Lords of the Land tells the tragic story of Jewish settlement in the West Bank and Gaza Strip. In the aftermath of the 1967 war and Israel's devastating victory over its Arab neighbors, catastrophe struck both the soul and psyche of the state of Israel. Based on years of research, and written by one of Israel's leading historians and journalists, this involving narrative focuses on the settlers themselves -- often fueled by messianic zeal but also inspired by the original Zionist settlers -- and shows the role the state of Israel has played in nurturing them through massive economic aid and legal sanctions. The occupation, the authors argue, has transformed the very foundations of Israel's society, economy, army, history, language, moral profile, and international standing. "The vast majority of the 6.5 million Israelis who live in their country do not know any other reality," the authors write. "The vast majority of the 3.5 million Palestinians who live in the regions of their occupied land do not know any other reality. The prolonged military occupation and the Jewish settlements that are perpetuating it have toppled Israeli governments and have brought Israel's democracy and its political culture to the brink of an abyss."

Lords of the Land presents the only study in English of the large, landed estates in colonial Peru. It focuses on the function of the estates and their linkages with the rest of Spanish America. Based almost exclusively on documents from archives in Rome, Madrid, and Lima (most hitherto unused), the book guides the reader through the agricultural cycles of Peru's great ecclesiastical estates and explains how they first developed, functioned, and distributed their products. Colonial labor forms, finance, and early trade networks are carefully detailed. Painstakingly researched and gracefully articulated, this book fills a major gap in the economic and agricultural history of colonial Latin America.

European traders and soldiers established a foothold on Timor in the course of the seventeenth century, motivated by the quest for the commercially vital sandalwood and the intense competition between the Dutch and the Portuguese. Lords of the Land, Lords of the Sea focuses on two centuries of contacts between the indigenous polities on Timor and the early colonials, and covers the period 1600-1800. In contrast with most previous studies, the book treats Timor as a historical region in its own right, using a wide array of Dutch, Portuguese and other original sources, which are compared with the comprehensive corpus of oral tradition recorded on the island. From this rich material, a lively picture emerges of life and death in early Timorese society, the forms of trade, slavery, warfare, alliances, social life, and so forth. The investigation demonstrates that the European groups, although having a role as ordering political forces, were only part of the political landscape of Timor. They relied on alliances where the distinction between ally and vassal was moot, and led to frequent conflicts and uprisings. During a slow and complicated process, the often turbulent political conditions involving Europeans, Eurasians, and Timorese polities, paved the way for the later division of Timor into two spheres of roughly equal size.

The recognition and allocation of indigenous property rights have long posed complex questions for the imperial powers of the mid-nineteenth century and their modern successors. Recognizing rights of property raises questions about pre-existing indigenous authority and power over land that continue to trouble the people and governments of settler states. Through focusing on the settlement of New Zealand during the critical period of the 1830s through to the early 1860s, this book offers a fresh assessment of the histories of indigenous property rights and the jurisprudence of empire. It shows how native title became not only a key construct for relations between Empire and tribes, but how it acted more broadly as a constitutional frame within which discourses of political authority formed and were contested at the heart of Empire and the colonial peripheries. Native title thus becomes another episode in imperial political history in which increasingly fierce and highly polemical contestation burst into violence. Native title explodes as a form of civil war that lays the foundation (by Maori ever after challenged) for revised constitutional orders. Lords of the Land considers histories of indigenous property rights not only as the stuff of entwined streams of a law of nations and constitutional theory but also as exemplars of the politics of negotiability - engaging relations of struggle and ambition for power, together with the openness and limits of incoming settler polities towards indigenous polities and laws. This study is an examination of rights as instruments of analysis and political discourse, constructed and contested in and through time. Anchored in the striking experiences of New Zealand and the politics of trans-oceanic empire, it tells a tale of indigenous political autonomy and how the vocabularies of property rights mediated relations between empire and the indigenous political communities found in newly settled lands.

Lords of the Sea revises our understanding of the epic political, economic, and cultural transformations of Japan’s late medieval period (ca. 1300–1600) by shifting the conventional land-based analytical framework to one centered on the perspectives of seafarers who, though usually dismissed as "pirates," thought of themselves as sea lords. Over the course of these centuries, Japan’s sea lords became maritime magnates who wielded increasing amounts of political and economic authority by developing autonomous maritime domains that operated outside the auspices of state authority. They played key roles in the operation of networks linking Japan to the rest of the world, and their protection businesses, shipping organizations, and sea tenure practices spread their influence across the waves to the continent, shaping commercial and diplomatic relations with Korea and China. Japan's land-based authorities during this time not only came to accept the autonomy of "pirates" but also competed to sponsor sea-lord bands who could administer littoral estates, fight sea battles, protect shipping, and carry trade. In turn, prominent sea-lord families expanded their dominion by shifting their locus of service among several patrons and by appropriating land-based rhetorics of lordship, which forced authorities to recognize them as legitimate lords over sea-based domains. By the end of the late medieval period, the ambitions, tactics, and technologies of sea-lord mercenary bands proved integral to the naval dimensions of Japan’s sixteenth-century military revolution. Sea lords translated their late medieval autonomy into positions of influence in early modern Japan and helped make control of the seas part of the ideological foundations of the state.

Angus Wells carved a place for himself on the shelves of hundreds of thousands of fantasy readers. Now, with Lords Of The Sky, it is clear that he has saved his most sweeping and imaginative tale for an epic more powerful than anything he has written before. For centuries, the Dhar have had to face the Ahn, fierce warriors who would lay claim to Dharbek, the land they call their ancestral home. Now, in fantastic airships powered by magic, the Ahn have begun their greatest campaign yet. In preparation for the coming onslaught, Storymen like Daviot travel the land collecting tales and sharing the history it's their responsibility to safeguard. But Daviot's travels show him the dark side of Dharbek, and inspire him to be a catalyst for change, to overcome doubt and fear, and pursue the one dream that has eluded Dharbek. Using his special gifts for storytelling and world-building, Angus Wells reaches new heights with a story as ambitious as it is broad in scope. Lords Of The Sky has all the action, adventure and magic a fantasy-lover could desire, and tackles social change, prejudice, the value of genuine friendship and the power of enduring love.

The 8th Novel of the Internationally Acclaimed Chaos Seeds Saga Over 100 THOUSAND ????? Reviews A mesmerizing tale reminiscent of the brutality of Goblin Slayer and the majesty of Game of Thrones Audible's Customer Favorite of the Year! #1 Audiobook 2017 #1 in Epic Fantasy || #1 in HumorWelcome my friends! Welcome... to "The Land!" The battle of the dead was won, but at a great cost. Sion,leader of the Mist Village was left with only pain and regret as Richter was claimed by the abyss. What no one but the abandoned chaos seed knows is that he narrowly avoided the curse of the lich Singh, a curse that still hangs above his head. Now, surrounded by miles of darkness and tons of crushing rock,Richter has to find his way back into the light. The only problem is that this monster of a man is being pursued by monsters, a demon and his own foolish choices. Faced with all the dangers of the deep dark, what will Richter say when the buried horrors of The Land come a calling and asked if he's paid his dues? Well he'll look right back, stare that horror in the eye and say, "Yes sir, the check is in the mail!" Welcome back my friends! Welcome back... to The Land! ps - Gnomes still Rule!