ANCIENT WARRIORS

THE BEST WARRIORS IN HISTORY

The 22 part series produced by Seven Art Productions for the Learning Channel (Discovery Communications) in 1994 is a gem; each episode lasting about 25 minutes explores the lives and times of an ancient warrior clan or race through some important battle or any other crucial event in their history. In some cases, we are also told about some great general or king who led his people to glory that they had never seen before.

Amongst the factors that work in favor of this series is its short run time; in fact, it is one of the shortest documentary series that I have seen. In spite of this, an earnest effort is made to educate the viewer regarding the weapons that these warriors used, how they trained and the strategies that they applied to get the better of their enemies - in short, all the things that made them some of the greatest fighters in world history. Unlike other documentaries that concentrate mainly on people and events that happened in the US and Europe, the makers have made sure that warriors like the Assyrians, the Mauryans, the Samurais and the Ninjas which hail from the Afro-Asian region too are covered. Finally, we are also told of the circumstances that eventually led their downfall. The episodes are as follows:

Sr.	Warrior	Event
1	The Assyrians	Sacking of Judeah & Lacish by King Sennacherib
2	The Celts	Victory over Rome at the Battle of Allia
3	The Normans	William the Conqueror's conquest of England
4	The Legions of Rome	Trajn's Dacian Wars
5	The Macedonians	Alexander the Great's victories in his Afro-Asian campaigns
6	The Soldiers of the Pharoh	The Recapture of Upper Nile from the Hyksos by Ahmose I
7	The Spartans	The Battles of Thermopylae and Plataea
8	The Jannisaries	Battle of Verna and the capture of Constantinople
9	The Huns	The military career of Attila and his general Edeko
10	The Knights Templar	The live of grand master Gerard de Ridefort
11	The Vikings	The live of Egill Skallagrímsson
12	The Highlanders	The unification of Scotland by Robert the Bruce
13	The Irish	The live of King Brain who drove the Vikings and united Ireland
14	The Maurya	Ashoka the Great's victory over the kingdom of Kalinga
15	The Aztecs	The victories of Emperor Moctezuma II
16	The Samurai	The Genpei War
17	The Shaolin	The Shaolin monks rescue an Emperor's son from a warlord
18	The Hawaiians	The live of King Kamehameha
19	The Ninjas	The help rendered by Ninja warriors to Toguwasha emperor Ieyasu
20	The Sioux	The live of Crazy Horse
21	The Zulus
22	The Romans