History Buff-All

I asked a while back if we have a thread for people who want to talk about history, and it doesn't appear we do! Please feel free to talk about different historical events you're currently reading/studying, would like to know more about or are just plain interested in. I'd encourage everyone to discuss with each other and ask plenty questions. I, myself, am always interested to learn from others who have more reading and insight into any sort of historical period.

If you'd like to get into history more, please feel free to ask away for some advice to get started. I'll try to keep a list of good resources for getting into history, but if this thread takes off I will move to a Google sheet where everyone can add their recommendations.

So, any suggestions I can add to this post.

Podcasts:
Dan Carlin's Hardcore History (various)
Tides of History [halfwaywrong recommendation] (various)
History on Fire [halfwaywrong recommendation] (various)
The History of Rome (Rome) [tboon recommendation]
Revolutions (country revoluitons in history) [tboon recommendation]
Stuff You Missed in History Class (various) [Nevin73 recommendation]
Russian History Retold [wordsmythe recommendation]
History of the Papacy [wordsmythe recommendation]
History of the Great War [wordsmythe recommendation]
History of Philosophy without any Gaps [wordsmythe recommendation]
History of India [wordsmythe recommendation]
History of English (language) [wordsmythe recommendation]
History in the Bible (history of Christianity) [wordsmythe recommendation]
History of Byzantium (Byzantium empire) [wordsmythe recommendation]
History Extra (interviews with historians) [Roke recommendation]

YouTubers:
Armchair Historian (history shorts)
Feature History (history shorts)
Drachinifel (Warships in WW1 & WW2) [Aetius recommendation]

Documentaries:
The Vietnam War (Vietnam War...obviously)
Prohibition (American alcohol ban)

History event period focus: Ottoman Empire during WW1.

Books:
Sean McMeekin - The Berlin-Baghdad Express: The Ottoman Empire and Germany's Bid for World Power
Sean McMeekin - The Ottoman Endgame: War, Revolution, and the Making of the Modern Middle East, 1908–1923

Ever since playing EU4, I have had an obsession with the Ottoman Empire. How did such a big empire evaporate so suddenly in the space of one war?

The Ottomans were on the ropes for quite some time before the war. You can open any book about them about the period before and during WW1 and you'll see a writer mention "the sick man of Europe". The Ottomans were broke, overstretched, being bullied by their neighbours & European mega-powers and struggling to contain discontent from many of their own subjects.

When I was growing up, I hadn't even heard of the Ottoman Empire. When people in Britain spoke about WW1, it always focused around the trench warfare. This is in spite of the fact that the British and the Ottomans fought some of the most grusome battles of the entire war. Like a lot of other nations though, this is because Britain tends to shy away from admitting many of the past errors it has made (in history classes at school, we were also never taught anything about the British Empire abroad.)

Winston Churchill is often considered a hero for his stubborn nature in WW2, but his exploits in the second war often overshadow some of his disastrous decision making he made in the First World War. The Gallipoli landing of the British Empire troops was a terrible moment in British millitary history. Further bad decision making led to Churchill being sent to the front as a punishment.

With above resources, I am currently half way through Sean McMeekin - The Berlin-Baghdad Express. Although this book, from its title, may seem like it's more about just a train line, it is actually focused heavily on the German Empire and their desire for the Ottoman Empire to start a holy war in the name of Islam, going as far to send agents out throughout dominantly Muslim countries to spread propaganda. Kaiser Wilhelm II was a huge fan of the Ottomans and the Islamic religion, to the point where he declared himself as a proctector of all Muslims across the globe, even taking the monkier "Hajji Wilhelm".

When the Ottomans entered the war, they did actually declare it as a defensive holy war. One of the reasons they did this was to try and boost morale and support for the war across their vast empire (which is largely fractured, particularly in Arab nations), but in hindsight, it could never work. The most obvious reason was the fact that it had a massive asterix next to it, in that it was all infidels unless they were a war time ally (Germany and Austria-Hungary).

