A Short History of the World: Free Audiobook and Listening Guide

A Short History of the World, credited to H. G. Wells, is available as a LibriVox volunteer audiobook. This guide identifies the recording, its source summary and its audio tracks.

About the work

The LibriVox catalogue summary, preserved with the recording, reads:

LibriVox recording of A Short History of the World by H. G. Wells. Read in English by Kristine Bekere A Short History of the World is a non-fictional historic work by English author H. G. Wells, largely inspired by Wells's earlier 1919 work The Outline of History. The book summarises the scientific knowledge of the time regarding the history of Earth and life. It starts with its origins, goes on to explain the development of the Earth and life on Earth, reaching primitive thought and the development of humankind from the Cradle of Civilisation.The book ends with the outcome of the First World War, the Russian famine of 1921, and the League of Nations in 1922. In 1934 Albert Einstein recommended the book for the study of history as a means of interpreting progress in civilisation. - Summary adopted from Wikipedia

Recording facts

• Recording title: A Short History of the World
• Author credits: H. G. Wells
• Language: English
• Original MP3 tracks: 68
• Listed recording duration: 13:51:48

Catalogue topics

• history
• world history
• h.g.wells

Opening tracks: first 24 of 68

1. 01 - The World in Space — 6:11
2. 02 - The World in Time — 6:14
3. 03 - The Beginnings of Life — 6:12
4. 04 - The Age of Fishes — 9:07
5. 05 - The Age of the Coal Swamps — 9:39
6. 06 - The Age of Reptiles — 8:59
7. 07 - The First Birds and the First Mammals — 10:08
8. 08 - The Age of Mammals — 9:17
9. 09 - Monkeys, Apes and Sub-Men — 9:13
10. 10 - The Neanderthaler And the Rhodesian Man — 9:11
11. 11 - The First True Men — 9:51
12. 12 - Primitive Thought — 10:18
13. 13 - The Beginnings of Cultivation — 10:21
14. 14 - Primitive Neolithic Civilizations — 10:56
15. 15 - Sumeria, Early Egypt And Writing — 10:01
16. 16 - Primitive Nomadic Peoples — 9:21
17. 17 - The First Sea-Going Peoples — 11:07
18. 18 - Egypt, Babylon And Assyria — 14:50
19. 19 - The Primitive Aryans — 10:37
20. 20 - The Last Babylonian Empire and the Empire of Darius I — 9:11
21. 21 - The Early History of the Jews — 12:08
22. 22 - Priests and Prophets in Judea — 9:58
23. 23 - The Greeks — 12:24
24. 24 - The Wars of the Greeks and Persians — 9:24

Listen to this recording

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Source and rights

This is a record from LibriVox's official Internet Archive collection, with a public-domain licence recorded in its metadata. LibriVox's policy includes its catalogue summaries as well as its recordings. Its public-domain assessment follows United States law; copyright status can differ elsewhere. The summary and track facts are reproduced and reformatted from that record. Dates attached to the archive upload are not treated as original book publication dates.