Conquerors

The world's great conquerors blazed trails of blood, havoc and destruction across the pages of world history. Their exploits have excited, appalled and amazed generations of people, and today's readership is no exception. Some conquerors did nothing but pillage, loot and kill. Others set out to create new empires and new civilizations from the lands that they overran. Historians have painted some conquerors as little better than savage beasts devoid of culture or feeling, but others have come down to us as highly civilized individuals bringing culture and the arts in the wake of their conquering armies. "Conquerors" looks at 13 of the most successful empire builders, up to the eighteenth century, that the world has ever seen. Each conqueror is detailed in turn; the scope of their conquests is examined together with the backgrounds to their careers and the results that followed after their deaths.