Battle of the Metaurus: Nero saves Rome
The Carthaginians made many mistakes during their ill-fated Punic Wars with Rome. In the first two, they fought wars of attrition against the most stubborn…
The Sword of Rome: Marcus Claudius Marcellus
All three of the Punic Wars were won by Rome, and the third war saw Carthage’s complete destruction, but there were periods where the Romans…
The Battle of Telamon: A Gaulish Army Trapped Between Three Roman Armies
The Romans and the Gauls had a bitter rivalry that lasted as long as any other in the world. One of the most humiliating events…
Single Combat in Ancient Rome
David and Goliath, Hector and Achilles, Romulus and Acro. Great instances of single combat are not limited to these far distant and historically vague events.…
The Siege of Masada: Rome’s Assertion of Authority
During Rome’s centuries as a growing empire it faced countless rebellions and challenges to its dominance of the Mediterranean, the old Italian allies even revolted…
The Shield of Rome: Fabius Cunctator
Many generals are overshadowed or underappreciated for what they did for their state; Belisarius who reconquered much of the lost Western Roman Empire and Tamerlane,…
Thousands of Romans killed in the dense German woodland: What if the Teutoburg Disaster Didn’t Happend
“What if” history questions can be a divisive. Some view them as an exercise in futility, a place where no serious historians should go. Others…
Great Sieges: Jerusalem (70 CE) – One Million Lives Lost In 8 Months Of Combat
The Romans generally tolerated other religions, allowing and even welcoming Egyptian gods into their pantheon. Though they viewed the monotheistic Jews as being odd, they…
Egyptian Warfare and the Largest Chariot Battle in History
The battle of Megiddo was the first reliably recorded battle, and not long after the battle of Kadesh would claim the title of the largest…
How Cortes Captured the Mighty Tenochtitlan with 1,000 Spaniards… and smallpox, and 100,000 natives, and guns
In June of 1521 Hernan Cortes had a sizable force of Conquistadors outside of Tenochtitlan but was tasked with rescuing his garrison of a few…
Development of the Awe-inspiring Triple Walls of Constantinople
The great city of Constantinople was one of the most impressive and impregnable cities in the world for over 1,000 years. It retained the glory…
The Fall of the Aztecs, The Bloody Path to Tenochtitlan
Tenochtitlan was an absolutely amazing city. The city was larger than any in Europe at the time and held approximately 200,000 people with some estimates…