Try free for 30 days
-
Flying Snakes and Griffin Claws
- And Other Classical Myths, Historical Oddities, and Scientific Curiosities
- Narrated by: Nancy Crane, Adrienne Mayor
- Length: 11 hrs and 2 mins
Failed to add items
Add to basket failed.
Add to Wish List failed.
Remove from Wish List failed.
Follow podcast failed
Unfollow podcast failed
Buy Now for $19.46
No valid payment method on file.
We are sorry. We are not allowed to sell this product with the selected payment method
Listeners also picked
-
Gods and Robots
- Myths, Machines, and Ancient Dreams of Technology
- By: Adrienne Mayor
- Narrated by: Adrienne Mayor
- Length: 9 hrs and 24 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
The first robot to walk the earth was a bronze giant called Talos. This wondrous machine was created not by MIT Robotics Lab, but by Hephaestus, the Greek god of invention, more than 2,500 years ago. In this groundbreaking account of the earliest expressions of the timeless impulse to create artificial life, Adrienne Mayor tells the fascinating story of how ancient Greek, Roman, Indian, and Chinese myths envisioned artificial life, automata, self-moving devices, and human enhancements - and how these visions relate to and reflect the ancient invention of real animated machines.
-
-
It was OK
- By Anonymous User on 28-12-2023
-
Amazons
- Lives and Legends of Warrior Women across the Ancient World
- By: Adrienne Mayor
- Narrated by: Fran Tunno
- Length: 16 hrs and 40 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Amazons - fierce warrior women dwelling on the fringes of the known world - were the mythic archenemies of the ancient Greeks. Heracles and Achilles displayed their valor in duels with Amazon queens, and the Athenians reveled in their victory over a powerful Amazon army. In historical times, Cyrus of Persia, Alexander the Great, and the Roman general Pompey tangled with Amazons.
-
-
Enlightening
- By Anonymous User on 02-02-2023
-
Weavers, Scribes, and Kings
- A New History of the Ancient Near East
- By: Amanda H. Podany
- Narrated by: Amanda H. Podany
- Length: 18 hrs and 26 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
In this sweeping history of the ancient Near East, Amanda Podany takes listeners on a gripping journey from the creation of the world's first cities to the conquests of Alexander the Great. The book is built around the life stories of many ancient men and women, from kings, priestesses, and merchants to brickmakers, musicians, and weavers. Their habits of daily life, beliefs, triumphs, and crises, and the changes that people faced over time are explored through their own written words and the buildings, cities, and empires in which they lived.
-
The Sewing Girl's Tale
- A Story of Crime and Consequences in Revolutionary America
- By: John Wood Sweet
- Narrated by: Gabra Zackman
- Length: 11 hrs and 6 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
On a moonless night in the summer of 1793 a crime was committed in the back room of a New York brothel—the kind of crime that even victims usually kept secret. Instead, seventeen-year-old seamstress Lanah Sawyer did what virtually no one in US history had done before: she charged a gentleman with rape. Her accusation sparked a raw courtroom drama and a relentless struggle for vindication that threatened both Lanah’s and her assailant’s lives.
-
1177 B.C. (Revised and Updated)
- The Year Civilization Collapsed
- By: Eric H. Cline
- Narrated by: Eric H. Cline
- Length: 10 hrs and 47 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
This audiobook narrated by acclaimed archaeologist and best-selling author Eric Cline offers a breathtaking account of how the collapse of an ancient civilized world ushered in the first Dark Ages.
-
-
The rise and fall: Two millenniums BC.
- By Amazon Customer on 18-09-2023
-
Vergil
- The Poets Life
- By: Sarah Ruden
- Narrated by: Suzanne Toren
- Length: 7 hrs and 9 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
The Aeneid stands as a towering work of Classical Roman literature and a gripping dramatization of the best and worst of human nature. In the process of creating this epic poem, Vergil (70–19 BCE) became the world’s first media celebrity, a living legend. But the real Vergil is a shadowy figure. Sarah Ruden, widely praised for her translation of the Aeneid, uses evidence from Roman life and history alongside Vergil’s own writings to make careful deductions to reconstruct the life of Rome’s greatest poet.
