The War of the Three Gods

Romans, Persians, and the Rise of Islam

By: Peter Crawford

Narrated by: James Lurie

Length: 11 hrs and 13 mins

Publisher's summary

The War of the Three Gods is a military history of the Near and Middle East in the seventh century - with its chief focus on the reign of the Eastern Roman Emperor Heraclius (AD 610-641) - a pivotal and dramatic time in world history. The Eastern Roman Empire was brought to the very brink of extinction by the Sassanid Persians before Heraclius managed to inflict a crushing defeat on the Sassanids with a desperate, final gambit. His conquests were shortlived, however, for the newly converted adherents of Islam burst upon the region, administering the coup de grace to Sassanid power and laying siege to Constantinople itself, ushering in a new era.

Peter Crawford skillfully explains the threeway struggle between the Christian Roman, Zoroastrian Persian, and Islamic Arab empires, a period of conflict peopled with fascinating characters, including Heraclius, Khusro II, and the Prophet Muhammad himself. Many of the epic battles of the period - Nineveh, Yarmuk, Qadisiyyah, and Nahavand - and sieges such as those of Jerusalem and Constantinople are described in as rich detail. The strategies and tactics of these very different armies are discussed and analyzed, while plentiful maps allow the listener to follow the events and varying fortunes of the contending empires. This is an exciting and important study of a conflict that reshaped the map of the world.

Download the accompanying reference guide.

©2014 Peter Crawford. First published 2013 Pen & Sword Books Limited (P)2014 Audible Inc.

Recommended listen for history buffs

Three Gods caught my eye because it treats a region and period often neglected in both popular and academic works - the area we might call the Middle East just before the arrival of Islam. Of no fault of Crawford, the work is uneven, and I found the contest between the Eastern Romans and Sassinids more satisfying. The sources are fairly limited to support the subject matter but they're more reliable then those addressing the rise of Islam. As Crawford moves to narrating the struggle against Islam and is dependent on all but hagiographical Muslim sources, the author can often provide no more than speculation. Crawford does weigh the sources, despite their nonsensical nature, and strives to provide balance. There's also a focus on the contributions of the Arabs and a recognition of their successes, rather than merely stressing the weakness of the Eastern Romans and Sassinids. All three - exhausted regional powers due to protracted wars, dynastic weakness, and well motivated Muslim forces led by gifted leaders - explain the triumph of Islam.

I'm usually very forgiving of readers / narrators unless their reading negatively affects my opinion of the book. Here, Lurie did influence my listening satisfaction. In terms of his reading, he's fine and his voice seems reasonably matched to the material. However, given the size of the empires discussed and wide range of "characters" his mispronunciations made it harder to follow a book already packed with perhaps unfamiliar places and people. As this is an avoidable problem, it's harder to forgive.

Three Gods is an insightful work which provokes questions about the validity of Eurocentric views of the "Dark Ages."

a secularist writing about what he doesn't underst

his arrogance stops him from writing an objective history on this topic. at one point he refers to a debate about the Holy Trinity as a " Petty squabble"

An educational trip back thirteen centuries in time

A very well written overview of a period of history that defined the end of the ancient world and the beginning of the Muslim empire. The writer doesn’t get bogged down in detail and the reader is a pleasure to listen to.

Filled in some blanks

An interesting account of a period that I had little understanding and an all but forgotten empire. In total, very good but very heavy on battlefield tactics that I felt was at times unnecessary. Also at times the chronology jumps around a bit and I found it a little hard to keep up, but I recommend this book to the casual history non-fiction reader.

A historical drama, but lots of facts

This book gives a great understanding of the romans, persians, and muslims at the time of the rise of Islam. It is very detailed and provides names, places, dates, and descriptions of battles in ways that was hard to remember. I still loved it though even with all the information being thrown at you, and as a muslim it was very interesting to see this history from a non believing perspective that was not biased either. If you love history, or your just interested in this era, the middle east, the rise of islam, fall of eastern rome, etc. then this book is for you.

What Dark Ages

This book revealed information I never heard before.
There's no standing still in human history.

Having trouble finishing this one...

I've been eagerly wating for Audible to release an audiobook on this subject since finishing Albert Hourani's A History of the Arab Peoples back in 2010. Popular history seems to be mostly silent when it comes to providing a Roman or Persian perspective on the rise of the Islamic Caliphate. I was hoping that this title would fill the gap.

The author strikes a good balance between creating an entertaining narrative and acknowledging when the historical sources are too spotty to be dogmatic about what actually occurred. Though not as compelling as similar titles in the genre, the book is well-written overall.

The narration of this book is nearly unbearable. The narrator has a professional voice and good pronunciation but doesn't project well, resulting in a whisper-like, grumbly, bass-heavy recording. This is problematic for me, since I do the majority of my listening while engaged in sometimes-noisy manual labor and almost always listen to my books at 2x or 3x normal playback speed. Even while driving, I've found it difficult to concentrate on the content unless I play the audio at high volume and at 1x or 1.25x speed.

I'm pleased that Audible has provided a PDF supplement with this audiobook, featuring political and battle strategy maps which have proved more fascinating than the book itself. This is a welcome change to the several books and lectures I have downloaded which advertise supplementary content but fail to deliver.

Interesting book, a bit dry

This audiobook goes through the Roman and Persian histories leading up to the rise of Islam, and how it spread across the two empires. It is exactly what you'd expect.

Good historical narrative

This book is a good historical overview of the Romano-Persian wars of the seventh century, but overstates Muslim successes without addressing the growing schisms and fault lines that rapidly led to reverses and internal conflict. It points those out readily enough to describe Roman reverses and Persian collapse, but dismisses them to easily when examining Islam.

Compare with Richard J Evans' the Pursuit of Power

This book just doesn't get into the depth of characterizations of the people of history or their times. Compared w/ Evans' work, it's just a list of battles and wars and this and that and it just doesn't flow. My god where are the good history writers?