The Other Side of History: Daily Life in the Ancient World

By: Robert Garland, The Great Courses

Narrated by: Robert Garland

Length: 24 hrs and 28 mins

Publisher's summary

Look beyond the abstract dates and figures, kings and queens, and battles and wars that make up so many historical accounts. Over the course of 48 richly detailed lectures, Professor Garland covers the breadth and depth of human history from the perspective of the so-called ordinary people, from its earliest beginnings through the Middle Ages.

The past truly comes alive as you take a series of imaginative leaps into the world of history's anonymous citizens, people such as a Greek soldier marching into battle in the front row of a phalanx; an Egyptian woman putting on makeup before attending an evening party with her husband; a Greek citizen relaxing at a drinking party with the likes of Socrates; a Roman slave captured in war and sent to work in the mines; and a Celtic monk scurrying away with the Book of Kells during a Viking invasion.

Put yourself in the sandals of ordinary people and discover what it was like to be among history's 99%. What did these everyday people do for a living? What was their home like? What did they eat? What did they wear? What did they do to relax? What were their beliefs about marriage? Religion? The afterlife?

This extraordinary journey takes you across space and time in an effort to be another person - someone with whom you might not think you have anything at all in common - and come away with an incredible sense of interconnectedness. You'll see the range of possibilities of what it means to be human, making this a journey very much worth taking.

PLEASE NOTE: When you purchase this title, the accompanying reference material will be available in your Library section along with the audio.

©2012 The Teaching Company, LLC (P)2012 The Great Courses

Entertaining and Facinating

What did you love best about The Other Side of History: Daily Life in the Ancient World?

This book will take you into the lives of common people. Professor Garland is down to earth and well spoken and adds a touch of humor. I loved this. My all time favorite audio book.

Did you have an extreme reaction to this book? Did it make you laugh or cry?

Yes....both. And I am so very grateful to live in this era. Our ancestors had it very tough.

Any additional comments?

You will find many of your own beliefs and customs are rooted a long way back in history. I highly recommend this book even if you are not a history buff.

Enthralling experience through ancient history

If you could sum up The Other Side of History: Daily Life in the Ancient World in three words, what would they be?

Personable, relate-able, fascinating

Who was your favorite character and why?

His recitation of Chaucer in Middle English, I enjoyed hearing what I would guess to be an authentic accent to how the language was spoken.

What does Professor Robert Garland bring to the story that you wouldn’t experience if you just read the book?

His quips about his personal feelings or how we would personally feel if we lived during those times.

Did you have an extreme reaction to this book? Did it make you laugh or cry?

I laughed at his story when he was 6 and burst out singing the hymn for the holy crusade in the middle of a restaurant with his family.

Maybe a theme that I've discussed with my friends about how he stresses how dangerous life was in ancient times, especially during Greek and Roman times, how easily it was to become sick or injured and how often those occurrences could leave you permanently disfigured or dead.

Any additional comments?

I'd enjoy meeting this professor.

Excellent but limited geographical reference

Great lecture series but the information was 90% focused on classical ancient history in the Mediterranean and Britain. Highly recommend the series but disappointed with the limited focus on cultures most people are already quite familiar with.

Incredible breadth and depth

So much knowledge and insight offered in this marathon of a course. Worth sticking with it and listening to the whole thing. Very rewarding and enjoyable.

Vivid and engaging lectures

What made the experience of listening to The Other Side of History: Daily Life in the Ancient World the most enjoyable?

Garland's ability as a story-teller and use of the second person to "put you in the sandals" of the ancient peoples that he describes, makes this is a vivid and engaging listen. He even has some pretty funny jokes if you listen for them. This would certainly be one of the most fun college courses to take at a University.

What was one of the most memorable moments of The Other Side of History: Daily Life in the Ancient World?

One of the most memorable moments I think is actually in the beginning, as he describes the chaos of the Thera volcano explosion and "your" flight from the island. I really got the sense of a peaceful fishing village in the Aegean bronze age being thrown into a nightmare-ish fit of destruction with the ensuing terror. But the description of medeival Britain and Chaucer's Canterburry Tales, battle as a Greek hoplite, and an Egyptian farmer are all quite memorable.

What does Professor Robert Garland bring to the story that you wouldn’t experience if you just read the book?

Although it's not a book but a lecture series, it would have been made for an entertaining read. However it's Garland as a story-teller that sets this apart as an audio-series.

