In the Shadow of the Sword cover art

In the Shadow of the Sword

The Battle for Global Empire and the End of the Ancient World

 Preview
Try Premium Plus free
Pick 1 audiobook a month from our unmatched collection - including bestsellers and new releases.
Listen all you want to thousands of included audiobooks, Originals, celeb exclusives, and podcasts.
Access exclusive sales and deals.
£8.99/month after 30 days. Renews automatically. See here for eligibility.

In the Shadow of the Sword

By: Tom Holland
Narrated by: Jonathan Keeble
Try Premium Plus free

£8.99/month after 30 days. Renews automatically. See here for eligibility.

Buy Now for £16.99

Buy Now for £16.99

Confirm Purchase
Pay using card ending in
Switch payment method
By completing your purchase, you agree to Audible's Conditions of Use and authorise Audible to charge your designated card or any other card on file. Please see our Privacy Notice, Cookies Notice and Interest-based Ads Notice.
Cancel

About this listen

In the 6th century AD, the Near East was divided between two venerable empires: the Persian and the Roman. A hundred years on and one had vanished forever, while the other seemed almost finished. Ruling in their place were the Arabs: an upheaval so profound that it spelt, in effect, the end of the ancient world. In The Shadow of the Sword, Tom Holland explores how this came about. Spanning from Constantinople to the Arabian desert, and starring some of the most remarkable rulers who ever lived, he tells a story vivid with drama, horror, and startling achievement.

©2012 Tom Holland (P)2012 Hachette Digital Ancient Ancient History Imperialism Crusade

Listeners also enjoyed...

 Genghis Khan and the Making of the Modern World cover art
Henry VIII: The Quest for Fame cover art
The Eagle and the Lion cover art
The Silmarillion cover art
Babylon cover art
The Burgundians cover art
Christianity cover art
Mecca cover art
The Norman Conquest cover art
The Storm Before the Storm cover art
A Little History of the World cover art
Carthage Must Be Destroyed cover art
Worlds at War cover art
Black Rednecks and White Liberals cover art
America Alone cover art
In God's Path cover art

Critic reviews

Holland's new book traces the process by which the world of the first millennium came to be dominated by one God, three religions and an innumerable succession of emperors (Dan Jones)
It is difficult not to be bedazzled by a cast that includes ulcerated Christian holy men, Zoroastrian priests obsessed with dental hygiene, demonic emperors, barbarians with self-inflicted cranial deformities and Arab ambassadors stinking of camel (Richard Miles)
Holland is a restless wanderer across the ancient world, both geographically and intellectually... A dazzling range of characters... Holland is a skilful and energetic narrator, and while he guides us along the more intricate twists and turns of the period, he also keeps our eyes on the bigger story (Anthony Sattin)
Holland leaves almost no aspect of the traditional story of Islam intact as he charts its rise to global power from the ashes of the Roman and Persian empires (Bryan Appleyard)
A work of history, trying to tell the truth, as modern historians understand that fraught concept... A gripping, colourful book (Charles Moore)
A handsome volume, tackling an important question from a novel perspective, backed by useful notes and written in an accessible and fluid style (Michael Scott)
A brave and valuable attempt to train the lens of popular history upon an exceptionally contentious field of study... elegant and entertaining... In the Shadow of the Sword stands as a useful, and sometimes provocative, starting point for anyone interested in approaching the birth of Islam from a historical, rather than devotional, perspective (Thomas Ashbridge)
Elegantly written and refreshingly free from specialist jargon... marshalling its resources with dexterity, it is a veritable tour de force (Malise Ruthven)
Those unwilling to struggle through academic texts have long needed a guide to the story of Islam as it's understood by those with the fullest access to the latest linguistic and archaeological evidence. Now at last in Tom Holland's In the Shadow of the Sword, they finally have it (David Frum)
All stars
Most relevant  
Not quite as well written as dominion, however it’s still a fabulous book about parts of time which are rarely told to British audiences. Very interesting.

Very interesting narrative of early and developing Islamic world

Something went wrong. Please try again in a few minutes.
excellent and detailed insight into the collapsing classical world and the power of religion taking shape amongst the waring peoples

superb

Something went wrong. Please try again in a few minutes.
Tom Holland never lets me down and this is another classic. I like most of all his writing style; portentous and grand without becoming hackneyed. Jonathon Keeble as narrator is the cherry on the top. I first encountered him reading Jonathon Strange and his innate gravitas lends itself well to Holland’s writing. Brilliant.

Absolutely solid as usual.

Something went wrong. Please try again in a few minutes.
An epic and ambotious tome that is able to cover the whole scope of the Roman Empire, Christian Roman Empire, Persian Empires, Islam, Christianity and some Judaism all into one monumental. It zooms out to the epic conflicts and then hones in on intricate debates on Islamic historiography, Jewish roots of Christianity including the Nazarenes, and the ground-breaking insights into the cross-fertilisation that gave rise to Islam. It is simply epic.

Epic

Something went wrong. Please try again in a few minutes.
Hats off before this opus magnus! What a feat of scholarly mastery. The complexities and ambiguity of the Islamic history explored and explained through a dizzying array of facts, stories and speculations.

Masterfully woven

Something went wrong. Please try again in a few minutes.
complex history of the rise of Muslims well told.
Clear as possible, with some horrific moments
Not for the squeamish.

Islam unrolled

Something went wrong. Please try again in a few minutes.
As expected of a Tom Holland book, this was a masterpiece. The narrator however ruined it for me. He seemed to get almost every single foreign word's pronunciation horribly wrong. I think narrators should first research their books before narrating them.

Wonderful book, mediocre narration.

Something went wrong. Please try again in a few minutes.
Great book. Tremendous research. Narrator's voice is great too. My only crticism is the narrator's pronunciation of Arabic names and words could have been better. That's it.

Great book

Something went wrong. Please try again in a few minutes.
If you want to learn about late Roman empire or the pre Islamic Persian empire, this book will tell it to you via a great story.

Very good history of Roman and Persian empires

Something went wrong. Please try again in a few minutes.
Very insightful and well researched. controversial and ground braking. Totally destroys the nonsense of the opposition.

Everyone needs to read this!

Something went wrong. Please try again in a few minutes.
See more reviews