Cambridge Modern History and others [series in progress]

Suggest and discuss books to read (all languages welcome!)
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Steampunk
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Post by Steampunk »

Wikipedia features on the front page today on article on Cambridge Modern History.
. . .a comprehensive modern history of the world, beginning with the 15th century age of Discovery, published by the Cambridge University Press in the United Kingdom and also in the United States.

The first series, planned by Lord Acton and edited by him with Stanley Leathes, Sir Adolphus William Ward and G. W. Prothero, was launched in 1902 and totalled fourteen volumes, the last of them being an historical atlas which appeared in 1912. The period covered was from 1450 to 1910.
My first thought was "Really? 'totalled?' Is that a typo, or another of those weird Brit spellings?"

Soon after, I thought: "What a cool project that would be!"

12 volumes, discounting the Tables and General Index and Atlas editions. And pretty hefty tomes, too. Volume One, which can be found at Archive.org is 800 + pages.

Fun!

http://www.archive.org/details/cambridgemodernh01actouoft


Jim
JoeD
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Post by JoeD »

Steampunk wrote:Wikipedia features on the front page today on article on Cambridge Modern History.
. . .a comprehensive modern history of the world, beginning with the 15th century age of Discovery, published by the Cambridge University Press in the United Kingdom and also in the United States.

The first series, planned by Lord Acton and edited by him with Stanley Leathes, Sir Adolphus William Ward and G. W. Prothero, was launched in 1902 and totalled fourteen volumes, the last of them being an historical atlas which appeared in 1912. The period covered was from 1450 to 1910.
My first thought was "Really? "totalled?" Is that a typo, or another of those weird Brit spellings?"

Soon after, I thought: "What a cool project that would be!"

12 volumes, discounting the Tables and General Index and Atlas editions. And pretty hefty tomes, too. Volume One, which can be found at Archive.org is 800 + pages.

Fun!

http://www.archive.org/details/cambridgemodernh01actouoft


Jim
Very cool! I would like to investigate this series further. I like it because it deals with more modern history.

Here are a couple of other historical series that Librivox might also find interesting:

Henry Smith Williams was the main editor for a massive 25 volume set, Historians History of the World. From the front page: "A comprehensive narrative of the rise and development of nations ans recorded by over two thousand of the great writers of all ages: edited with the assistance of a distinguished board of advisers and contributors". I have downloaded all volumes except the 24th, which I could not find. The last volume is an index. It primarily focuses on Europe, although the 1st volume covers Egypt and Mesopotamia. They are big, thick books with tiny font. I have thought about sticking volume 1 of this series up for Librivox, but have not had the nerve to do so yet.

Volume 1: http://www.archive.org/details/historianshisto01willgoog

Another historical series that is on archive.org, and that I cannot believe is in the public domain, is Will and Ariel Currant's Story of Civilization, published between 1935 and 1975. The series is very popular, and I see it in nearly every library I visit, although I have never read them. It would seem pointless for Librivox to tackle this one, since somebody has already uploaded a complete and professionally done audio-recording of the entire series onto archive.org!! (How this wound up on archive.org is beyond me!)

Complete wikipedia write-up:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Story_of_Civilization

First volume:
http://www.archive.org/details/StoryOfCiv01_OurOrientalHeritage

First volume on audio:
http://www.archive.org/details/01_Our_Oriental_Heritage_Audiobook



[EDIT] I just looked up Historians History of the World on wikipedia, and sure enough, there is an article on the series there:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Historians_History_of_the_World
Cori
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Post by Cori »

JoeD wrote:Another historical series that is on archive.org, and that I cannot believe is in the public domain, is Will and Ariel Currant's Story of Civilization, published between 1935 and 1975. The series is very popular, and I see it in nearly every library I visit, although I have never read them. It would seem pointless for Librivox to tackle this one, since somebody has already uploaded a complete and professionally done audio-recording of the entire series onto archive.org!! (How this wound up on archive.org is beyond me!)
It's not in the public domain -- unless the copyright holders agreed to that -- its copyright was correctly renewed in accordance with US law in 1963, and the text is in copyright until 2031, while the audio version is likely to be copyrighted rather longer than that.
There's honestly no such thing as a stupid question -- but I'm afraid I can't rule out giving a stupid answer : : To Posterity and Beyond!
BellonaTimes
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Post by BellonaTimes »

How about The Great Events by Famous Historians series? Most of it is on PG, with five or six remaining volumes on Archive:
http://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/16352 Vol 1
Edited by Charles F. (Charles Francis) Horne, 1870-1942,
http://www.gutenberg.org/browse/authors/h#a3319
Rossiter Johnson, 1840-1931, and John Rudd (no dates given)
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Jer
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Post by Jer »

Interesting. I have a "Library of the Future IV" CD set which came out in the late 80's for Windows 3.0 that had as one of it's promos Buy this and get "The Story of Civilization by Durant"...... It had the Story in text and in low quality audio too.

The CD of the Future had a few thousand books on it. They even put out a World History and an American History CD. (Quite good actually). When Windows 95 came out the software died. I tried to find the publisher and they bit the dust somewhere. I still have them around somewhere. It was ultra compressed by their own methods. One had to use their interface to read the texts or listen, etc. Had some tiny video too.
ColleenMc
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Post by ColleenMc »

The Cambridge Modern History is in progress!

Volume 1 is completed and is here: https://librivox.org/the-cambridge-modern-history-volume-01-the-renaissance/

Volume 2 is in progress: viewtopic.php?f=2&t=83405

Volume 3 is in progress: viewtopic.php?f=28&t=86588


Colleen
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ColleenMc
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Post by ColleenMc »

The Great Events by Famous Historians is also under way!

Six volumes have been completed and can be found here: https://librivox.org/search?q=great%20events%20by%20famous%20historians&search_form=advanced

The seventh is in progress currently: viewtopic.php?f=28&t=86547

Colleen
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