War and Peace in Ancient and Medieval History

Jeremy Black reviews two books on military history, ancient and modern.

Jeremy Black | Published in History Today
War and Peace in Ancient and Medieval History
Edited by Philip de Souza and John France
Cambridge University Press   260pp   £55
ISBN 0 521 81703 X
 
Castles, Battles, and Bombs
How Economics Explains Military History
Jurgen Brauer and Hubert van Tuyll
University of Chicago Press   424pp   £15
ISBN 0 226 07163 4

While both interesting, each of these books has a somewhat misleading title. War and Peace in Ancient and Medieval History is about the making and breaking of peace treaties and truces, rather than war, while the ambitious Castles, Battles, and Bombs both rests on assertion and downplays other explanations of developments.

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