Was this a book you wanted to listen to all in one sitting?

This series would have been a pretty serious commitment to listen to all in one sitting, but with the continuity of topics, it's very easy to listen to for long periods.

Fantastic

Would you listen to The Other Side of History: Daily Life in the Ancient World again? Why?

This is a wonderful overview of many aspects of Ancient History. It's very well done.

Well done enough.

A fine edition to The Great Courses if one can navigate past the good doctors constant pandering to the East and his knack for knuckle-rapping Western civilization while simultaneously excusing other Eastern cultures for identical(or at very least attempted)acts.

Slavery was almost universal and omni-present. While he completely admonishes Westerners for this in an entire segment ,he later glances over the Persian Empires enslavement of MASSIVE numbers of humans with the excuse of "But Persians bred their captives,Greece took them by force!" Very consoling to the human property, I'm sure..

The role of women is also discussed at length. Greece once again is put on the chopping block for their treatment of women. What he neglects to mention is that the female herself would have abhorred the idea of mixing company with men in, say, a Gymnasium.

He speaks of military conquest with a mind thoroughly infected by modernity. Conquest was a fact of life. The taking of spoils(human,animal or material) was the way of things. The attacker AND the defender knew this. It was expected.

Civilization advances through conquest. War is the mother of all invention,not necessity.


A section on the crusades that neglects to mention Moslem aggression and conquest in Europe entirely?
The man is scholarly,but only when it is conducive to his warped ultra liberal worldview.

His attitude and perspective is so askew its almost fallacious.
Judging by the way he presented himself here, I would be willing to bet money blindly that his Twitter feed is filled to the brim with I'm With Her hashtags, vegan recipes and pictures of his cats.

Fantastisk

Love it, every minute of it. A must hear for People interested in history and culture

Nitty Gritty History of the Western World

Any additional comments?

Professor Robert Garland's Other Side of History takes us on a journey through the history of Western Civlization as seen through the eyes of common people. Much of what we read about in history books focuses on kings and politicians, wars and conquests. And while these elements are present in this lecture series, they're put into the context of how they affected ordinary people.

Make no mistake, this lecture series takes the broad view -- I was anticipating that every lecture would be dedicated to a single person, but Garland jumps around from woman to priest to senator to slave, frequently speaking from a second person viewpoint. The series is very long, however, and covers a lot of ground, enabling us to zoom into the details of the lives of many races and classes of people. Garland takes us from prehistoric times right up through medieval times. A few lectures are devoted to prehistory, a few to Egypt, and there's a smattering of lectures on Mesopotamia and Hellenistic Egypt, among others, but the bulk of lessons revolve around Greece, Rome, and Britain, as these are our chief sources of Western Literature. (I was just a tad disappointed that we never covered Eastern or African History, but that is for another course, I suppose).

Garland uses this literature, along with archaeological findings, to paint a dizzying array of characters. We learn a little of classical ancient figures like Cleopatra or Chaucer, but mostly we learn about how women, slaves, merchants, elderly, farmers, soldiers and the like lived.

We learn that maybe the Vikings weren't so bad after all; that Egyptians really liked their cats; that Romans employed an unusual method of oral hygiene; that women are almost universally oppressed until quite recently; and that some slaves had it better than others. Garland takes us into the streets of a violent, stinky, overcrowded metropolis and plants us in the shoes of everyday people, enlightening us as to their worries, hopes, rituals, and religious beliefs.

All in all, this is a fascinating series and I highly recommend it. I warn that sometimes we're given information that is extrapolated from possibly unreliable sources (for instance, Canterbury Tales plays a large role in Garland's interpretation of medieval times), but since much of what we learn of the past comes from the roughly ten percent of literate (i.e. not ordinary) people, we'll never know for sure what everyday folks really thought. However, most of what he teaches is historical standard, albeit focused on a different side of history than we're used to seeing.

A note on the performance: Professor Garland's lectures are well done and he's a good public speaker. But be aware that he has a very slight lisp and also that Often times. He. Speaks. In. One word. Sentences. Maybe. It's. For Emphasis. I didn't notice either of these things until well into the series, and they were never severely distracting, but once you notice them they're in your head for good.

Refreshing change.

This was a refreshing change from the usual "great man" approach to history. a good review Into the everyday lives of normal people.