War in the Modern World by Theodore RoppReview by: Forrest C. PogueThe American Historical Review, Vol. 67, No. 3 (Apr., 1962), pp. 681-683Published by: Oxford University Press on behalf of the American Historical AssociationStable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/1844112 .

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Ropp: WJar in the Modertn JJorld 68i

imperialism), the uses to which these words of power were put, and the changes and perversions of their meaning since the Roman Empire. After luminous chap- ters on the chameleonlike changes in the meaning and use of the word "empire" in classical and medieval times, the book settles down to its main subject-the British Empire. Koebner shows that uses of the term "British Empire" in the time of Henry VIII, Elizabeth, Cromwell, and the Stuarts carried meanings quite different from the later sense of the term, and in most of the meanings the colonies did not figure at all. Koebner demonstrates that "British Empire" in its modern sense dates from the reign of Queen Anne. It was the union of the Scottish and English crowns that gave the basis for the modern meaning-together with military success on the Continent, the empire of the sea, and world-wide trade. Colonies hardly yet figured in the concept. They were to acquire an "honourable place" in the British Em- pire in the decades following, but it was still a marginal place. Koebner gives Franklin, James Otis, and Jefferson a large part of the credit for hammering out a clear concept of the territorial British Empire, giving full place to the colonies. Koebner's writing and conversation were marked by the rare quality of a deep in- sistant need to go beyond the contemporary fa?ades of word and idea and to fol- low their devious ways deep back into the beginnings. Not only a contribution of great and enduring importance on the theme of empire, and the British Empire in particular, the book also demonstrates a most fruitful method of historical re- search and analysis which alone should give it lasting importance. It might well serve as a model in courses on the meanings and methods of history and a warning against basing research uncritically on the shifting sands of stereotypes and of words used and abused in many senses over many centuries. Koebner's instinct to follow things to their sources extended to the historical validity of classical passages in speeches. Thus bibliographical research proved that many of Grattan's speeches (and many of Burke's best passages) were literary versions prepared long after the event, and in the case of Grattan, greatly altered. No brief review can convey any real impression of the range, depth, and precision of Koebner's scholarship or of the lucidity of his thought. In printing and editing the book is a model.

Bethesda, Maryland H. DUNCAN HALL

WAR IN THE MODERN WORLD. By Theodore Ropp. (Durham, N. C.: Duke University Press. T959. PP. xv, 400. $IO.oo.)

ON the assumption that war, which has blighted so many years of man's his- tory by its costs of preparation, prosecution, and reconstruction, might have some significance for a generation that lives continually under the threat of conflict, Professor Ropp has written a short and vivid summary of warfare as waged in modern times. He has cut his way through the details of the development of leggings or the nature of military uniforms to emphasize the effects that techno-

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682 Reviews of Books

logical developments, improved transport, and better care of the wounded have had on fighting.

The specialists who want to know more about such matters as the Civil War use of the Zouave uniform, the ratio of guns to infantry in the armies of Lee and Meade at Gettysburg, problems of recruiting through the years, or Gerhard Ritter's recent conclusions about the Schlieffen Plan will find detailed bibliographi- cal notes, often with a sampling of what is in store for them. Unfortunately, there are no maps to aid either the specialist or the casual reader.

As one might expect, the mass of material on World War II has proved to be too much. As a result, a number of books are included which are already dated, and the author has wisely refrained from attempting any definite conclusions on many of the controversies of the period. On the other hand, sufficient time has elapsed for him to do a masterful job of reinterpreting the events of World War I. In many ways the bibliography and treatment of the I9I4-19I8 conflict constitute the best section of the book. Inasmuch as nearly every student of military history claims some special competence on some phase of the American Civil War, it is a brave man who undertakes to summarize it in twenty pages. The high points and most of the standard books are there, but every reader is likely to find that Ropp has left out something he thinks should be included. For those who have been lost in details of attacks on the enemy's works, inept generalship, politics in war- time Washington and Richmond, and the crudities of camp life, there is still something to be learned here about the nature of that war.

For the historian who shuns military history because it seems to be filled with nothing but platoon actions, flank marches, and dreary pages of mutual vilifica- tion by half-forgotten battle leaders, Ropp's book is a reminder that the history of warfare includes the raw materials with which the political, economic, diplomatic, or social historian also works. His chapter on the years of uneasy peace, I871-

I9I4, although omitting William Langer's key volumes, draws on most of the other standard works on imperialism in that period. His book does not stop with Clausewitz, Jomini, and Du Picq, but introduces us to Tolstoy, Bloch, and Isaiah Berlin. It is a volume in which quotations from Douhet and Haushofer rub elbows with David Low's explanation of the origin and development of Colonel Blimp and F. Scott Fitzgerald's description of the battlefield of the Somme.

In his recent provocative essay on "Military History" Walter Millis suggests that Ropp's book, however admirable, offers little to political and military leaders of today which will prepare them for the realities of the future. In a sense, he is saying that his own recent book, Arms and Men, is a better volume on military history than his earlier, The Martial Spirit. One may agree that no one will want to read the latter book for methods of fighting an atomic war, but it is hard to be- lieve that leaders of today could not learn soimething from his pages on our I898

war in Cuba. Ropp preserves timeless lessons for us, along with his evidence that warfare did much to disrupt and change the life of man in the past three hun-

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Bacon: Digging for History 683

dred years. The historian cannot ignore the ways and means by which nations enforced these changes if he is to give the whole picture of the past.

Arlington, Virginia FORREST C. POGUE

Ancient and Medieval DIGGING FOR HISTORY: ARCHAEOLOGICAL DISCOVERIES

THROUGHOUT THE WORLD, I945 TO I959. By Edward Bacon. Intro- duction by William Foxwell Albright. (New York: John Day Company. I96I.

PP. 3I8. $io.oo.)

OVER sixty years ago Sir Bruce Ingram, editor of the Illustrated London News, discovered that for popular appeal archaeology is second only to sex. Archaeologi- cal features which appeared in almost every issue of the News became so popular that the magazine achieved considerable status as an archaeological publication. Not the least valuable of these many articles were the illustrations which the editor culled from various news sources.

Edward Bacon, for many years the man on the News staff responsible for these articles, conceived the idea of gathering the best and the most interesting findings in one book. Digging for History is the result.

Bacon chose the period of 1945 through 1959 as the span of the most thril- ling discoveries and most significant advances since the science of archaeology began. This premise generally is true; within this period the most significant ad- vances in the chronology of Mesopotamia and Asiatic centers were made. Many historians and archaeologists will regret, however, that Bacon does not include some of the great discoveries prior to I945. The chronology and general cultural outline of Greece, Minoan Crete, Egypt, and China were well established before that date.

Bacon includes important archaeological discoveries over the world from the United Kingdom to China. There are two sections on archaeological technique, with special emphasis upon new techniques: one section deals with archaeological field techniques and the other with laboratory methods.

Understandably, perhaps, certain archaeological areas are favored in prefer- ence to others in which archaeological discoveries were not so spectacular. The United Kingdom and Greece are covered adequately, and all significant archae- ological advances in those areas are noted in considerable detail. China and Russia receive less attention, and there is little detail. A serious lack of balance is noted in connection with the single section on the Americas, which is the poorest in the book. Bacon states that the Mayan civilization is the only one worthy of note, but he fails to record all of the really significant advances in that field. He ignores the important and spectacular excavations in the valley of Mexico, in the Andean area, in the American Southwest, and in the mound area of the eastern United

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