Battle Castles
A sumptuous, action-packed pan-European history, Battle Castles brings to life mighty medieval fortifications and the epic sieges they resisted: clashes that defied the limits of military technology, turned empires to dust, and transformed mortals into legends.Castles and their ruins still dominate the landscape and our imaginations, and are a constant reminder to us today of a time when violence, or the threat of it, was the norm.Dan Snow explores in turn the worlds greatest castles: Dover Castle, the Key to England and King Johns first line of defence against the French; Château Gaillard, Richard Is fortress in Normandy (the only chink in whose armaments was through the latrines); Castillo de Gibalfaro, the last vanguard of Moorish rule in Southern Spain; Malbork Castle, headquarters of the evangelical and entrepreneurial Teutonic Knights in Poland; Edward Is network of castles in Wales, with its heart at Conwy; and Krak des Chevaliers in Syria an astounding feat of engineering by the Crusaders. Each castles story is dramatically recounted the building techniques, day-to-day life and, the weapons used in its attack and defence. Spanning across the globe, and using the latest CGI reconstructions, Dan Snow gets to the very heart of the bloodshed and battles of the greatest fortresses of the Middle Ages.Publish date: 27th Sep 2012Format: Hardback, 336ppAbout The AuthorDan Snow is an historian who has researched, written and presented several documentaries on British and world history for the BBC including Twentieth Century Battlefields, the BAFTA award-winning Battlefield Britain,which he co-presented with his father Peter Snow, and his BBC2 series on the history of the Royal Navy. His writing has appeared in The Times, the Sunday Times, the Guardian, the Daily Express and BBC History Magazine. He is theauthor of Death or Victory a history of Wolfes siege of Quebec. Educated at the University of Oxford, he has jointBritish and Canadian citizenship. He lives in London.