Showing titles in Greece

Plutarch’s Lives remains one of the world’s most profoundly influential literary works. Written at the beginning of the second century, it forms a brilliant social history of the ancient world. His “parallel lives” were originally presented in a series of books that gave an account of one Greek and one Roman life, followed by a comparison of the two. Volume 1 compares Theseus and Romulus, Alcibiades and Coriolanus, and Aristides and Marcus Cato, among others.

Finalist for the Los Angeles Times Book Prize (Biography) A Hollywood love story, a Hollywood memoir, a dual biography of two of Hollywood’s most famous figures, whose golden lives were lived at the center of Hollywood’s golden age, written by their daughter, an acclaimed writer and producer...

What do the Greek myths mean to us today? It's now a golden age for these tales – they crop up in novels, films and popular culture. But what's the modern relevance of Theseus, Hera and Pandora? Were these stories ever meant for children? And what's to be seen now at the places where heroes fought and gods once quarrelled?

When Athenians suffered the shame of having lost a war from their own greed and foolishness, around 404 BCE the public's blame was directed at Socrates, a man whose unique appearance and behavior, as well as his disapproval of the democracy, made him a ready target. Socrates was subsequently put on trial and sentenced to death. However, as René Girard has pointed out, no individual can be held responsible for a communal crisis.

The classical Greek intellectual tradition pervades nearly every aspect of our modern Western civilization. Our logic and science, our philosophy, politics, literature, architecture, and art are all indebted to the ancient inhabitants of the small mountainous Mediterranean country. And the powerful myths of the Greeks, refined by Homer, Hesiod, Herodotus, and the great Greek dramatists, still resonate at the core of our culture.

In Unbinding the Heart, author, speaker, and Huffington Post regular Agapi Stassinopoulos brings you an unabridged reading of her inspiring journey of inner exploration to reconnect with our true selves—featuring a new guided meditation available only in this audio book. Born in Greece, a...

From about the ninth to fifth centuries BCE, the population of Greece grew unprecedentedly large, expanding from about 800,000 people to as many as 13 million. About a quarter million of these lived in Athens. The average size of urban households during this period grew considerably, a fact that suggests that food was suddenly available in excesses sufficient to keep larger families healthy and alive much more effectively than just a millennium earlier. Bigger families meant bigger armies and larger communities that would eventually grow into the metropolises of Classical Greece.

Theophrastus' Characters is a joyous festival of fault-finding: a collection of thirty closely observed personality portraits, defining the full spectrum of human flaws, failings, and follies. With piquant details of speech and behavior taken straight off the streets of ancient Athens, Theophrastus gives us sketches of the mean, vile, and annoying that are comically distorted yet vividly real. Enlivened by Pamela Mensch's fresh translation, Theophrastus' Characters transports us to a world populated by figures of flesh and blood, not bronze and marble.

The Yesterdays of Crete, is designed to be an easy listen snapshot of this beautiful and now highly popular tourist island. The history of human occupation in Crete spans back for more than 130,000 years and at a time it was the prime source of Greek mythology through the periods of King Minos, the Minotaur and the Labyrinth. The island has been occupied by the Mycenaean's, Romans, Venetians, Ottomans and Nazi Germany to mention but a few.

The Peloponnesian War broke out in 431 B.C. and continued intermittently for 27 years. It pitted the all-powerful land force of Sparta and its allies against the supremely powerful naval force of Athens. Thucydides actually participated in this conflict, a war that he realized would have a greater influence on the history of Greece than any other. He vividly narrates exciting episodes and carefully describes tactical aspects of the war, and also provides illuminating character profiles.

Before medical schools. Before clinical science. There were sanctuaries. Across the hills of ancient Greece, the sick traveled to quiet marble precincts dedicated to Asclepius — god of healing, son of Apollo, student of a centaur, and himself a figure both mortal and divine. They came not only for remedies, but for dreams.

There are few mythological characters that require less of an introduction than Hercules. His "labours" are known and have been reimagined by cultures far beyond their Greek beginnings, and he continues to influence modern culture in more ways than any other ancient Greek hero.

Inside this tome, we will examine Hellenistic Greece in a way that brings the people to life and puts their decisions up for debate, even two thousand years later. If you’ve ever wondered any of the following, then this audiobook was made for you: Did Cleopatra really marry her brother? What happened to Alexander’s far-reaching empire after his death? Why would Hannibal choose elephants for battle? Where were the mighty Spartans when Rome came knocking?

What does it mean to be great? There have been many that have come through the sands of time proclaiming their own greatness. We see it in the news every day - leaders, heroes, tyrants, and even reality star presidential candidates claim that they are great. But what about Alexander the Great?

Although it is no longer quite as well remembered as it was thousands of years ago, one of the most important cities in the ancient world was Ephesus, a city that dates back nearly 3,000 years and can lay claim to the Temple of Artemis, one of the seven wonders of the ancient world. Moreover, while Sparta and Athens were often the centers of power in ancient Greece, Ephesus, located in present-day Turkey on the coast of Ionia, was an instrumental part of the Ionian League.

For centuries, whispers of a forbidden ritual have haunted archaeologists and historians, a chilling practice woven into the rise and fall of Egypt’s most powerful rulers. In The Pharaoh’s Kill List: Inside the Ancient Egyptian Tradition of Human Sacrifice, bestselling researcher Davis Truman pulls back the curtain on a world where divine kingship demanded blood, loyalty was enforced through death, and every royal tomb carried secrets meant to stay hidden forever.

Phèdre est un des nombreux dialogues socratiques transmis par Platon. Il y est question de la beauté et de l'amour, entendu comme désir, dans un premier temps, puis de la beauté d'un discours et de la rhétorique dans un second temps. L'amour comme la rhétorique peuvent éléver la beauté de l'âme mais ils peuvent tout aussi bien l'abaisser, en s'attachant seulement au plaisir et à la domination d'autrui.

The Amazons, a fascinating exploration of the legendary women-warriors who captured the Greek imagination. Rothery draws on classical texts, folklore, anthropology, and comparative histories to trace the myth’s evolution—and to ask: how much of the legend is rooted in fact?

A History of Greece is the thrilling story of the rise and decline of the greatest civilization the world has ever known. As Cyril Robinson's exquisite narrative unfolds, we find ourselves plunged into mankind's greatest and most magnificent adventure.

During the Persian Wars, Sparta and Athens worked in tandem to defeat what was, in terms of relative resources and power, the greatest empire in human history. For the decade and a half that followed, they continued their collaboration until a rift opened and an intense, strategic rivalry began. In a continuation of his series on ancient Sparta, noted historian Paul Rahe examines the grounds for their alliance, the reasons for its eventual collapse, and the first stage in an enduring conflict that would wreak havoc on Greece for six decades.