The Germans were the ones who dominantly pushed for a pan-Islamic uprising. At the time, the British had a number of Muslim subjects in places like India and Egypt. The Germans knew the importance of the Suez canal to British supply lines, and wanted to take control in order to hugely weaken them. The British relied heavily on navy strength; the actual ground power of British born troops was somewhat small. They deployed many troops from across their empire. For the Germans, they hoped that having the Sultan Caliph of the Ottoman Empire call for all Muslims to unite would cause rebellions within British armies, who had Muslim subjects within many of their ranks (Egypt especially.) Agents from Germany planted propaganda everywhere and tried to groundswell support.


The raid on Suez
, itself, was a bit of a disaster, mainly due to the fact that the Ottoman/German faction that fought had a grueling trip across the desert, which left many men malnourished and tired. Morale was not an issue before the battle, however, as the Ottomans and Germans sent out a holy cleric from Mecca with a green flag to inspire others (the holy cleric was actually quite old, and actually ended up dying from a heart attack before the battle, as many people flocked to the flag to show their support, overwhelming him!)

The British had a much bigger force at Suez, and the rebellion from within the British ranks by Muslims never happened (after, many within the German ranks felt they misjudged the clamour for fight-back against the British rule.) Put on top of that the British could fly planes overhead to see all the moves, and the Ottoman/German forces never stood a chance. It was was a losing cause before it even got started, not to mention the fact that the Germans struggled to bring together many of the powerful tribes in Arabia to the battle. They actually bet heavily on the wrong tribe (Ibn Rashid tribe, I think), when they should have (in hindsight) backed the Ibn Saud Wahabis, who were heavily devoted to Islamic causes, but did not entertain the Germans, as they backed their main rivals in the region.

I am currently half way through my second Sean McMeekin book, as mentioned above. It's very interesting to see how much attention the Germans paid to the Asian theatre, as they really felt that it would have a huge impact in taking Britain, especially, out of the war. As mentioned, they really wanted to take Suez to hurt the British, but they just couldn't. I'd highly recommend his books, the Ottoman side of the war is often forgotten about in the war and worth a read due to the fact they had so much on the line for this (which they ultimately lost). The subsequent Greek/Turkish war straight after WW1 is also extremely interesting, which I'd recommend reading up on!

I am a history major studying the late end of colonial America until the beginning of the Civil War, so roughly 1770’s until about 1860. Yes I am aware that the war’s implications far outstretched 1860 but I am using the time periods as marks for the years. My main focus will be on the War of 1812 (Fun fact! Iirc The only president to ever use the authority granted to him in war as commander-in-chief to command a military unit directly served during this war: President Madison took control of an artillary unit in the Battle of Bladensburg because its official commander was killed.) because I view it as the “real” war of American independence. Without going into the whole spiel, the revolutionary war was magnitudes easier and not nearly as decisive as we are lead to believe in school. I think the other reason I want to study this is because of one of Robear’s college buddies who is a material historian specializing in the war of 1812: I can go into full detail at another point, but he had always fostered a love and interest for studying and preserving history for me. I have even done reenacting at Fort McHenry when during the anniversary event each year. Edit: fat fingered numbers are frustrating on cell phones.

Peter Jackson is colorizing a WWI movie.. I saw a youtube trailer and it looked very impressive

That's a good point, I should add TV/movie resources too!

I just discovered Drachinifel on Youtube, who has a bunch of short videos on WWI and WWII warships with some great historical pictures. He used a computerized voice at first, so it's a bit odd, but the more recent videos have his real voice (which is quite pleasant, so I've no idea why he thought the synthesized voice was necessary).

A couple of podcasts I enjoy are Tides of History and
History on Fire.

Also my wife actually has a PhD in history although I'm not entirely convinced she actually likes much of history.

Clusks wrote:

The Gallipoli landing of the British Empire troops was a terrible moment in British millitary history. Further bad decision making led to Churchill being sent to the front as a punishment.

The landing at Gallipoli is a very big deal here in Australia. Australia had only had its federation 14 years earlier and this was our first major act as a nation on the global stage. It's probably the largest single event to shape our cultural identity. Though I imagine it's probably barely a blip on the radar for the rest of the world.

