, Paul Cartledge
The Spartans, Paul Cartledge
1 Rating(s)
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The Spartans
The World of the WarriorHeroes of Ancient Greece, from Utopia to Crisis and Collapse

Author: Paul Cartledge

Narrator: John Lee

Unabridged: 8 hr 36 min

Format: Digital Audiobook Download

Published: 01/01/2006

Categories: Nonfiction, History


Synopsis

The Spartans of ancient Greece were a powerful and unique people, a society of warriorheroes who exemplified the heroic virtues of selfsacrifice, community endeavor, and achievement against all odds. Paul Cartledge engagingly examines the rise and fall of this singular society.

About Paul Cartledge

Paul Cartledge has taught Greek history at Cambridge University since 1979 and is also a Fellow at Clare College. Widely acknowledged to be the world’s leading expert on the subject of Sparta and ancient Greece, he is the first A. G. Leventis Professor of Greek Culture (2008) which focuses on the study of more than 1,000 years of Greek cultural achievements and highlights the lasting influence they continue to have on society today. In addition to having written and edited scores of articles and books, including The Spartans: An Epic History; and Thermopylae: The Battle that Changed the World, he is also academic consultant to the BBC and PBS for the series The Greeks: Crucible of Civilization.


Reviews

Goodreads review by Cody on April 02, 2020

"Thus, one not insignificant reason why we today should care who the ancient Spartans were, is that they played a key role - some might say the key role - in defending Greece and so preserving from foreign and alien conquest a form of culture or civilisation that constitutes one of the chief roots o......more

Goodreads review by Julian on April 08, 2019

This is an excellent book about The Spartans. Once you have finished, you will understand fully what the adjective spartan should mean. They were physically and mentally hard and never took a backwards step, at least until the Battle of Leuctra in 371BC. There are some amusing anecdotes such as the......more

Goodreads review by Myke on December 26, 2018

The classic, definitive work on the subject, and well-deserving of the title. Cartledge is open-eyed and tracking steadily with what the evidence tells us of the Spartans, deftly sidestepping the enormous social pressure toward hagiography that has so colored all discussion of Spartan society since......more

Goodreads review by Abigail on January 20, 2014

Paul Cartledge describes this work as his first attempt to write a “properly general” history of Sparta. It would not be wholly inaccurate to describe his style as, on the one hand, too erudite to be considered truly popular, yet on the other hand, too informal to be truly academic. He lands, then,......more

Goodreads review by Trisha on September 16, 2010

I just finished 281 pages that detail the birth and death of Sparta. My mind is reeling. The book was dense with historical information, centered on war, but surprisingly offering quite a lot of cultural insight through the inclusion of anecdotes and sayings attributed to various Spartans. Now, I ha......more