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Justinian's Flea
- Plague, Empire, and the Birth of Europe
- Narrated by: Barrett Whitener
- Length: 11 hrs and 52 mins
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Publisher's summary
In Justinian's Flea, William Rosen tells the story of history's first pandemic - a plague seven centuries before the Black Death that killed tens of millions, devastated the empires of Persia and Rome, left a path of victims from Ireland to Iraq, and opened the way for the armies of Islam. Weaving together evolutionary microbiology, economics, military strategy, ecology, and ancient and modern medicine, Rosen offers a sweeping narrative of one of the great hinge moments in history, one that will appeal to readers of John Kelly's The Great Mortality, John Barry's The Great Influenza, and Jared Diamond's Collapse.
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Islamic conquest history from the outside
- By SAMA on 01-22-15
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The Templars
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- By: Michael Haag
- Narrated by: Guy Bethell
- Length: 11 hrs and 6 mins
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Arguably one of the most provocative, puzzling, and misunderstood organizations of medieval times, the legendary Knights Templar have always been shrouded in a veil of mystery, while inspiring popular culture from Indiana Jones to Dan Brown. In The Templars, author Michael Haag offers a definitive history of these loyal Christian soldiers of the Crusades - sworn to defend the Holy Land and Jerusalem, but ultimately damned and destroyed by the Pope and his church.
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Narrator ruined it
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By: Michael Haag
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Marathon
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- By: Richard A. Billows
- Narrated by: Jeremy Gage
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Published to coincide with Marathon's 2500th anniversary, a riveting history of the historic battle. The Battle of Marathon in 490 B.C. is not only understood as the most decisive event in the struggle between the Greeks and the Persians, but can also be seen as perhaps the most significant moment in our collective history. 10,000 Athenian citizens faced a Persian military force of more than 25,000.
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Effectively evokes the world of ancient greece
- By Aaron on 11-02-10
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The Mental Floss History of the World
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About 60,000 years ago, the first Homo sapiens were just beginning their move across the grasslands and up the ladder of civilization. Everything since then, as they say, is history. Just in case you were sleeping in class that day, the geniuses at mental_floss magazine have put together a hilarious (and historically accurate) primer on everything you need to know---and that means the good stuff.
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Brilliant and Funny. What more could you want?
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The Race for Paradise
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In The Race for Paradise, Paul M. Cobb offers a new history of the confrontations between Muslims and Franks we now call the "Crusades", one that emphasizes the diversity of Muslim experiences of the European holy war. There is more to the story than Jerusalem, the Templars, Saladin, and the Assassins. Cobb considers the Arab perspective on all shores of the Muslim Mediterranean, from Spain to Syria.
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A heady piece of history and a romp.
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In Search of the Dark Ages
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In Search of the Dark Ages is an unrivalled exploration of the origins of English identity, and the best-selling book that established Michael Wood as one of Britain's leading historians. Now, on the book's 40th anniversary, this fully revised and expanded edition illuminates further the fascinating and mysterious centuries between the Romans and the Norman Conquest.
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Brilliant!
- By Dee Goulet on 08-31-22
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When Montezuma Met Cortes
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In 1519, the Spanish conquistador Hernando Cortés first met Montezuma, the Aztec emperor, at the entrance to the capital city of Tenochtitlan. This introduction - the prelude to the Spanish seizure of Mexico City and to European colonization of the mainland of the Americas - has long been the symbol of Cortés' bold and brilliant military genius. Montezuma, on the other hand, is remembered as a coward who gave away a vast empire and touched off a wave of colonial invasions across the hemisphere. But is this really what happened?
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Flawed, but worth it for those interested.
- By "J" on 02-16-18
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Walls
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With Frye as our raconteur-guide, we journey back to a time before barriers of brick and stone even existed - to an era in which nomadic tribes vied for scarce resources, and each man was bred to a life of struggle. Ultimately, those same men would create edifices of mud, brick, and stone and with them effectively divide humanity: On one side were those the walls protected; on the other, those the walls kept out. The stars of this narrative are the walls themselves - rising up in places as ancient and exotic as Mesopotamia, Babylon, Greece, China, Rome, Mongolia, Afghanistan, the lower Mississippi, and even Central America....
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A boom that will transform how you view all of history.
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The Sea Wolves
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In AD 793 Norse warriors struck the English isle of Lindisfarne and laid waste to it. Wave after wave of Norse "sea wolves" followed in search of plunder, land, or a glorious death in battle. Much of the British Isles fell before their swords, and the continental capitals of Paris and Aachen were sacked in turn. Turning east, they swept down the uncharted rivers of central Europe, captured Kiev, and clashed with mighty Constantinople, the capital of the Byzantine Empire.
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A little dry but very interesting
- By Angela on 08-30-15
By: Lars Brownworth
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What listeners say about Justinian's Flea
Average customer ratingsReviews - Please select the tabs below to change the source of reviews.
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- Mrs.
- 07-28-12
Amost interesting book, but.....
Would you recommend this book to a friend? Why or why not?