Currently I am engrossed in studying The Thirty Years War and its antecedents. I have no idea why, but that period is fascinating to me (possibly EU4 is why). Over the last six months or so I finished reading The Thirty Years War: Europe's Tragedy by Peter H. Wilson, which I think is pretty good especially in explaining what is a bunch of very complicated political and religioussituations while the military actions are, if anything, more confusing, especially as the war drags on and people start to change sides, where enemies become allies and then become enemies again. I also just finished The Business of War: Military Enterprise and Military Revolution in Early Modern Europe by David Parrott, which, while not directly about the The Thirty Years War, discusses the role of mercenaries in it at great length.

Some podcast suggestions:
The History of Rome by Mike Duncan - this is a truly great podcast if you have any interest at all in Roman History. He covers it all, from mythological foundation up until the end of the western empire.
Revolutions also by Mike Duncan - he goes into "famous" revolutions in some detail. Not every revolution ever but the ones he chooses to cover he does in great depth.

Both are very good (Rome starts a little rough but gets good about 8-10 episodes in).

My reading list tends to be a mixture of Science Fiction and History.

The most-recent history book in that parade was Marcus Agrippa: Right-hand Man of Caesar Augustus, by Lindsay Powell. I was no doubt inspired to pick up this book by the upcoming Paradox game Imperator: Rome.

I had mixed feelings about this book. Primarily, due to the lack of primary sources for Agrippa, a lot of the text was speculative at best. Along with that, the book (necessarily IMO) spent more time talking about Augustus himself, rather than Agrippa given that most of Agrippa's renown comes from his hand in the rise of Augustus. That said, the bits about Agrippa's focus on building up Rome were quite interesting, and the book does a good job of describing Rome between the deaths of Julius and Augustus.

Before that, I read The Fall of the Dynasties: The Collapse of the Old Order: 1905-1922 by Edmond Taylor. Several years ago (when I was still playing Diplomacy), I tore through a number of books about the Great War era. This particular book was originally published in 1963 (which shows in some places), but recently came out on Kindle. I really enjoyed reading this, and found that its focus on the dynasties themselves, rather than the nations & armies, was a new angle for me, particular with Turkey and with the Habsburgs.

A nice history blog that focuses on ancient world news stories daily, it usually has one story a day and is a nice read while waking up, at least that's what I use it for. It does have some bias, I usually see Mediterranean and European stuff most often, but it does have a bit more variety than some blogs. Still an interesting read even if it does focus on those locations more often than not.

I used to have a long commute where I really enjoyed Hardcore History. Carlin provides context in an extremely approachable way. Since I don't have that commute anymore I've gotten out of listening to podcasts and I really do miss his.

Stuff You Missed in History Class is usually light on detail, but provides a great synopsis on a wide variety of historical topics.

I've always been a history nerd, raised in a house with wargaming miniatures (the story goes that my dad and his friends looked over their Napoleonics and scoffed at Gygax and Arneson as the pair were unravelling Chainmail into D&D). My formal studies are allied work in literature (historical context of publication and reception) and digital humanities work with history. Somehow it was more common that I'd be interested in and able to take the class on Carolinian masques or Elizabethan woodblock printing of political cartoons in the English department than stuff out of the history dept.

Anyway, here are podcast links that I actively follow and aren't yet linked in this thread:

Russian History Retold (formerly Russian Rulers History Podcast) - generally more credulous about the state-approved version of things than I'd like, and trails off into some less serious stuff this year.

Mike Duncan's Revolutions (has been mentioned)

History of the Papacy

History of the Great War - Hey, check out this goodjer!

History of Philosophy without any Gaps - one of my favorite pods, from a historian of philosophy who specializes in Arabic-speaking stuff. Currently in the low 300s in episode count, and not yet at the Renaissance. Also spun off a second channel for Indian and Africana philosophies.

History of India - I'm only a few eps in, but I like it so far.

History of English
- language history, not to be confused with the History of England

History in the Bible - Not exactly inclined toward a charitable reading of more orthodox interpretations, and a tad snarky, but rather thorough.

