Book cover of Origins of the European Economy: Communications and Commerce AD 300-900

Book description

For fifty years debate has raged about early European commerce during the period between antiquity and the middle ages. Was there trade? If so, in what - and with whom? New evidence and new ways of looking at old evidence are now breaking the stalemate. Analysis of communications - the…

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Why read it?

1 author picked Origins of the European Economy as one of their favorite books. Why do they recommend it?

No other book has inspired my own work as much as this one, although it is about far more than the history of Sicily.

McCormick found extensive evidence for travel and communication in the early medieval Mediterranean—a period in which it was previously thought that long-distance trade had all but stopped after the decline of the Roman Empire.

McCormick’s method was to collect every tiny anecdote he could find about something or someone that went from one place to another across the Sea. All these tidbits of data added up to something huge, and showed clearly that travel and exchange…

From Sarah's list on medieval Sicily.

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Book cover of Aggressor

Aggressor by FX Holden,

It is April 1st, 2038. Day 60 of China's blockade of the rebel island of Taiwan.

The US government has agreed to provide Taiwan with a weapons system so advanced that it can disrupt the balance of power in the region. But what pilot would be crazy enough to run…

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