Rhodes & Barnato

One became the architect of an empire. The other its greatest rival. Together they built the diamond industry that changed the world.

Born just a year apart, Cecil Rhodes and Barney Barnato could hardly have been more different. Rhodes was the son of a Hertfordshire clergyman; Barnato grew up in London's East End, the child of a Jewish immigrant family. Yet both were drawn to the diamond fields of southern Africa, where ambition and ruthless determination transformed them into two of the richest and most powerful men of the Victorian age.

Rhodes was the calculating strategist; Barnato the charismatic showman. Their rivalry reshaped the diamond industry, led to the creation of De Beers, and helped transform southern Africa.

Neither man lived to see his fiftieth birthday. In this compelling dual biography, James Leasor traces their parallel rise from obscurity to immense wealth and power, telling the story of two remarkable men whose ambition changed history and whose legacy remains both influential and controversial.