David Ralston for University of Chicago The title pretty much says it all, Ralston considers five nations which have imported the European concept of an army: Russia, the Ottoman Empire, Khedival Egypt, China and Japan. I thought the question of what constituted a European army was glossed over a leetle too quickly. For example, when Peter Ivanovich started building his army how many "European" countries had such armies? Not England, not the largest state in Europe (the Polish-Lithuanian Kingdom), not most of Germany, indeed the progenitor of such armies (the Marquis de Louvois) had been dead less than 20 years. But working on the principle that while he cannot describe an elephant he knows one when he sees one Ralston gives a good factual treatment of the process - but it was hardly sparkling analysis. More Book Corner: Hot Blood & Cold Steel The Rules of the Game Philip II Importing the European Army War and Society in early Modern Europe 1495-1715 First Punic War Warfare in the Latin East 1192-1291 Spanish Naval Power 1589 to 1665 The Anatomy of Glory The First Crusade and the Idea of Crusading The Kaiser Time to Kill First World War The Military Revolution Debate Pallas Armata titles Back to Perfidious Albion #95 Table of Contents Back to Perfidious Albion List of Issues Back to MagWeb Master Magazine List © Copyright 1997 by Charles and Teresa Vasey. This article appears in MagWeb (Magazine Web) on the Internet World Wide Web. Other military history articles and gaming articles are available at http://www.magweb.com