History of Byzantium (Seeks to pick up where Duncan left off in History of Rome, which is good, but also gets favorable review from Peter Adamson from History of Philosophy, which pairs pretty nicely.

wordsmythe wrote:

History of the Great War - Hey, check out this goodjer!

I feel bad that I fell off listening to this. Will catch up I promise, Kamakazi!

wordsmythe wrote:

History in the Bible - Not exactly inclined toward a charitable reading of more orthodox interpretations, and a tad snarky, but rather thorough.

History of Byzantium (Seeks to pick up where Duncan left off in History of Rome, which is good, but also gets favorable review from Peter Adamson from History of Philosophy, which pairs pretty nicely.

Those are both good. I want to restart History of Byzantium as I fell off it after about 20 episodes. History in the Bible is one where I listen to an episode every couple of weeks. I am pretty far behind at this point.

Great idea for a thread Clusks.

On the podcast front, I really like History Extra. It's an interview format usually talking around the professor's/writer's/radio or TV presenter's latest work on a historical subject but it's a really nice change from the dude-narrates-into-a-microphone format that's so prevalent in historical podcasts. A recent episode with Lucy Worsley about Queen Victoria has me really wanting to read a biography

I haven't been reading much lately but I'll always stump for Robert Massie's Dreadnought. It's just a delightful read about the build up to the First World War.

Roke wrote:

I haven't been reading much lately but I'll always stump for Robert Massie's Dreadnought. It's just a delightful read about the build up to the First World War.

Yes, this and The Guns of August by Barbara Tuchman are my favorites among the bunch of WWI books I mentioned earlier.

Thanks for all the recommendations, I actually didn't know that many history podcasts, there's quite a few here I'll have to pick up on. I've updated the main post, but decided to leave out authors. I think, due to the wealth of suggestions, I might just move to a Google Sheet at the weekend so anyone can add what they want as a recommendation, and let people filter it in case they want to pick up something on history.

halfwaywrong wrote:

A couple of podcasts I enjoy are Tides of History and
History on Fire.

Also my wife actually has a PhD in history although I'm not entirely convinced she actually likes much of history.

Clusks wrote:

The Gallipoli landing of the British Empire troops was a terrible moment in British millitary history. Further bad decision making led to Churchill being sent to the front as a punishment.

The landing at Gallipoli is a very big deal here in Australia. Australia had only had its federation 14 years earlier and this was our first major act as a nation on the global stage. It's probably the largest single event to shape our cultural identity. Though I imagine it's probably barely a blip on the radar for the rest of the world.

My girlfriend did her undergraduate and a Master's in history, and is much the same. She doesn't really care for much history pre-20th century.

My memories from school were that WW1 was brushed over rather quickly, and it was straight onto WW2. Often when we have Remberance Day in the UK (which was created after WW1), many of the memories focus on the trenches and not any mention of the Ottoman campaign. I'd go as far to hazard a guess that there's a fair chunk of the population who have never heard of the Ottoman Empire. I certainly never knew when I was growing up.

I recently got my father for his birthday Max Hastings - Vietnam: An Epic History of a Divisive War 1945-1975 which I'm actually hoping to borrow from him when he's finished reading it, as I loved the Ken Burns Vietnman documentary that much it's made me want to learn more about it.

Dr.Incurable wrote:

A nice history blog that focuses on ancient world news stories daily, it usually has one story a day and is a nice read while waking up, at least that's what I use it for.

Along those lines, I have the occasional history-based twitter account in my feed. Lately, the one I see the most is rogueclassicist, but I'd love to find a few others to add to the mix. (I'm not sure PostcardFromThePast counts.)

Clusks wrote:

I'd go as far to hazard a guess that there's a fair chunk of the population who have never heard of the Ottoman Empire. I certainly never knew when I was growing up.

Imagine how it is over here in the US. Our high school classes tend to speed past WWI to get to the Great Depression and WWII. I think a fair chunk of our population could not name a single battle from WWI. For WWII, they could at least name a few of the big ones (Pearl Harbor, Midway, D-Day, the Battle of the Bulge). I guess that shouldn't be surprising, given that we waited 4 years to join in WWI.

