{"product_id":"the-river-and-the-hammer-c-r-alderton-9798196194795","title":"The River and the Hammer: Otto the Great and the Battle That Ended the Magyar Terror","description":"\u003cp\u003eFor fifty years, they had come out of the east without warning.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eThe Magyars - ferocious nomadic horsemen who had swept into the heart of Europe at the end of the ninth century - terrorised the kingdoms of Christendom with a campaign of raiding that no ruler seemed capable of stopping. Monasteries burned. Harvests were destroyed. Populations fled behind city walls. Chroniclers compared them to the horsemen of the Apocalypse.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eIn August 955 AD, King Otto I of Germany rode out to meet them on a river plain in Bavaria with an army of heavy cavalry and a battle plan that nobody had tried before.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eWhat followed ended fifty years of terror in a single afternoon.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eThe Battle of Lechfeld is the most important military engagement of the early medieval period. It stopped the Magyar invasions permanently, transformed a German king into the most powerful ruler in western Europe, and shaped the political map of a continent for centuries. Almost no one has heard of it.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e\u003ci\u003eThe River and the Hammer\u003c\/i\u003e is the gripping narrative account of the forgotten battle that ended the Magyar terror - told through the lives of the commanders who fought it, the bishop who held a besieged city through sheer force of will, and the disgraced duke who rode into battle without his helmet and did not ride out again. This is history as it should be told: urgent, human, and impossible to put down.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e\u003cb\u003eBook Two in the Forgotten Battles series.\u003c\/b\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e\u003ci\u003ePerfect for fans of Tom Holland, Adrian Goldsworthy, and Bernard Cornwell.\u003c\/i\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003eAuthor:\u003c\/b\u003e C. R. Alderton\u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003eISBN-13:\u003c\/b\u003e 9798196194795\u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003ePublisher:\u003c\/b\u003e Independently Published\u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003eLanguage:\u003c\/b\u003e English\u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003ePublished:\u003c\/b\u003e 05\/09\/2026\u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003ePages:\u003c\/b\u003e 148\u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003eFormat:\u003c\/b\u003e Paperback\u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003eWeight:\u003c\/b\u003e 0.39lbs\u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003eSize:\u003c\/b\u003e 8.50h x 5.50w x 0.34d","brand":"C. R. Alderton","offers":[{"title":"Paperback","offer_id":48801500528895,"sku":"9798196194795","price":12.99,"currency_code":"USD","in_stock":true}],"url":"https:\/\/www.whiterainbookhouse.com\/products\/the-river-and-the-hammer-c-r-alderton-9798196194795","provider":"WR Book House","version":"1.0","type":"link"}