-
Gods and Robots
- Myths, Machines, and Ancient Dreams of Technology
- By: Adrienne Mayor
- Narrated by: Adrienne Mayor
- Length: 9 hrs and 24 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
The first robot to walk the earth was a bronze giant called Talos. This wondrous machine was created not by MIT Robotics Lab, but by Hephaestus, the Greek god of invention, more than 2,500 years ago. In this groundbreaking account of the earliest expressions of the timeless impulse to create artificial life, Adrienne Mayor tells the fascinating story of how ancient Greek, Roman, Indian, and Chinese myths envisioned artificial life, automata, self-moving devices, and human enhancements - and how these visions relate to and reflect the ancient invention of real animated machines.
-
-
It was OK
- By Anonymous User on 28-12-2023
-
Amazons
- Lives and Legends of Warrior Women across the Ancient World
- By: Adrienne Mayor
- Narrated by: Fran Tunno
- Length: 16 hrs and 40 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Amazons - fierce warrior women dwelling on the fringes of the known world - were the mythic archenemies of the ancient Greeks. Heracles and Achilles displayed their valor in duels with Amazon queens, and the Athenians reveled in their victory over a powerful Amazon army. In historical times, Cyrus of Persia, Alexander the Great, and the Roman general Pompey tangled with Amazons.
-
-
Enlightening
- By Anonymous User on 02-02-2023
-
Weavers, Scribes, and Kings
- A New History of the Ancient Near East
- By: Amanda H. Podany
- Narrated by: Amanda H. Podany
- Length: 18 hrs and 26 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
In this sweeping history of the ancient Near East, Amanda Podany takes listeners on a gripping journey from the creation of the world's first cities to the conquests of Alexander the Great. The book is built around the life stories of many ancient men and women, from kings, priestesses, and merchants to brickmakers, musicians, and weavers. Their habits of daily life, beliefs, triumphs, and crises, and the changes that people faced over time are explored through their own written words and the buildings, cities, and empires in which they lived.
-
The Sewing Girl's Tale
- A Story of Crime and Consequences in Revolutionary America
- By: John Wood Sweet
- Narrated by: Gabra Zackman
- Length: 11 hrs and 6 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
On a moonless night in the summer of 1793 a crime was committed in the back room of a New York brothel—the kind of crime that even victims usually kept secret. Instead, seventeen-year-old seamstress Lanah Sawyer did what virtually no one in US history had done before: she charged a gentleman with rape. Her accusation sparked a raw courtroom drama and a relentless struggle for vindication that threatened both Lanah’s and her assailant’s lives.
-
1177 B.C. (Revised and Updated)
- The Year Civilization Collapsed
- By: Eric H. Cline
- Narrated by: Eric H. Cline
- Length: 10 hrs and 47 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
This audiobook narrated by acclaimed archaeologist and best-selling author Eric Cline offers a breathtaking account of how the collapse of an ancient civilized world ushered in the first Dark Ages.
-
-
The rise and fall: Two millenniums BC.
- By Amazon Customer on 18-09-2023
-
Vergil
- The Poets Life
- By: Sarah Ruden
- Narrated by: Suzanne Toren
- Length: 7 hrs and 9 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
The Aeneid stands as a towering work of Classical Roman literature and a gripping dramatization of the best and worst of human nature. In the process of creating this epic poem, Vergil (70–19 BCE) became the world’s first media celebrity, a living legend. But the real Vergil is a shadowy figure. Sarah Ruden, widely praised for her translation of the Aeneid, uses evidence from Roman life and history alongside Vergil’s own writings to make careful deductions to reconstruct the life of Rome’s greatest poet.
-
Remnants of Ancient Life
- The New Science of Old Fossils
- By: Dale Greenwalt
- Narrated by: Christopher Ragland
- Length: 7 hrs and 49 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
This audiobook narrated by Christopher Ragland describes the revolution in science that is transforming our understanding of extinct life.
-
Indigenous Continent
- The Epic Contest for North America
- By: Pekka Hamalainen
- Narrated by: Kaipo Schwab
- Length: 18 hrs and 44 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
In Indigenous Continent, acclaimed historian Pekka Hämäläinen presents a sweeping counternarrative that shatters the most basic assumptions about American history. Shifting our perspective away from Jamestown, Plymouth Rock, the Revolution, and other well-trodden episodes on the conventional timeline, he depicts a sovereign world of Native nations whose members, far from helpless victims of colonial violence, dominated the continent for centuries after the first European arrivals.
