Sultans Of Rome: The Turkish World Expansion

Asia in Europe and the Making of the West #3

by Warwick Ball

It has become conventional to think of the Turkish capture of Constantinople in 1453 as an Asiatic conquest. The Turks originated in Asiait is truebut Constantinople was conquered from the west not the east: the Ottomans became a European power before they became a Middle Eastern one and remained a primarily European power. Indeed, the Middle East and even most of Anatolia itself was conquered from Europe. This demonstrates that it was no sudden rush of semi-civilized horse-riding nomads from the steppe, but the culmination of complex movements that had seen Turkish dynasties establish glittering monuments and cities throughout Asia. And when Turks first entered Anatolia in the 11th century, it was a Byzantine Emperor who made a relatively minor Turkish prince the first Sultan in the land that would come to be known as Turkeya prince, furthermore, who called himself not Sultan of Turkey, but Sultan of Rome! Few people, therefore, combine so thoroughly the legacies of Europe and Asia, East and West, the civilizations of Greece and Rome with that of Islam, the Near East and beyond. Few have bridged so many civilizations; have brought so many cultural strands together. Their story is as much our history as well as theirs and others

Genres: History, Nonfiction

248 pages, Paperback

First published September 1, 2012

About the author

Warwick Ball is an Australian-born near-eastern archeologist.

In the past 30 years, Ball has mainly excavated in Jordan, Iran, Iraq, Syria, and Afghanistan.

Ball was formerly director of excavations at The British School of Archaeology in Iraq. He is the editor of the scholarly journal Afghanistan. His publications include the volume The Monuments of Afghanistan, History, Archaeology and Architecture, I.B. Tauris, London 2008. The book consists of exceptional photography of numerous rare archaeological sites no longer well accessible today for reasons of security.

He currently resides in Scotland.

Reviews

[Ted · Rating 3 out of 5]

This is book 3 of a series examining the spread of Eastern cultures into Europe. The book looks at the history of the Turkic speaking cultures from their roots in Siberia and central Asia and follows their expansion into China, west to the Caspian Sea, into India, Persia, Anatolia and Eastern Europe. The first half of the book roughly covers the period 300 BC to 1300 AD. The second half deals with the Ottoman Empire and its demise after WW I. Covering almost 2000 years of history in less than 200 pages of text would be a challenge for any writer. In this case, it is further complicated by the fact that the Turkic population of Asia incorporates 18 different cultural groups - each with their own distinct history.

Given the brevity of the work, it provides an interesting and informative overview of the history, migrations and cultural influences of the Turkic people. It also contains a good number of maps and almost 100 color photos. The book definitely sparked my interest in reading more about the complex and fascinating history of the Turks. Unfortunately, I didn't find this a particularly easy read. The text is very much focused on facts, names, dates, battles, kingdoms, etc. and it's a bit dry. More description and background detail might have made it more engaging for me.