A witty, informative and highly entertaining guide to how to be a pirate, combining historical accuracy with a humorous eye in an irreverent but revealing look at the world of piracy and buccaneering.

The essential guide to the complex, fascinating world of Chinese myths: retelling the stories and exploring their significance in Chinese culture.

This is a concise and entertaining guide to the complex tradition of Chinese mythology. While many around the world are familiar with some aspects of Chinese myth - through Chinese New Year festivities or the classic adventures of the Monkey King in Journey to the West - few outside of China understand the richness of Chinese mythology, ...

An engaging and witty compendium of ninety-four notable men and women who shaped and experienced one of the most creative and inventive periods in human civilization.

An updated edition of this classic and much-loved history, bringing Scotland’s story right up to date with the momentous events of the last five years.

In a bestselling work of profound and lasting importance, the late Albert Hourani told the definitive history of the Arab peoples from the seventh century, when the new religion of Islam began to spread from the Arabian peninsula westwards, to the present day. It is a masterly distillation of a lifetime of scholarship and a unique insight into a perpetually troubled region. This updated edition by Malise Ruthven adds a substantial new chapter which includes recent events such as 9/11, the US ...

The gripping, untold story of how six epic journeys launched the three communist revolutions that changed world history forever. From the streets of Petrograd during the heady autumn of 1917, to Mao's stunning victory in October 1949, and Fidel's triumphant arrival in Havana, in January 1959, the history of the twentieth century was transformed in dramatic and profound ways by the Russian, Chinese, and Cuban revolutions. In Three Revolutions, the stories of these epoch-defining events are...

Bestselling historian and broadcaster Tom Holland gives a thrilling panoramic account of the birth of the new Western Europe in the year 1000

An epic page-turner about Waterloo, one of the greatest land battles in British history, rich in dramatic human detail and grounded in first class research.

Could we ever see Vladimir Putin in the dock for his crimes? What about a Western ally like Benjamin Netanyahu? Putting a country's leader on trial once seemed unthinkable. But as journalist and human rights advocate Steve Crawshaw describes in Prosecuting the Powerful - a blend of vivid reportage and gripping history - a series of remarkable changes in recent years means that, despite many challenges, both scenarios are now a possibility.

Drawing on his on-the-ground reporting from ...

This volume provides a history of the computer which now comes properly up to the ubiquitous age, with new chapters that look at globalization, platformitization and regulation, allowing readers to engage with the more recent takeover by computers in their historical perspective. With the growing ubiquity of computers, the subject is one of interest to many students and this will feature in history of science and technology courses, and world history courses as well as ones specifically on co...