Home › Books › The Ottomans: Khans, Caesars, and Caliphs
The Ottomans: Khans, Caesars, and Caliphs
by
76/99
Critics' Rating Index
38/99
Readers' Rating Index
88/99
Scholars' Citation Index
66/99
Volume of Reviews
64/99
Volume of Reader Ratings
Sign in to add to your shelf, rate, or review this book.
About This Book
This major new history of the Ottoman dynasty reveals a diverse empire that straddled East and West. The Ottoman Empire has long been depicted as the Islamic, Asian antithesis of the Christian, European West. But the reality was starkly different: the Ottomans' multiethnic, multilingual, and multireligious domain reached deep into Europe's heart. Indeed, the Ottoman rulers saw themselves as the new Romans. Recounting the Ottomans' remarkable rise from a frontier principality to a world empire, historian Marc David Baer traces their debts to their Turkish, Mongolian, Islamic, and Byzantine heritage. The Ottomans pioneered religious toleration even as they used religious conversion to integrate conquered peoples. But in the nineteenth century, they embraced exclusivity, leading to ethnic cleansing, genocide, and the empire's demise after the First World War. The Ottomans vividly reveals the dynasty's full history and its enduring impact on Europe and the world.
Reviews
"Baer's elegantly written narrative is full of bloody state building—a new sultan was expected to murder his brothers to keep them from challenging him for the throne—along with intriguing, counterintuitive takes on Ottoman culture ..."
"Baer's fine book gives a panoramic and thought-provoking account of over half a millennium of Ottoman and—it now goes without saying—European history."
"The book is marred by a predictable anti-western slant, with the enlightened Ottomans often compared favourably to the backward or intolerant European Christians ..."
"There's no study more masterful than Baer's on the lengthy rule of the Ottoman Empire, from its founding in the 13th century to its collapse in 1924."
"Inevitably, compromises have to be made in telling this vast story in one volume and much detail must be suppressed."
"Baer...organizes his material according to contemporary concerns such as minorities, women and sexual mores, thereby eking out surprisingly fresh insights from this hitherto well-plowed terrain."
Preview
Reader Reviews
0 reviewsSign in to write a review.
No reader reviews yet. Be the first!