Great Ages of Man: Age of Kings (Color Illustrated Hardcover)

Description

Age of Kings is one of twenty-one volumes from the Time-Life book series Great Ages of Man. Published in the 1960s, this series is an overview of the major eras of world history. This volume presents the many facets of the age of absolutism in the 17th century. Topics covered include the emergence of the idea of the modern secular state, the Thirty Years’ War (1618-1648), King Louis XIV of France, Baroque art and literature (including the sculptures of Bernini and John Milton’s epic poem Paradise Lost), opera, famous scientists (Copernicus, Brahe, Kepler, Galileo, Newton, Harvey, Huygens, Boyle, Malpighi, Halley, and others), philosophy (Rene Descartes), poetry (Nicolas Boileau), mathematics (Blaise Pascal), the Edict of Nantes (and its revocation), Oliver Cromwell and the English Civil War, the Restoration of Charles II in England, the Glorious Revolution of 1688, the London of Samuel Pepys, Czar Peter the Great of Russia, the War of the Spanish Succession, and the Peace of Utrecht. As with other books in this series, numerous illustrations and photographs supplement the narrative. A timeline, index, and bibliography are included. When I first started reading this book, I thought it might be a little dry; however, I was pleasantly surprised with how author Charles Blitzer capably and succinctly captured the main points of a complicated yet important era of world history. In sum, Age of Kings is a well-done overview of the many aspects of the age of absolutism.