The fall of the dynasties : the collapse of the old order, 1905-1922 / by Edmond Taylor.

Format:

Book

Author/Creator:

Taylor, Edmond, 1908-1998, author.

Series:

Herman Graf book.

A Herman Graf Book

Language:

English

Subjects (All):

Europe--Kings and rulers.

Europe.

Europe--History--1871-1918.

Physical Description:

1 online resource (400 pages) : illustrations, maps

Edition:

First Skyhorse Publishing edition.

Place of Publication:

New York, New York : Skyhorse Publishing, 2015

Language Note:

English

Summary:

"Popular history of the finest sort . . . an excellent book worthy to rank with Barbara Tuchman's The Guns of August and Alan Moorehead's Gallipoli." --The New York Times On June 28, 1914, in the dusty Balkan town of Sarajevo, an assassin fired two shots. In the next five minutes, as the stout middle-aged Archduke Franz Ferdinand of Habsburg, heir to the Austro-Hungarian throne, and his wife bled to death, a dynasty--and with it, a whole way of life--began to topple. In the ages before World War I, four dynasties--the Habsburg, Hohenzollern, Ottoman, and Romanov--dominated much of civilization. Outwardly different, they were at bottom somewhat alike: opulent, grandiose, suffocating in tradition, ostentatiously gilded on the surface and rotting at the core. Worse still, they were tragically out of step with the forces shaping the modern world. The Fall of the Dynasties covers the period from 1905 to 1922, when these four ruling houses crumbled and fell, destroying old alliances and obliterating old boundaries. World War I was precipitated by their decay and their splintered baroque rubble proved to be a treacherous base for the new nations that emerged from the war. "All convulsions of the last half-century," Taylor writes, "stem back to Sarajevo: the two World Wars, the Bolshevik revolution, the rise and fall of Hitler, and the ongoing turmoil in the Middle East. Millions upon millions of deaths can be traced to one or another of these upheavals; all of us who survive have been scarred at least emotionally by them." In this classic volume, Taylor traces the origins of the dynasties whose collapse brought the old order crashing down and the events leading to their astonishingly swift downfall. Skyhorse Publishing, as well as our Arcade imprint, are proud to publish a broad range of books for readers interested in history--books about World War II,

the Third Reich, Hitler and his henchmen, the JFK assassination, conspiracies, the American Civil War, the American Revolution, gladiators, Vikings, ancient Rome, medieval times, the old West, and much more. While not every title we publish becomes a New York Times bestseller or a national bestseller, we are committed to books on subjects that are sometimes overlooked and to authors whose work might not otherwise find a home.

Contents:

Front Cover

Title Page

Copyright Page

Acknowledgments

Contents

1 Sarajevo: The Shots That Still Ring Round the World

2 Flashbacks to a Sunset World

3 Dynasts and Diplomats

4 The Year of the Red Cock

5 The Fossile Monarchy

6 Sick Man's Legacy

7 Rehearsal for Doom

8 The Unlucky Brinkmanship of Wilhelm II

9 The Gravediggers of Autocracy

10 Murder, Muddle, and Machiavelli

11 The Failure of Diplomacy

12 The Failure of Arms

13 The Suicide of the Russian Monarchy

14 The Lost Revolution

15 The Age of the Witch Doctor

16 To the Bitter End

17 Exit the Hohenzollerns

18 The Fall of the House of Habsburg

19 The Time of Troubles

20 The Doomed Peace

Bibliography.

Notes:

Bibliographic Level Mode of Issuance: Monograph

Includes bibliographical references.

Description based on print version record.

ISBN:

9781510700512

151070051X

OCLC:

1086128280