During the 1930s, the Greek architect and writer Panos Tzelepis (1894-1976) recorded the memories and tales of Stavris, an older relative, who as a young man had lived amongst the underworld figures of late-19th century Istanbul. Realising the importance of these memoirs as a unique record of life during the final decades of the Ottoman Empire, Panos Tzelepis published them in two volumes, the first appearing in 1965 under the title "In the Time of the Sultans." In this first collection of urban chronicles we encounter colourful characters, from a Jewish doctor who treated the poor, the owner of a secret hash-den, the madam of a high-class brothel, to the lives of the kabadayi, or "tough guys," who developed their own codes of honour, conduct and social justice in the sprawling multi-cultural metropolis that was Istanbul towards the end of the 19th century and at the beginning of the 20th. Translated into English for the first time by Charles Howard, a prominent archiver and compiler of rebetiko music, Tzelepis's literary renderings of Istanbul and its people are given new life in a book brimming with intricate and dazzling details of a world that has long since vanished.

A history of 600 years - an epic story of a dynasty that started as a small group of cavalry mercenaries to become the absolute rulers of the greatest and longest lasting Islamic empire in history.

The Ottoman Empire was a hub of flourishing intellectual fervor, geopolitical power, and enlightened pluralistic rule. At the helm of its ascent was the omnipotent Sultan Selim I (1470-1520), who, with the aid of his extraordinarily gifted mother, Gülbahar, hugely expanded the empire, propelling it onto the world stage. Aware of centuries of European suppression of Islamic history, Alan Mikhail centers Selim's Ottoman Empire and Islam as the very pivots of global history, redefining such world-changing events as Christopher Columbus's voyages - which originated, in fact, as a Catholic jihad that would come to view Native Americans as somehow "Moorish" - the Protestant Reformation, the transatlantic slave trade, and the dramatic Ottoman seizure of the Middle East and North Africa. Drawing on previously unexamined sources and written in gripping detail, Mikhail's groundbreaking account vividly recaptures Selim's life and world. An historical masterwork, God's Shadow radically reshapes our understanding of a world we thought we knew.A leading historian of his generation, Alan Mikhail, Professor of History and Chair of the Department of History at Yale University, has reforged our understandings of the past through his previous three prize-winning books on the history of Middle East.

This is an English translation of a critical portrait of the Ottoman capital of Istanbul during the days of the Sultan Abd al-Hamid.

"When at last we were approaching the Harem, the Sultan, surely quite alarmed, said to me in a low voice (was that so the eunuch walking in front of us wouldn't hear, or because in this lonely and dark passageway he was frightened of his own voice?), Ne olacak? 'What is to become of things?'" Translated into English for the first time, this memoir provides fascinating first-hand insight into the personalities, intrigues, and inner workings of the Ottoman palace in its final decades. Written by Halid Ziya Uşaklıgil, who was First Secretary to Sultan Mehmed V and would go on to be one of Turkey's most famous novelists, On the Sultan's Service makes available to English readers the remarkable account of life and work in the Ottoman palace chancery—the public, "business" side of the palace—in its final incarnation. We learn of the court's new role under this second-to-last Sultan in post-Revolution Turkey. No longer exercising political power, the palace negotiated the minefields between political factions, sought ways to unite the empire in the face of sharpening nationalist aspirations, and faced with a kind of shocked despondency the opening salvos of the wars that were to overwhelm the country. Uşaklıgil includes interviews with the Imperial family and descriptions of royal nuptials, the palaces and its visitors, and the crises that shook the court. He delivers an insightful and moving portrait of Mehmed V, the elderly gentleman who reigned over the Ottoman Empire through both Balkan Wars and World War I.

Intended to "familiarize the English-speaking people with the annals of the beautiful Orient and with the various phases of the rapidly impending crisis in Turkey," the book is a history of Turkey and the Ottoman Empire, primarily a political history mostly concerned with wars, treaties, and invasions.

The rise of the modern Middle East from the ashes of the Ottoman Empire.