Reviews
The Fifteen Decisive Battles of the World: From Marathon to Waterloo by Edward Shepherd Creasy
capellan's review against another edition
2.0
Creasy's selection of battles strongly reflects his European heritage, and any prospective reader should go in well-warned that his text also strongly reflects the prejudices of a wealthy Victorian, with frequent glowing remarks about the mission of the Anglo-Saxon race.
Are the military and political insights worth stomaching the racism? Eh, not really, I'd say. He does better with the political - that is, the establishment of the situation leading up to the battle, and the reasons why he considers it a decisive encounter - than he does with the purely military. The actual conduct of some battles is barely touched on, while others include details that I suspect have very little evidence to support them. Most notable in the latter category is the Battle of Hastings, where we get accounts of the actions of numerous individual soldiers within the melee.
If this is a subject matter of interest to you, I'd suggest looking for a more recent text, with more academic rigour and fewer - or at least less pervasive - cultural prejudices.
Are the military and political insights worth stomaching the racism? Eh, not really, I'd say. He does better with the political - that is, the establishment of the situation leading up to the battle, and the reasons why he considers it a decisive encounter - than he does with the purely military. The actual conduct of some battles is barely touched on, while others include details that I suspect have very little evidence to support them. Most notable in the latter category is the Battle of Hastings, where we get accounts of the actions of numerous individual soldiers within the melee.
If this is a subject matter of interest to you, I'd suggest looking for a more recent text, with more academic rigour and fewer - or at least less pervasive - cultural prejudices.
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