This book has been around a few years – since 2012 – but had passed me by as I was busy reading other books by Ben Kane. Spartacus: The Gladiator takes the story up to the moment when the slave army has inflicted its first great defeat on Rome. It is here - against the unbelievable brutality of gladiatorial life - that Spartacus and Crixus the Gaul plan the audacious overthrow of their Roman masters, escaping to Vesuvius, where they recruit and train a huge slave army - an army which will keep the might of Rome at bay for two years and create one of the most extraordinary legends in history. Betrayed again to the Romans by his jealous king, Spartacus - and with him Ariadne - are taken in captivity to the school of gladiators at Capua. But here he quickly falls foul of his overlord, the Thracian king, who has set his heart on Dionysian priestess, Ariadne - later to become wife of Spartacus. Ben Kane's brilliant novel begins in the Thracian village to which Spartacus has returned, after escaping from life as an auxiliary in the Roman army. This of course is grist to the novelist's mill.

In historical terms we know very little about Spartacus the man - partly because most contemporary Roman historians were keen to obliterate his memory and prevent him from attaining mythic status. The first of two epic novels which tell the story of one of the most charismatic heroes history has ever known - Spartacus, the gladiator slave who took on and nearly defeated the might of Rome, during the years 73-71 BC. To learn more about how and for what purposes Amazon uses personal information (such as Amazon Store order history), please visit our Privacy Notice. You can change your choices at any time by visiting Cookie Preferences, as described in the Cookie Notice. Click ‘Customise Cookies’ to decline these cookies, make more detailed choices, or learn more. Third parties use cookies for their purposes of displaying and measuring personalised ads, generating audience insights, and developing and improving products. This includes using first- and third-party cookies, which store or access standard device information such as a unique identifier. If you agree, we’ll also use cookies to complement your shopping experience across the Amazon stores as described in our Cookie Notice. We also use these cookies to understand how customers use our services (for example, by measuring site visits) so we can make improvements. We use cookies and similar tools that are necessary to enable you to make purchases, to enhance your shopping experiences and to provide our services, as detailed in our Cookie Notice.

Spartacus the gladiator ben kane