-
-
First Nations’ sovereignty, survival and pride in the face of massive disruption
- By Toby Eccles on 24-01-2024
-
The Iliad & The Odyssey
- By: Homer
- Narrated by: John Lescault
- Length: 28 hrs and 37 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Little is known about the Ancient Greek oral poet Homer, the supposed 8th century BC author of the world-read Iliad and his later masterpiece, The Odyssey. These classic epics provided the basis for Greek education and culture throughout the classical age and formed the backbone of humane education through the birth of the Roman Empire and the spread of Christianity.
-
-
Epic
- By Anonymous User on 22-05-2023
-
Medieval European Empires
- Early Nations of Fifth-Century Europe to the Renaissance
- By: Arthur Eaton
- Narrated by: Steve King
- Length: 6 hrs and 1 min
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
The medieval period has to be one of the most fascinating periods of history. With it comes the images of castles, knights, conquests, and, of course, kingdoms and empires. Every European empire and kingdom during this age is filled with exciting tales, shrewd plots for revenge or power, creation of a national identity enduring to the present day, and inventions with lasting influence.
-
Trajan
- Rome's Last Conqueror
- By: Nicholas Jackson
- Narrated by: James Cameron Stewart
- Length: 12 hrs and 58 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Until the publication of this captivating biography, no such volume on Trajan's life has been tailored to the general listener. The unique book illuminates a neglected period of ancient Roman history. Trajan rose from fairly obscure beginnings to become the emperor of Rome. He was born in Italica, an Italic settlement close to modern Seville in present-day Spain, and is the first Roman Emperor to be born outside of Rome. His remarkable rise from officer to general and then to emperor in just over twenty years reveals a shrewd politician who maintained absolute power.
-
American Rascal
- How Jay Gould Built Wall Street's Biggest Fortune
- By: Greg Steinmetz
- Narrated by: Feodor Chin
- Length: 8 hrs and 45 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Had Jay Gould put his name on a university or concert hall, he would undoubtedly have been a household name today. The son of a poor farmer whose early life was marked by tragedy, Gould saw money as the means to give his family a better life…even if, to do so, he had to pull a fast one on everyone else.
Publisher's Summary
Adrienne Mayor and Nancy Crane narrate this treasury of astonishing mythic marvels
Adrienne Mayor is renowned for exploring the borders of history, science, archaeology, anthropology, and popular knowledge to find historical realities and scientific insights—glimmering, long-buried nuggets of truth—embedded in myth, legends, and folklore. Combing through ancient texts and obscure sources, she has spent decades prospecting for intriguing wonders and marvels, historical mysteries, diverting anecdotes, and hidden gems from antiquity, medieval, and modern times. Flying Snakes and Griffin Claws is a treasury of fifty of her most amazing and amusing discoveries.
The book explores such subjects as how mirages inspired legends of cities in the sky, the true identity of winged serpents in ancient Egypt, how ghost ships led to the discovery of the Gulf Stream, and the beauty secrets of ancient Amazons. Other pieces examine Arthur Conan Doyle’s sea serpent and Geronimo’s dragon, Flaubert’s obsession with ancient Carthage, ancient tattooing practices, and the strange relationship between wine goblets and women’s breasts since the times of Helen of Troy and Marie Antoinette. And there’s much, much more.
Showcasing Mayor’s trademark passion not to demythologize myths, but to uncover the fascinating truths buried beneath them, Flying Snakes and Griffin Claws is a wonder cabinet of delightful curiosities.
PLEASE NOTE: When you purchase this title, the accompanying PDF will be available in your Audible Library along with the audio.
Critic Reviews
“If it were up to me, I’d replace the whole internet and two-thirds of telephony with Adrienne Mayor books.” - Ian Dreiblatt, Literary Hub
What listeners say about Flying Snakes and Griffin Claws
Average Customer RatingsReviews - Please select the tabs below to change the source of reviews.
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
- Kyle A.
- 21-08-2022
A vivid historical managery
broad, surprising, delicious. A antiquarian holiday for the senses. you will listen over again. Her other books are more spacific to the title, this would be a good one to get people hooked.
Something went wrong. Please try again in a few minutes.
You voted on this review!
You reported this review!