There are those books that simply do not lend themselves to being audio books, this is one of them. Page after page after page on the internal workings of a flea and the bacterium that inhabit its stomach are actually fascinating but the information is so heavy that one need be able to flip back and review earlier pages; indeed a few bookmarks would be helpful. With an audio book this is extremely difficult.
The hard copy of the book has several maps which are useful, something which again one loses in the audio format.
Further, the litany of names and places that are necessary in this volume are made easier to remember, in the hard copy, through the presence of an index; without one it is easy to get lost. I found myself need to relistening to several chapters in an effort to ensure the correct placement of personages and places.
Given the above I would not recommend this book. Read it by all means but do not listen to it.
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Overall
- Arden
- 04-13-20
The First Pandemic
This is the story of the eastern Roman empire, how Justinian tried to reunite the empire, and how the plague ended this campaign. Heavy on history including speculation about the origin of the bubonic plague. My greatest learning was how close in time the Justinian plague was to the birth of Islam
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- Nathan
- 09-26-23
Mostly history, lots of plague, altogether awesome
Rich historical storytelling with lots of tasty tangents.
Narrator could be more compelling, but excellent and wide-ranging coverage for fans of Justinian and the Byzantine world. Loved it!
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Overall
- Andrew
- 11-29-07
The Book Is Good . . .
. . . but oh my, the narration. Sounds like some sort of smoking cessation tape you put on before falling asleep. At first I thought I'd never make it through to the end. After a half hour, or so, you can get used to the narrator and start enjoying the book. No doubt a 4 to 5 star book, in written form.
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3 people found this helpful
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- Scott
- 05-10-12
Beautifuly Read, Lots of Details
What made the experience of listening to Justinian's Flea the most enjoyable?
First, I buy anything read by Garrett Whitener. Just listening to him read regardless of the text is a joy. As far as this particular book goes, it's all in the inifinite details. There is a theory about the large sweep of history but you have to see it yourself (although it is revealed at the end in case you didn't see it). If you don't like details this isn't the book for you. I've gone back many times to listen in particular to the chapter on the flea itself and the life cycle of the Black Plague vector. I can certainly understand that reviews of the book are binary - you like it a lot or you don't a lot. I like it a lot - a whole lot.
Who was your favorite character and why?
The flea!
Which character – as performed by Barrett Whitener – was your favorite?
I suppose Justinian's wife although Whitener does Roman generals beautifully too.
Any additional comments?
If you don't like this book I recommend you look for others read by Whitener that you may like. He is the all time best reader in my opinion and he does read books of many different genre.
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- Ken
- 10-07-14
If you want to know...
If you could sum up Justinian's Flea in three words, what would they be?
Linear Historical Briefing
What other book might you compare Justinian's Flea to and why?
Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire - Outline of History - The Fabric of the Cosmos,because it provides a living, breathing story of Goths, Huns, Romans in a linear story with the precision of a Physicist peeling the mystery of the Universe - from string to that other unseen, a Multiverse.
What about Barrett Whitener’s performance did you like?
He knew the story, spoke the language, gave the feel of excitement of a scale of battle we rarely if ever have known, intrigue, and human suffering living in bacterium in the gut of a flea riding the rat from Egypt to every boat, barn and castle across the Roman Empire.
Did you have an extreme reaction to this book? Did it make you laugh or cry?
No... maybe respect. Lots of respect and a well done with the weaving of a great unseeable disaster into a story that should teach us what to expect - when we least expect - and to wake up to what we are; as Richard Dawkins wrote, 'self replicating molecules that accumulated survival machines and were emancipated by language... and now we realize we are vulnerable to other self replicating machines... Asimov said it best; We are matter contemplating itself.
Any additional comments?
Good story, well told, worth the time to listen and learn from that parallel universe we call The Roman Empire; they were us in another time.
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- Mohad Cheridi
- 08-07-17
well done...
I'm at a loss to understand why some find that the narrator didn't do justice to the book... When i first read some of the negative reviews about this narrator i listened to the sample and wasn't quite sure about him...But after finishing the book i have no hesitation in my judgement : 5 stars...
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- Todd
- 05-25-20
Fantastic book. Too bad Barrett Whitener Sucks. ...
Too bad Barrett Whitener and the producers saw fit to have this terrifically intelligent book performed like a robot. It’s hard to imagine a worse, less human performance.
Totally bizarre.
More unfathomably horrible performances from Audible.
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- Amazon Customer
- 07-20-24
AI NARRATOR
The word is Arian, pronounced Ariy An, not Orion. it's like fingernails on a blackboatd. the information is great. The prose is well constructed. The AI should be ditched ASAP.
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- Matt
- 11-23-16
DO NOT PURCHASE!!! ITS READ BY A MACHINE!!!
This book wasn’t for you, but who do you think might enjoy it more?
Anyone who will not be lulled into sleep by a robot?
Would you ever listen to anything by William Rosen again?
If it is not read by a machine.
How did the narrator detract from the book?
Is it possible to not be distracted by a robot?
If you could play editor, what scene or scenes would you have cut from Justinian's Flea?
I have no idea since the robot almost lulled me into sleep.
Any additional comments?
Audible should not have any books read by robots.
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