Ancient History

Graham Hancock's multi-million best seller Fingerprints of the Gods remains an astonishing, deeply controversial, wide-ranging investigation of the mysteries of our past and the evidence for Earth's lost civilisation....

Here are the thrills, grandeur, and unabashed fun of the Greek myths, stylishly retold by Stephen Fry. The legendary writer, actor, and comedian breathes life into ancient tales, from Pandora's box to Prometheus's fire, and transforms the adventures of Zeus and the Olympians....

Do you know that the Olympians weren’t the original immortals? Or that the Goddess Hera restored her virginity each year? The ancient Greeks wove one of the richest and best-preserved collections of stories of all the early civilizations....

Do you know how many wives Zeus had? Or how the famous Trojan War was caused by one beautiful lady? Or how Thor got his hammer? Give your imagination a real treat. This Mega Mythology Collection of eight audiobooks is for you....

These lectures consistently deliver a fresh level of understanding about medieval England, its rulers and subjects, and their significance....

Far from being a time of darkness, the Middle Ages was an essential period in the grand narrative of Western history. Discover what it was like to actually live in this extraordinary era....

For eons, the wisdom cultivated by the Egyptian people has been extolled time and time again. These timeless myths are fountains of insight and, many would argue, beacons of light that can shatter the darkness of ignorance. Listen to learn more....

The secretive Mysteries conducted at Eleusis in Greece for nearly two millennia have long puzzled scholars with strange accounts of initiates experiencing otherworldly journeys....

At the dawn of the last millennium, Europe was among the world's stagnant regions, with illiteracy, starvation, and disease the norm for almost everyone...

These 34 astonishing lectures will introduce you to the major language families of the world and their many offspring, including a variety of languages that are no longer spoken but provide vital links between past and present....

When we think of Ancient Egypt, we picture movies with mazes, pyramids, traps, mummies, and symbols. And although some of these things were definitely part of it, there is so much more to this ancient civilization. Ancient Egypt was a North African society that grew in the lower banks of the Nile River, in what's now the nation of Egypt. Let’s explore some of the most important features of that society today, and try to grasp what transpired in the culture, the thoughts, the problems, and the development of the Egyptian region more than 5,000 years ago.

The Anglo-Saxon period, stretching from the fifth to the late eleventh century, begins with the Roman retreat from the Western world and ends with the Norman takeover of England. Between these epochal events, many of the contours and patterns of English life that would endure for the next millennium were shaped. In this authoritative work, N. J. Higham and M. J. Ryan reexamine Anglo-Saxon England in the light of new research in disciplines as wide ranging as historical genetics, paleobotany, archaeology, literary studies, art history, and numismatics.

The Hittites were mentioned in the Bible. They were an Anatolian people that contributed to creating a kingdom in Kussara before 1750 BC, the Kanesh or Nesha kingdom between 1750 and 1650 BC, and finally an empire based upon Hattusa in north-central Anatolia around 1650 BC. Under uppiluliuma I, the empire reached its peak in the mid-14th century BC, when it ruled over much of Anatolia and areas of the northern Levant and Upper Mesopotamia.

The most mysterious Anunnaki governor of all was Ur-Nammu of Ur, who subsequently became an independent Anunnaki king (2113-2096 BC) and founded a spin-off Anunnaki dynasty known as the Third Dynasty of Ur, which endured for more than a century. This Anunnaki empire was more compact than the Sargon of Agade and showed an advanced Anunnaki Sumerian civilization. It was a highly organized bureaucratic society, reflected by cuneiform tablets from this period, represented in world museums to the number of well over 100,000; most of these are waiting to be published. 

Whether you have played a Prince of Persia video game, seen the movie, or just heard about it in history class, it is hard to ignore the Persian Empire, which was among the greatest empires of the world for some time. The typical area for the Persian Empire was what is now Iran. The Persians had a vast influence on surrounding countries and regions. Their style, art, music, rule, and culture have had an influence on the development of science and the forming of nations. Learn more in this audiobook about this empire of old.

Political disintegration is a persistent feature of world history. The Collapse of Complex Societies, though written by an archaeologist, will therefore strike a chord throughout the social sciences. Any explanation of societal collapse carries lessons not just for the study of ancient societies, but for the members of all such societies in both the present and future. Dr. Tainter describes nearly two dozen cases of collapse and reviews more than 2,000 years of explanations.