There are several purposes to this book. One is to resurrect wisdom long forgotten that is still of great relevance today. Some ideas in these early works are attributed currently to later, more modern authors, who either reinvented the wheel or actually took the ideas from these earlier texts. The excerpts printed here have been selected primarily because of their enduring relevance; texts or passages dealing with purely technical or tactical details, long overtaken by changing technology, have been omitted. The second purpose is to find out something about the strategic thinking of the period, that is, for what political purposes and with what aims the authors thought wars could and should be waged. Passages of politico-military relevance have been included that give us information about strategic war aims, even though the text itself was aimed lower, perhaps at the level of the commanding officer, and not at that of the supreme political decision maker. Several texts provide an introduction to thinking about the purpose and conduct of war, against the background of different cultures, mentalities, and world view.