A MAMMOTH task to chronicle millennia of history but Wright has produced an excellent work whose comprehensive coverage includes more than one or two surprises.
In the 4,000 entries, modern figures such as George W Bush, Vladimir Putin and our own Tony Blair rub shoulders with the likes of Rameses the Great, Buddha and Hannibal.
The 25 detailed maps are particularly interesting, including not only empires such as the British, the Roman and the Ottoman, but also covering such topics as the spread of the Black Death and the distribution of Native American tribes.
Truly, every interest is here.
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