Ancient Greece

If Gadamer is an important guide to the hermeneutics of beginnings and the spirit of theorizing, Thomas Martin’s work is one of the most concise, readable, and comprehensive introductions to the social history of ancient Greece and the spiritual origins of Western culture. While there are many fine histories of the period, this book provides access to the whole sweep of Greek history from the beginnings of Hellenic civilization in Indo-European and Mycenaean cultures, to the Archaic age, the beginnings of democracy with the age of the city-state, the collapse of the Athenian Empire at the end of the Peloponnesian… show more.

There are lots of books that provide a straightforward account of Greek history for the general reader, but this is the one I recommend most highly. It assumes no prior knowledge of Greek history, there are summaries at the head of each chapter, and convenient subsections within it, all of which ensure that the reader never gets lost or left behind. Martin has set himself the formidable task of covering 20,000 years of history – from the Stone Age down to the collapse of the kingdoms that emerged after the break-up of the empire of Alexander the Great – and… show more.