As far as the Ottoman Empire is concerned, we never actually saw combat or declared war against them. Here, an Ottoman is a piece of furniture that you can put your feet on.

With it being 100 years since the end of WWI, I stumbled across The Great War

It has actually ended today (4 years of making!), but as a lot of episodes to catch up on. I've watched the first few and I'm enjoying it!

For my Ancient World History class, we have to take multiple societies and write a paper theorizing about why societies were formed in the first place. I decided to go all in and it'll either pay off in spades, or this'll be the first class I fail, either way I'm bound to learn a lot. The societies I'm studying are the Nubians, The Olmec and the Phoenicians, and I'm turning the prompt on it's head a little bit by saying civilizations were formed to deal with "an increasingly complex world", and that while each civilization had unique problems, they all to deal with increasing complexity associated with societal advancement. For example, with mastery of agriculture comes an increase in technology related to agriculture: the hoe, the shovel, retrieving and replanting seeds which then improves the efficiency of an existing agricultural structure, which then requires more people in order to work the fields so that they can harvest the increased bounty, which leads to more people who may or may not come up with even more improvements to this or another system causing similar advances in technology/society leading to their own open ended situations, is just one example. I may have bitten off more than I can chew but I hope that if I pull this off it'll reflect well.

I recently read Dan Jones' The Templars: The Rise and Spectacular Fall of God's Holy Warriors. This was my first time reading actual history of the Knights Templar rather than seeing whatever goofy thing happens to be in random movies, games, etc. I enjoyed learning about the time period, so I've rolled right into reading The Crusades, by Thomas Asbridge. I'm about a quarter of the way through, up to the start of the Second Crusade, and while there's a lot of information, it's very readable, and I find myself wanting to continue reading when I'm doing other things. So thumbs up so far.

If you liked learning about the Templars, I would recommend Dungeon, Fire, and Sword, by John J. Robinson. I thought it was one of the best books on the topic that I've ever read. He keeps it interesting and from falling into "dryness", a problem I find in many historical books.

Thanks, I'll add that to my list.

I finished Thomas Asbridge's The Crusades over the holiday weekend, and really enjoyed it. It can be pretty dense at times, and a lot of details have already escaped me, but I learned a lot about the time period and the major players in the area. It favored going over the events that happened in Egype, Palestine, and Syria, so the only thing I wish it had focused more on was how Europeans viewed the crusades and maybe some more of the political machinations in Europe that enabled and hindered the crusades. It touched on these things, but only lightly.

Gonna take a break and read some fiction next. We'll see what unread history on my shelf catches my eye after that.

Just finished Hitler's Soldiers: The German Army in the Third Reich. The big theme there is "the German army was much more complicit in Nazi atrocities than you thought" which wasn't as much of a surprise to me as I've already read a lot on the topic. But it also talked about how the army developed and then degraded with Germany's fortunes before and during the war, and how diverse personnel in different units affected the way those units approached both combat and occupation duties.

Not sure what's up next- doing a little light fiction right now, but after enjoying John Leguizamo's Latin History for Morons I'm likely to dive into Charles Mann's 1491 or something similar.

I will be browsing this thread and posted a link to it on my own not-so-popular This (Pseudo-Fictional) Day in History thread. I'm currently enjoying putting a fictional spin on history, but find the real thing just as fascinating.

I feel your pain Clusks, but know there are a few of us out here appreciating your post!

Hrdina wrote:
Clusks wrote:

I'd go as far to hazard a guess that there's a fair chunk of the population who have never heard of the Ottoman Empire. I certainly never knew when I was growing up.

Imagine how it is over here in the US. Our high school classes tend to speed past WWI to get to the Great Depression and WWII. I think a fair chunk of our population could not name a single battle from WWI. For WWII, they could at least name a few of the big ones (Pearl Harbor, Midway, D-Day, the Battle of the Bulge). I guess that shouldn't be surprising, given that we waited 4 years to join in WWI.

As far as the Ottoman Empire is concerned, we never actually saw combat or declared war against them. Here, an Ottoman is a piece of furniture that you can put your feet on.

