We think of the Renaissance as a shining era of human achievement, yet it was also an age of constant, harrowing warfare. Armies, not philosophers, shaped the face of Europe as modern nation-states emerged from feudal society. Martines captures the dark reality of the period in a gripping narrative mosaic, putting us on the front lines of battle, and on the streets of cities under siege, to reveal what Europe's wars meant to the men and women who endured them.