100 Battles That Shaped the World

by Martin J. Dougherty

Features 100 battles that have had a significant influence on the make up of the modern world. Includes color tactical maps that allow the reader to grasp the decisive moves of the battle and locator maps which, put the reader on the spot and the at glance information boxes help the reader to quickly understand the importance and impact of the battles.

Genres: History, Nonfiction, Reference, Coffee Table Books, War

256 pages, Paperback

First published January 1, 2012

About the author

Hailing from northeast England, Martin J Dougherty is a professional writer specialising in military history. He has been at times a games designer, an engineer, a self-protection instructor, a teacher and a defence analyst. Martin has published a range of books covering topics as diverse as self-protection, medieval warfare and space flight, and has addressed international conferences on anti-shipping missiles and homeland security issues.

Martin's interests include martial arts and fencing. He has coached Fencing, Ju-Jitsu, Self-Defence and Kickboxing for many years at the University of Sunderland, and has competed to national level as a fencer. As a martial artist he holds black belts in Combat Ju-Jitsu, Nihon Tai-Jitsu and Self-Defence. Martin is a Senior Assessor with the Self-Defence Federation and an IL1 instructor/assessor with the Britsh Federation for Historical Swordplay, specialising in the Military Sabre and the Smallsword.

Reviews

[Nur Raudhah]

This books gives summary if 100 battles which including pictures. This book really good if the reader wants to know about the strategical techniques use to win the battles.

[Blogul]

I have read a lot of books in this genre (shorts 100 about battles, guns, tanks, uniforms, aircrafts and so on) and while some were bad and most were goodish, this is clearly the jewel of its kind. First, it is not dumbed down for dummies, as I see the nowadays trend grows - so it dares to lose some potential readers (the mentioned dummies) but manages to not annoy the regulars. Second, though using only 2 pages for a battle, it still manages to convey plenty of data, and, most crucial, the really significant facts, supported with maps, general and tactical, well-selected pictures and snippet-descriptions and illustrations of relevant units, weapons or generals. Therefore, the whole image is way bigger than just the article itself. Even further, every battle has an excellent ”Battle Facts” abstract (who, what, where, when, why, outcome) - which in a few lines summarizes and irons into the readers memory the essence of the battle.

[George Scott]

I have to give this four stars, because it is such a beautifully crafted design. The information itself is just too sketchy to give much enlightenment. Each of the battles really needed a 20-page chapter (or even a whole book of its own), rather than a single or double page with very well chosen illustrations and/or photographs. The maps are beautiful too, though it looks like the story told by them was written by a different author than the one who wrote the text. It was a good effort, but it has some problems, mostly of just trying to shoehorn too much information into such a limited format.

Oh, the title is "100 Battles—Decisive Conflicts That Have Shaped The World" (I added the emdash).

[Anna M (readwithanna)]

Unrated - I skimmed parts of this book when some of the battles did not hold my attention as much. It is fairly detailed for each battle - especially since a lot of the battle only get one page to explain what happened. Many do get a two page spread, and some of the more involved/significant get another two pages with military diagrams of movements. Some also have boxes explaining the types of soldiers/weapons being used. They all include a box with the facts - Who, What, Where, When, Why, the Outcome, and a small map of the location.

I did not feel that I could rate since I skimmed so much and that this is more like a reference that I would not sit down and read all the way through.

[Jordan]

Jordan McGuire

Ms. Porter

English 10

5/11/17


100 battles that shaped the world

From Leonidas to Miltiades, from Xerxes to Alexander the Great, and from Grant to Lee, 100 Battles That Shaped the World by Parragon Books has it all. As the title states, the book is about 100 important battles that caused the world to be the way it is today. These particular battles were the downfall of empires, the survival from extinction, and the whole reason our modern countries are what they are today. I personally loved this book because i'm a sucker for history texts about amazing events military related. However, I particularly enjoyed the way this text was written because it states certain facts about the event into it’s own paragraph instead of squishing all of it together. In each battle the book lists, it includes a detailed paragraph with facts about what happened in the battle, Pictures of materials used in the battle and a famous picture from the battle, and on the next page it includes a map of the formations of each unit and how they strategically won each fight. Also, there is a map of the formations and tactics used in the battle on the next page. If somebody doesn’t find history texts interesting, I would not recommend this book to them for obvious reasons. But for those that, like me, are in love with or even slightly enjoy military texts, I would strongly recommend this book. I learned so many interesting facts about battles I have never heard of, and now in depth facts about battles I have previously studied.

[Tom Darrow]

One of the dangers of making a book like this is that it comes off feeling sort of "one size fits all". It doesn't matter how long a battle was, how big it was or how long ago it happened... about 90 of the 100 battles get 2 pages... which means many of them are rushed through and others are kind of talked up in their importance.

Another issue with this book is it's lack of editing. There are numerous grammatical errors and there are also some inaccuracies with the facts (for example... for one of the commanders it had his birth date as being after when the battle took place).

Finally, this book overwhelmingly covers Napoleonic War and WWII battles. I'd say almost half of the book is on those two topics alone. A little more variety would have been nice.

[Ralph Wark]

I read a couple of reviews, and quite rightly they said it was a bit thin in detail, most battles getting two pages of narration and pictures. Well, that's why I bought the book, god knows there are plenty of good books about D-Day, Themopylae, and the Napoleonic wars. I bought this as light reading to perhaps discover a few other battles to read about in depth, and I did!! Good teo page maps of the major conflicts, and cheap at B&N.

[Kate]

I enjoyed this a lot more than I thought I did! Loved the breakdown of the range of significant battles and reading some of the WW2 battles got me really pumped up! Anyways I personally enjoyed this book and it will be added to my collection. 4.5 stars

[Nicholas Maulucci]

there were a few battles that were interesting, but generally a boring book.