# Thebes: The forgotten City of Ancient Greece by author # Paul Cartledge is a wonderful history. Thebes overshadowed by rivals, at one point was the most powerful city in Ancient Greece. And this novel gives the city long lost credit.🌟🐾
Thank you,
#Netgalley, # Paul Cartledge, and # Abrams Press for the advanced copy
* Good gift for those in School along with history lovers with the holidays approaching.🎁

Thebes will always be relegated to standing in the shadows behind the more well-known Spartans and Athenians. But, Cartledge makes a valiant effort to dredge Thebes up from relative obscurity; polish her up and tell the world about all about her. Cartledge once again succeeds in threading the needle between scholarly and popular history, making a readable little book in the process. He weaves together disparate elements of Theban culture to write a book about Ancient Greece that is not focused on the Athenians or the Spartans. Thebans deserve to shine a little more and this book does an admirable job.

Thebes is often overlooked by books on Ancient Greece, in favor of Athens and Sparta so I was thrilled to see a book dedicated to this often ignored area.

This is a fantastic book with a lot of information, starting with pre-history, to Thebes as we know it and moving through it's downfall with lots of great detail of everything in between. The middle of the book includes a lot of information on wars in the region which I highly enjoyed, as a fan of military history. Mr. Cartledge also injects his own personality and snark though out which is great, especially if you need a bit of a break from the often heavy subject matter. Though it's a bit short coming in at 320 pages, I feel like we could have adding a few hundred more with even more detail and information (but I like my books big!).

I was a bit disappointed with sections of the book where Thebes is not only no longer the focus, but after is completely relegated to the background and not even given a passing glance, though I understand that often times that's necessary. The book does seem to jump around a bit, and I wish Mr. Cartledge would have finished out lines of thought/narrative instead of shelving them for later, I have a bad memory and it's tough to recall the beginnings of these sometimes. However I still really enjoyed the book and will definitely recommend it to friends and family. I've read most of Cartledge's work and I've loved every single one.

I received an ARC in exchange for an honest review.

If you are anything like me, your last lectures on Ancient Greece occurred many years ago, focused on Athens and Sparta, and have dissolved into a bit of a fog. My knowledge of the city of Thebes was limited to references in Disney’s Hercules. But I’m always on the lookout for new information, so this book covering the rise and fall of historical Thebes, as well as Thebes of myth, sounded promising. I was expecting a work along the lines of Mary Beard’s SPQR: decidedly grounded in academic fact, but approachable by the armchair historian who knows very little. Thebes is not that book. Cartledge is obviously an expert on his subject, but he assumes a relatively high level of familiarity with Ancient Greece and Grecians. The ARC I received as an ebook did not have the maps, illustrations, or pictures, and therefore I can’t comment on how those might help readers who don’t already know quite a bit about the geography and history of the region. The overall tone and style are highly academic, including a stereotypical lack of clarity and confusing cross-references within the text.

I can’t recommend this to general readers, but I can see it as a candidate for individuals who have read deeply and broadly about Ancient Greece, or for use in an academic setting.

I received a copy of this work from the publisher via NetGalley for an honest review.

Very interesting and detailed book. Enjoy the fruits of labor from Cartledge’s deep dive into Ancient Greece, which produced this informative and historically rich account of Thebes.

Thebes By Paul Cartledge gets three stars because it will go on to a deep detailed explanation great right? Then it will say we will put this on pause and come back to this another time. It jumps around a lot back and forth alot which can get quite confusing to the reader at least me. I'm a huge fan of greek and roman history and myths and comparatives so that's why it gets still a good rating. ( actually it would be 3.5) Since I don't mind the academic feeling of books. This arc was given to me by net galley in exchange for an honest review.