The Impossible Bourbons provides a remarkable account of this saga's most interesting characters, providing an insight into their lives, achievements and failings.
The Romanovs - the second and final dynasty to rule Russia - have captured the imagination of the world like no other royal family. The mysterious execution of Tsar Nicholas II and his immediate family in 1918 further fuelled this fascination. Yet the intrigue surrounding the family began centuries earlier with another notorious tsar - Ivan the Terrible. So-called due to his dramatic changed in temperament following the death of his wife, Ivan instigated one of the most terrifying periods in history as he and his Oprichniki viotently tortured his people. And he is only one of many Romanovs with a reputation... Tracing the ancestry back to the marriage of Anastasi Zakharyina and Ivan IV of Muscovy in 1547, through the demise of the House of Romanov, to the present generation, Oliver Thomson delves deep into the family's lineage. Including maps, portraits of family members and stunning colour photographs of the main surviving Romanov buildings, this absorbing book charts the rise and fall of one of the greatest families in history.
This is the 1,000-year saga of the remarkable Scottish family, who began as stewards, then became Stewarts, the Royal Stewarts, and finally Stuarts. They were remarkable not only for the continuity of the male line, which went for 26 generations without a break, but also for the 340 years that they held on to sovereign power. Yet, despite the longevity of the dynasty, the lives of many individuals were violent and short. Of the fourteen Stewart monarchs, eight failed to reach the age of fifty. Six of the fourteen died violent deaths, two were murdered, two executed and two killed in battle. Because of the tendency towards early death, the average age of accession was onlyl twenty-three, and six came to the throne before they were ten. Of the non-royals, over 100 were murdered and over 200 executed. It is a remarkable tale of tenacity and adaptability that has seen the family survive for 1,000 years. The Rises and Falls of the Royal Stewarts tells their fascinating tale with verve and drama.
This is a candid, sometimes controversial study of the psychological or other flaws of political, religious and economic leaders from ancient times to the present day: from Rameses II to Colonel Gaddafi, from Genghis Khan to Stalin and Hitler, from Buddha or Saint Paul to Martin Luther or Ron Hubbard, from bipolar, insecure, asthmatic or sex-addicted presidents to alcoholic prime ministers, mad kings, obese emperors and kleptomaniac dictators. Amongst their followers we find psychopathic police chiefs, gay generals, crazed philosophers, epileptic prophets and ludomaniac business- men. We look at how the minor personality disorders and health problems of the few have led frequently to considerable misery for the many.Without slavish adherence to the latest psychiatric fashions the author uses at least some of these concepts to help analyse the anti-social behaviour traits of leaders past and present and to assess the degree to which their mental or physical state contributed to most of the world's worst man-made disasters: wars, genocides, famines, persecutions, enslavements and recessions.We consider the questions: How many millions died because the Archangel Gabriel supposedly appeared to both the Virgin Mary and Mohammed? How many millions died because Napoleon was bullied at school, because Hitler failed to get into the Vienna Academy, because Stalin had an alcoholic father or because Mao suffered from attention deficit hyperactivity disorder?
In early medieval Scotland bitter rivalry grew up between two immigrant families from Flanders in their struggle for the crown: the Stewarts and the Douglases. This work covers the period from 1286 to what may be thought of as the "final" defeat of the Stewarts at Culloden in 1745.
This 1948 book provides a detailed study of the contribution of ancient societies to the development of geography, both in terms of theory and practical discovery. The text concentrates mainly on the perspectives of Greece and Rome, but other historical periods and regions are given attention, including ancient Egypt and China.
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