Includes bibliographical references and index.

The roots of the law of war in world history -- The law of war in pre-Columbian America -- Making law in the slaughterhouse of the world : early modernity & the law of war -- Colonialism and the law of war : Ireland and the Americas -- The law of war in eighteenth and nineteenth centuries : Europe and the United States of America -- The first world war and the failure of the law of war -- The second world war and the triumph of the law of war -- Into the 21st century : war crimes & their treatment since the second world war -- Singers of songs of experience : trying to explain war crimes in world history -- Conclusion : the future of the law of war.

Abstract freely available; full-text restricted to individual document purchasers.

"The greatly expanded and enhanced second edition of [this book] provides an authoritative and accessible global history of war crimes and the laws of war. Tracing human efforts to limit warfare, from codes of war in antiquity designed to maintain a religiously conceived cosmic order to the gradual use in the modern age of the criminal trial as a means of enforcing universal humanitarian norms, Michael Bryant's book is a masterful account of the subject. Five brand new chapters are included that reinforce the geographical, chronological, historiographical and conceptual dimensions of the book"-- Provided by the publisher.

Also published in print.

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