Weapons: An International Encyclopedia From 5000 B.C. to 2000 A.D., Updated Edition [Paperback]

Diagram Group (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: April 15, 1991

This definitive guide covers the entire history of weapons, from the earliest, most primitive instruments up to remarkable advances in modern defense and warfare, including:

Riot-control devices
Electrified nightsticks
Infantry weapons
Multiple-launch rockets
Fiber-optic missles
Wire-guided torpedoes
"Stealth" technology

Product Details

• Paperback: 336 pages
• Publisher: St. Martin's Griffin; Updated edition (April 15, 1991)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0312039506
• ISBN-13: 978-0312039509
• Product Dimensions: 10.8 x 8.4 x 0.8 inches
• Shipping Weight: 2 pounds
• Average Customer Review: 4.6 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (17 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #775,744 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

16 of 16 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars a good survey, March 26, 2000

By 

Yoon Ha Lee - See all my reviews

This review is from: Weapons: An International Encyclopedia From 5000 B.C. to 2000 A.D., Updated Edition (Paperback)

If you pick this book up expecting comprehensive detail on all the world's weapons, you'll be disappointed. You will, however, find a decent survey of many world weapons (with some bias toward the West), and sometimes short descriptions of where/when/how they were used. I find it most useful for looking up an unfamiliar weapon and for finding out what things look like. If you want more scholarly or detailed information, you'll have to hunt a little harder.

10 of 10 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Great Information!, March 8, 2003

By 

Leo "Katphish" (Norwich, NY, United States) - See all my reviews
(VINE VOICE)    (REAL NAME)   

Amazon Verified Purchase

This review is from: Weapons: An International Encyclopedia From 5000 B.C. to 2000 A.D., Updated Edition (Paperback)

A greta overview to the history of weapons. Really nice book. Plenty of diagrams, pictures, and really deep explanations. This is a great companion to every arm chair historian or anyone who is interested in military history. Teachers may well like to have a copy in the classroom to channel the fascination young boys have with guns, knives, swords and bombs into the learning process.

Especially nice is the section on Nuclear weapons. A very detailed accoutn of the effects of nuclear weapons, thier tactical use and specifics including maps that show the how the blast radius of a 100 Megaton bomb could effectively put an end to a sizable portion of britain. Also given are details on radiation behavior and the effects of varying RAD doses as well as explanations as to the various terminology and accronyms such as ICBM, SLBM, IRBM, MIRV ect. It even has a nice table showing various blast yields and the corresponging blast radius and thermal effects. For instance a 10 Megaton bomb would give someone standing 35 miles away first degree burns! There is also a good section on Bio weapons and a very good section on Chemical weapons.

information on more dated weapons of war are also very good, though not always with as much depth. But the scope is the strong point, everything from maces, to chain mail, to bronze swords, to wooden clubs, to pole arms and pikes, to bows and arrows, to flint lock muskets, to samuri swords to self proppelled artillery. It's ALL here. Dont expect to find a complete guide to every specific model of tank or fighter, or expect to find a complete covereage of every singe machine gun, but short of actually listing and covering every single weapon ever made, this really covers all of the history of man's quest to find better ways of destroying himself.

10 of 13 people found the following review helpful:

3.0 out of 5 stars Not as comprhensive as the title implies, February 17, 2000

By 

Luigi Kapaj - See all my reviews

This review is from: Weapons: An International Encyclopedia From 5000 B.C. to 2000 A.D., Updated Edition (Paperback)

There are some excellent qualities to this book and I am glad I bought it. However, there are some aspects that are severely lacking. The book very well organized but far from comprehensive. For each category it gives only a small sample of the weapons to have been used. For example, the page on composite bows only shows the Turkish and Indian versions without mentioning that these are both splinter groups of the Mongol Empire that spread it's use into both those regions, nor does it mention the Hun bow which were asymmetric nor the ancient Scythians who used these bows around 2000 bce. In most other places the book does spend a small amount of space on the theory behind each weapons use and excels in its brevity - a volume almost as thick could be written for nearly every weapon. However, it also suffers from classic Euro centrism. Its explanation of the conflict between sword theories of cutting versus thrusting is in itself a European theory that does not appear in other cultures. The weapons are grouped by type (knives, missiles, guns, etc.) with an index by region in the back but it is not well documented as to time periods. Some instances such as American Civil War are well presented but most weapons have little more than a name and picture. The Chinese repeating crossbow is mentioned as being used in the 19th century ce but does reference its first appearance hundreds of years before. The pictures themselves are very clear line drawings. I would like to see a future edition with more statistics per weapon (size & weight) a more thorough historical listing and a more international selection of weapons as the title implies. This book has a place on my reference shelf but better serves my role-playing games than my historical research.