A historian recounts the unlikely rise of a world capital, and how its understanding of Asia played a key role.If one had looked for a potential global city in Europe in the 1540s, the most likely candidate would have been Antwerp, which had emerged as the center of the German and Spanish silver exchange as well as the Portuguese spice and Spanish sugar trades. It almost certainly would not have been London, an unassuming hub of the wool and cloth trade with a popu...

Sea Rovers, Silver, and Samurai traces the roots of modern global East Asia by focusing on the fascinating history of its seaways. The East Asian maritime realm, from the Straits of Malacca to the Sea of Japan, has been a core region of international trade for millennia, but during the long seventeenth century (1550 to 1700), the velocity and scale of commerce increased dramatically. Chinese, Japanese, and Vietnamese smugglers and pirates forged autonomous networks and maritime po...

An examination of why Jews promote a positive image of Ottomans and Turks while denying the Armenian genocide and the existence of antisemitism in Turkey.Based on historical narrative, the Jews expelled from Spain in 1492 were embraced by the Ottoman Empire and then, later, protected from the Nazis during WWII. If we believe that Turks and Jews have lived in harmony for so long, then how can we believe that the Turks could have committed genocide against the Armenia...

"Shines a floodlight on a topic that has been cloaked in obscurity . . . a landmark work in both intellectual history and political theory" ( The Wall Street Journal).Philosophical esotericism—the practice of communicating one's unorthodox thoughts "between the lines"—was a common practice until the end of the eighteenth century. Despite its long and well-documented history, however, esotericism is often dismissed today as a rare occurrence. But by ignorin...

A unique tour through British history—from the perspective of the peasants and the poverty-stricken.The past is traditionally told from the viewpoint of kings and queens, politicians and pioneers. But what about the people struggling to survive at the very lowest levels of society?A Pauper's History of England covers a thousand years of poverty, from Domesday right up to the twentieth century, via the Black Death and the English Civil War. It paint...

"An ethical and accessible introduction to a historical period often implicated in racist narratives of nationalism and imperialism." —Sierra Lomuto, Assistant Professor of Global Medieval Literature, Rowan UniversityA collection of twenty-two essays, Whose Middle Ages? gives nonspecialists access to the richness of our historical knowledge while debunking damaging misconceptions about the medieval past. Myths about the medieval period are especially belove...

The 20th anniversary edition of the study that first revealed De Soto's path across the 16th century American South includes a forward by Robbie EthridgeBetween 1539 and 1542, the Spanish explorer Hernando de Soto led a small army on an expedition of almost four thousand miles across Southeastern America. De Soto's path had been one of history's most intriguing mysteries until the publication of Knights of Spain, Warriors of the Sun. Using a new route recon...

Discover some of the Victorian Era's most outlandish inventions—from the world-changing to the simply weird—in this look at nineteenth-century innovation.We all know that some of history's greatest inventions came about in the Victorian age. But in The Ingenious Victorians, John Wade goes beyond those famous advances to explore some of the weird and wonderful ideas and projects that have largely been forgotten. He also offers a new perspective on some of th...

A comprehensive study of the pervasive misogyny that left women behind while British society moved toward the Age of Enlightenment.Although the worlds of science and philosophy took giant strides away from the medieval view of the world, attitudes to women did not change from those that had pertained for centuries. The social turbulence of the first half of the seventeenth century afforded women new opportunities and new religious freedoms, and women were attracted...

Long-lost letters tell the story of an illegal slave shipment, a desperate Savannah businessman, and the lead-up to the Civil War.In 1858 Savannah businessman Charles Lamar, in violation of U.S. law, organized the shipment of hundreds of Africans on the luxury yacht Wanderer to Jekyll Island, Georgia. The four hundred survivors of the Middle Passage were sold into bondage. This was the first successful documented slave landing in the United States in about...

A month-by-month account of what life was like for the everyday person just before the Black Plague wiped out most of Europe.1326 was one of the most dramatic years in English history. The queen of England, Isabella of France, invaded the country with an army of mercenaries to destroy her husband's powerful and detested lover, Hugh Despenser the Younger, and brought down her husband, King Edward II, in the process.It was also a year, however, when the major...

**A New York Times–bestselling author's "superbly reported" account of the dismantling of the world's largest corporation ( The Washington Post).Written by the two-time Pulitzer Prize–winning author of Ghost Wars and Private Empire, The Deal of the Century chronicles the decade-long war for control of AT&T.When the US Department of Justice brought an antitrust lawsuit against AT&T in 1974, the telecommunications giant hel...