In the shadow of the sword : the battle for global empire and the end of an ancient world

In The 6th Century Ad, The Near East Was Divided Between Two Venerable Empires: The Persian And The Roman. A Hundred Years On, And One Had Vanished Forever, While The Other Seemed Almost Finished. Ruling In Their Place Were The Arabs: An Upheaval So Profound That It Spelt, In Effect, The End Of The Ancient World. In The Shadow Of The Sword, Tom Holland Explores How This Came About. Spanning Constantinople To The Arabian Desert, And Starring Some Of The Most Remarkable Rulers Who Ever Lived, He Tells A Story Vivid With Drama, Horror And Startling Achievement. Pt. I. Introduction. Known Unknowns -- Pt. Ii. Jahiliyya. Iranshahr ; New Rome ; The Children Of Abraham ; Countdown To Apocalypse -- Pt. Iii. Hijra. More Questions Than Answers ; The Forging Of Islam -- Envoi: Plus C̜a Change? -- Timeline -- Dramatis Personae. Tom Holland. Includes Bibliographical References (p. 481-507) And Index. No less than the collapse of the Roman Republic or the Persian invasion of Greece, the evolution of an Arab empire is one of the supreme narratives of ancient history; a story dazzlingly rich in drama, character and achievement. Just like the Romans, the Arabs came from nowhere to carve out a stupefyingly vast dominion - except that they achieved their conquests, not over the course of centuries, as the Romans did, but in a matter of decades. Just like the Greeks during the Persian wars, they overcame seemingly insuperable odds to emerge triumphant against the greatest empire of the day - not by standing on the defensive, however, but by hurling themselves against all who lay in their path. IN THE SHADOW OF THE SWORD effectively completes Tom Holland's trilogy describing the Ancient World. It represents an extraordinary achievement by the most exciting and readable young British historian working today "The remarkable story of an imperial civilization that endures as perhaps the only one to have survived from antiquity into the present day. No less significant than the collapse of the Roman Republic or the Persian invasion of Greece, the evolution of the Arab empire is one of the supreme narratives of ancient history, a story of manifest destiny that is dazzlingly rich in drama, character, and achievement. Just like the Romans, the Arabs came from nowhere; yet by 632, when the Prophet Muhammad is supposed to have died, all the tribes of the Arabian peninsula had come to acknowledge the authority of his teachings. During the next two hundred years, they carved out a stupefyingly vast dominion, overcoming seemingly insuperable odds to emerge triumphant against the greatest empire of the day."--Book cover * Tom Holland, author of RUBICON and PERSIAN FIRE, gives a thrilling panoramic account of the rise of Islam A vivid and detailed history of the Near East during late antiquity, culminating in the rise of Islam