Very true. I'm 41 and have heard of the Ottoman empire enough to know that it was associated with Turkey somehow and that's about it. Until finding this post today, I'd never taken the time to look it up and had no earthly idea that it existed up until the 20th century and was a major player in WWI.

It's a rather sad commentary on the American education system. In my experience, the history and geography education I received in Oregon are actually quite a bit better than a lot of other states around the country. Hrdina's right though - education about WWI was and probably still is almost non-existant.

beanman101283 wrote:

I finished Thomas Asbridge's The Crusades over the holiday weekend, and really enjoyed it. It can be pretty dense at times, and a lot of details have already escaped me, but I learned a lot about the time period and the major players in the area. It favored going over the events that happened in Egype, Palestine, and Syria, so the only thing I wish it had focused more on was how Europeans viewed the crusades and maybe some more of the political machinations in Europe that enabled and hindered the crusades. It touched on these things, but only lightly.

Gonna take a break and read some fiction next. We'll see what unread history on my shelf catches my eye after that.

I read Peter Frankopan’s The Silk Roads a while ago and it touches a bit on the Crusades, mainly how they were dressed up as religious duty, but the large majority of their purpose was for profit, particularly for many of the soldiers who fought (not just those at the top of the church.)

On Sean McMeekin - The Berlin-Baghdad Express, which I only recently finished, I found the book to drag a bit at the end, wrapping up the 2nd half of WWI rather quickly. It actually hardly focuses on the railway itself at times, more on Germany’s many efforts to cause tension in the colonies of the Entente which had a Muslim contingent. It was interesting to see the lengths Germany went to in order to disrupt their opponents.

On the lack of knowledge about the Ottomans, it’s one of the reasons i like McMeekin; he writes about plenty of the lesser known stories of WWI from the Ottoman perspective.

Last week I finished reading Waterloo: The History of Four Days, Three Armies, and Three Battles, by Bernard Cornwell.

Apparently Mr. Cornwell is primarily an author of (sometimes historical) fiction, and this was his first foray into non-fiction.

I approached the book with extremely limited foreknowledge of the battle. I knew the result and the main generals (Bonoparte, Wellington, Blücher, Ney), but little more.

I thought the book was extremely well-written, and I tore through it in less than two weeks. While the author did spend quite some time describing military matters in some detail (particularly the rock-paper-scissors nature of combat among infantry, cavalry, and artillery) the main focus was on the leaders. In particular, Cornwell draws a sharp contrast between Napoleon's relative hands-off approach and Wellington's involvement in details. He also spent a lot of attention on the relationship of trust between Wellington and Blücher.

I enjoyed this book way more than I would have expected from a book about a single battle, and would particularly recommend it to people who want something at a slightly higher level than a military history book.

IMAGE(https://images.gr-assets.com/books/1509467156l/36510206.jpg)

Hrdina wrote:

Apparently Mr. Cornwell is primarily an author of (sometimes historical) fiction, and this was his first foray into non-fiction.

Yep, he's the author of the excellent Richard Sharpe series - if you have any interest in this period I highly recommend it. He bends history a bit to fit Sharpe and his companions into historical events, but it's a fantastic window into the Peninsular War and the early 18th-century British infantry experience.

He's also the author of the Last Kingdom books that the Netflix show is based on.

Cornwell was doing a meet and greet in my city recently. I didn't go and see him, but I did manage to get a signed copy of his new novel to give my Dad as a gift, as he's a big Cornwell fan. That Waterloo book looks interesting, so it's on my list.

I've just started Rome: A History in Seven Sackings by Matthew Kneale, which had so many good reviews I just couldn't resist getting it in the book shop. I've been to Rome twice and haven't even seen everything the city has to offer. It's said a lot, but it really is a spectacular city for some of things you see. I know a fair bit the Romans in Britain (I actually live in the town where Hadrian's Wall ends), but not too much about the actual city of Rome.

Saying that, we went to the Vatican Museum last time and had mixed feelings about it. There's some amazing paintings and buildings, but there's very little in terms of history of the Catholic church, you're more just pushed through with the crowds to walk and look at everything; there's hardly anything to read. Saying that, I'd imagine the church probably doesn't want to talk too much about the Crusades, etc.