Overview

Situated at the intersection of Europe, Asia, and Africa, the Mediterranean Sea has been for millenia the place where religions, economies, and political systems met, clashed, influenced and absorbed one another. David Abulafia offers a fresh perspective by focusing on the sea itself: its practical importance for transport and sustenance; its dynamic role in the rise and fall of empires; and the remarkable cast of characters--sailors, merchants, migrants, pirates, pilgrims--who have crossed and recrossed it. Ranging from prehistory to the 21st century, The Great Sea is above all the history of human interaction across a region that has brought together many of the great civilizations of antiquity as well as the rival empires of medieval and modern times. Interweaving major political and naval developments with the ebb and flow of trade, Abulafia explores how commercial competition in the Mediterranean created both rivalries and partnerships, with merchants acting as intermediaries between cultures, trading goods that were as exotic on one side of the sea as they were commonplace on the other. He stresses the remarkable ability of Mediterranean cultures to uphold the civilizing ideal of convivencia, living together, exemplified in medieval Spain, where Christian theologians studied Arabic texts with the help of Jewish and Muslim scholars, and traceable throughout the history of the region. Brilliantly written and sweeping in its scope, The Great Sea is itself as varied and inclusive as the region it describes, covering everything from the Trojan War, the history of piracy, and the great naval battles between Carthage and Rome to the Jewish Diaspora into Hellenistic worlds, the rise of Islam, the Grand Tours of the 19th century, and mass tourism of the 20th. It is, in short, a magnum opus, the definitive account of perhaps the most vibrant theater of human interaction in history.

Full Product Details

Author:   David Abulafia
Publisher:   Oxford University Press
Imprint:   Oxford University Press Inc
Dimensions:   Width: 15.60cm , Height: 5.90cm , Length: 23.50cm
Weight:   1.266kg
ISBN:  

9780195323344

ISBN 10:   0195323343
Pages:   816
Publication Date:   24 November 2011
Audience:   College/higher education ,  Undergraduate ,  Postgraduate, Research & Scholarly
Format:   Hardback
Publisher's Status:   No Longer Our Product
Availability:   Awaiting stock  
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Table of Contents

Part 1: THE FIRST MEDITERRANEAN 1: Isolation and insulation: island communities before metal 2: Copper and Bronze 3: Merchants and Heroes 4: Sea Peoples and Land Peoples Part 2: THE SECOND MEDITERRANEAN 1: The purple traders 2: The heirs of Odysseus 3: The triumph of the Tyrrhenians 4: Towards the Garden of the Hesperides 5: Thalassocracies 6: The Lighthouse of the Mediterranean 7: 'Carthage must be destroyed' 8: 'Our Sea' 9: Old and new faiths 10: Dis-Integration Part 3: THE THIRD MEDITERRANEAN 1: Mediterranean troughs 2: Crossing the Boundaries 3: The great sea-change 4: 'The profit that God shall give' 5: Ways across the Sea 6: The fall and rise of empires 7: Merchants, mercenaries and missionaries 8: Serrata - Closing Part 4: THE FOURTH MEDITERRANEAN 1. Would-be Roman emperors 2. Transformations in the West 3: Holy Leagues and unholy alliances 4: Akdeniz - the battle for the White Sea 5: Interlopers in the Mediterranean 6: Diasporas in despair 7: Encouragement to others 8: Views through the Russian prism 9: Deys, beys and bashaws Part 5: THE FIFTH MEDITERRANEAN 1: Ever the twain shall meet 2: The Greek and the unGreek 3: Ottoman exit 4: A tale of four and a half cities 5: Mare Nostrum - again 6: A fragmented Mediterranean 7: The Last Mediterranean Appendix: The physical Mediterranean

Reviews

<br> This magnificent book ...is teeming with colourful characters. Over the course of nearly 800pp, we follow faiths; sail with fleets; trade with bankers, financiers and merchants; raid with pirates and observe battles and sieges; watch cities rise and fall and see peoples migrate in triumph and tragedy. But at its heart, this is a history of mankind - gripping, worldly, bloody, playful - that radiates scholarship and a sense of wonder and fun, using the Mediterranean as its medium, its watery road much travelled. -- Simon Sebag-Montefiore, Financial Times<br><p><br> This memorable study, its scholarship tinged with indulgent humour and an authorial eye for bizarre detail, celebrates the swirling changeability at the heart of that wonderful symbiosis of man and nature which once took place long Mediterranean shores -- Jonathan Keates, Sunday Telegraph<br><p><br> An Everest of a book, brocaded with studious observation and finely-tuned scholarship...the effect is mesmerising, as det

<br> This magnificent book ...is teeming with colourful characters. Over the course of nearly 800pp, we follow faiths; sail with fleets; trade with bankers, financiers and merchants; raid with pirates and observe battles and sieges; watch cities rise and fall and see peoples migrate in triumph and tragedy. But at its heart, this is a history of mankind - gripping, worldly, bloody, playful - that radiates scholarship and a sense of wonder and fun, using the Mediterranean as its medium, its watery road much travelled. -- Simon Sebag-Montefiore, Financial Times<br><p><br> This memorable study, its scholarship tinged with indulgent humour and an authorial eye for bizarre detail, celebrates the swirling changeability at the heart of that wonderful symbiosis of man and nature which once took place long Mediterranean shores -- Jonathan Keates, The Sunday Telegraph<br><p><br> An Everest of a book, brocaded with studious observation and finely-tuned scholarship...the effect is mesmerising, as

Author Information

<br>David Abulafia is Professor of Mediterranean History at Cambridge University and the author of The Mediterranean in History.<br>

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