The acclaimed biographer details the life, reign, and impact of King Charles II of England, revealing him to have been far more serious, sensible, and competent than has been thought.

    For well over a century, four successive Stuart kings laid claim to the crown. The first was James II, deposed in 1688 by his daughter, Mary, and her husband, William of Orange; then came James III (the Old Pretender) and his son, Charles III (Bonnie Prince Charlie — the Young Pretender); finally, there was Henry IX (the Cardinal King) who died in 1807, the last descendant in direct and legitimate line from James II. This book tells the story of these four men, and of their families. Although it gives a graphic account of the '45 and other Jacobite uprisings and explains the background to political events, it is, first and foremost, a biographical portrait of the exiled Stuarts. It is an account of their public and private lives, their personalities, their relationships with others, and the extraordinary hold which they never ceased to exercise over their adherents. It is a book about people; a book about the twilight of one of the world's most romantic, colourful and ill-fated dynasties. The fascinating, often bizarre, story of the ‘kings over the water’ is ideally suited to Theo Aronson's exceptional talents, and especially his ability to bring his subjects vividly to life and to make clear the labyrinthine relationships of European royalty. His reputation as an historian, based on such books as The Kaisers, A Family of Kings and Grandmama of Europe, is deservedly high. Of his most recent study, Victoria and Disraeli, C. P. Snow wrote: 'It is bright with intelligence and human wisdom.'

    The author chooses as his starting-point the invasion of Italy by France in 1494, which sowed the dragon's teeth of all the successive European wars; the French invasion was to accelerate the trend towards new armaments and new methods of warfare. The author describes the development of the handgun and the pike, the use and style of staff-weapons, mace and axe and war-hammer, dagger and dirk and bayonet. He shows how armour attained its full Renaissance splendour and then suffered its sorry and inevitable decline, culminating in the Industrial Revolution, with its far-reaching effects on military armaments. Above all, he follows the long history of the sword, queen of weapons, to the late eighteenth century, when it finally ceased to form a part of a gentleman's every-day wear. Lavishly illustrated.EWART OAKESHOTT was one of the world's leading authorities on the arms and armour of medieval Europe. His other works on the subject include Records of the Medieval Sword and The Sword in the Age of Chivalry.

    In the new edition of this classic book, Geoffrey Parker draws on material from all over Europe to provide an authoritative and exciting account of the eventful first half of the seventeenth century.

    Duffy demonstrates the implications of the fortress for questions of military organization, strategy, geography, law, architectural values, town life and symbolism and imagination. The book is well illustrated, and will be a valuable companion for enthusiasts of military and architectural history, as well as the general medievalist.

    European Weapons and Warfare 1618-1648 is a minutely-detailed survey of the armies of this extraordinary period.  It discusses the developments in strategy and organization and demonstrates these with full diagrams.  The techniques of hand-to-hand combat, together with edged weapons, hand guns, artillery and fortifications, are clearly illustrated with drawings taken from contemporary pictures and engravings or specially drawn from museum collections.  New military ideas emerged in Sweden with King Gustavus II, who personally built up a powerful, well trained and well-armed military force, and these developments spread rapidly during the Thirty Years’ War, being of great importance too, during England’s Civil War.  All of the many nations who took part in the Thirty Years’ War are examined here – their armor and weapons, their military techniques and the organization of their armies.