Fascinating!

Beautiful read, incredibly well-research, this book was a delight to listen to. A full five stars from me

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Great story well narrated

It's an excellent book!
It is nice having someone who knows what she is talking about telling it in a great story AND being able to narrate herself. I also enjoyed those lovely little morsels of knowledge, for example, what 'past' means in the origin of different languages

Great listening experience and I followed her stories using Google and Google Earth on occasion. Great experience!
With her lovely, calm voice and speed of narration, Mrs Hughes has created an audiobook I will enjoy listening to more than once!

Thank you very much. Now on to Istanbul. :-)

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"Bettering the best"

A number of books already tell us what we know and didn’t know about the seven wonders of the ancient world, so what has Bettany Hughes to add to this well researched topic? A lot, I found!!

She has been immersed in her subject since childhood and has visited all the sites repeatedly with special permission to touch, see and crawl around where tourists aren’t allowed. Her unrelenting enthusiasm is infectious and her intellectual enquiry and the depth of her knowledge are impressive.

She recreates the mindsets, cultures and religious belief systems of these ancient civilisations which produced such staggering constructions. Details allow us to see: whether it’s the colossal girth of a single finger of Zeus , or the fact that the dazzling stones of the Pyramids , those monumental paths to the after life with their light-shifting colours , were once reflected in surrounding water.

I hugely enjoyed her weaving in of a mass of references to myths and legends,, and her generous inclusion of quotation from a a huge range of chroniclers, poets, and philosophers from ancient times. She also explores the use of these ancient writings in later centuries, including the present one, which I liked. I enjoyed too her many linguistic asides which illustrate how languages of the ancient world have migrated into our current English vocabulary.

Hughes fully explores the mindset of the ‘super-elite’ who produced these astonishing creations and whose aim was to ‘better the best’ in order to secure their place in a burnished after life. But I liked her enquiries into the everyday living conditions of those enslaved human beings who passed their entire short and brutal lives building them stone by stone. The minutiae of the materials and their transportation are detailed – and also that of nineteenth century tomb raiders’ booty.

Descriptions of celebrations and customs with all their violence and brutality are filmic in their impact. I can still see those vast crowds attending the hideous mass sacrifices of human beings and bulls – even to the rivers of ordure left in their wake.

Hughes also keeps us in today’s world with updates on discoveries and current archaeological projects right up to 2022 and even 2023. The ancient world is still very much with her – and us.

Not all authors make good narrators of their own work, but Hughes has a very pleasant reading voice shot through with just the right amount of her persuasive enthusiasm. And she can pronounce all those names with aplomb!

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2 people found this helpful

Comprehensive narrative of the Seven Wonders

Just read it if you’d like to understand more about the ancient world. Well researched and accessible.

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Excellent story well told

Descriptions of the GREAT PYRAMID OF GIZA; the HANGING GARDENS OF BABYLON; the TEMPLE OF ARTEMIS AT EPHESUS; the STATUE OF ZEUS AT OLYMPIA; the MAUSOLEUM AT HALICARNASSUS; the COLOSSUS OF RHODES and the LIGHTHOUSE OF ALEXANDRIA. Even a bonus piece on the GREAT LIBRARY OF ALEXANDRIA, put into their historical contexts.
Well told in an informative and entertaining style as you would except from Bettany Hughes.

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1 person found this helpful

A fascinating listen

Bettany is an excellent narrator and really brings the Wonder’s to life. There is much background and detail explained in such a captivating way. I really enjoyed it and am straight into her history of Istanbul!

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Thanks Bettany

Another great book and well delivered by Bettany. I was only disappointed when it finished! Keep them coming please

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A greater understanding of the 7 wonders of the ancient world

Bethany is very good at not only explaining each wonder, but also how attitudes, beliefs and culture of powerful civilisations. Thank you!

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Bettany Hughes is a fantastic storyteller.

The 7 Wonders is like a cliche, but this book brings them to life. We see beyond the objects to learn about the people and cultures that created them.

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Ok..

This a collection of rambles only tangentially connected to the actual wonders themselves. Some of what Ms Hughes tells us is interesting and she seems more confident, both in speech and writing when the Greek world is under discussion. Also a lot of useful information is provided in the pdf: maps, bibliography, but strangely not the table of contents. Nor are there any chapter headings on the audio file which is immensely annoying.

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