Search results for ""Author Merchant"

A reassessment of the Anglo-Dutch wars of the second half of the seventeenth century, demonstrating that the conflict was primarily about trade. This book re-examines the history of Anglo-Dutch conflict during the seventeenth century, of which the three wars of 1652-4, 1665-7 and 1672-4 were the most obvious manifestation. Low-intensity conflict spanned a longer period. From 1618-19 hostilities in Asia between the Dutch and English East India Companies added new elements of tension beyond earlier disputes over the North Sea fisheries, merchant shipping and the cloth trade. The emerging multilateral trades of the Atlantic world added new challenges. This book integrates the European, Asian, American and African dimensions of the Anglo-Dutch Wars in an authentically global view. The role of the state receives special attention during a period in which both countries are best understood as 'fiscal-naval states'. The significance of sea power is reflected in the public history of the Anglo-Dutch wars, acknowledged in the concluding chapters. The book includes important new research findings and imaginative new thinking by leading historians of the subject.

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The Hanseatic League was a commercial and defensive federation of merchant guilds based in harbour towns along the North Sea and Baltic coasts of what are now Germany and her neighbours, which eventually dominated maritime trade in Northern Europe and spread its influence much further afield. The League was formed to protect the economic and political interests of member cities throughout a vast and complex trading network. The League continued to operate well into the 17th century, but its golden age was between c.1200 and c.1500; thereafter it failed to take full advantage of the wave of maritime exploration to the west, south and east of Europe. During its 300 years of dominance the League’s large ships – called ‘cogs’ – were at the forefront of maritime technology, were early users of cannon, and were manned by strong fighting crews to defend them from pirates in both open-sea and river warfare. The home cities raised their own armies for mutual defence, and their riches both allowed them, and required them, to invest in fortifications and gunpowder weapons, since as very attractive targets they were subjected to sieges at various times.

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Dinah Mulock Craik’s The Half-Caste concerns the coming-of-age of its title character, the mixed-race Zillah Le Poer, daughter of an English merchant and an Indian princess. Sent back to England as a young girl, Zillah has no knowledge that she is an heiress. She lives with her uncle Le Poer, his wife, and two daughters, and is treated as little more than a servant in the household. Zillah’s situation is gradually improved when Cassandra Pryor is employed as a governess to the Le Poer daughters and takes an interest in the mysterious “cousin.” Craik explores issues of gender, race, and empire in the Victorian period in this compact and gripping novella.Along with a newly-annotated text, this Broadview edition includes a critical introduction that discusses Craik’s involvement with contemporary racial and imperialist attitudes, her place within the broader genre of Anglo-Indian fiction, and the importance of Zillah Le Poer as a positive symbol of empire. The edition is also enriched with relevant contemporary contextual material, including Dinah Mulock Craik’s writing on gender and female employment, British views on the biracial Eurasian community in India, and writings on the Victorian governess.

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The story of Saint Josaphat, a prince who gave up his wealth and kingdom to follow Jesus, was one of the most popular Christian tales of the Middle Ages, translated into a dozen languages, and cited by Shakespeare in The Merchant of Venice. Yet Josaphat is only remembered today because of the similarities of his life to that of the Buddha. In Search of the Christian Buddha is set against the backdrop of the trade along the Silk Road, the Christian settlement of Palestine, the spread of Islam, and the Crusades. It traces the path of the Buddha’s tale from India and shows how it evolved, adopting details from each culture during its sojourn. These early instances of globalization allowed not only goods but also knowledge to flow between different cultures and around much of the world. Eminent scholars Donald S. Lopez Jr. and Peggy McCracken reveal how religions born thousands of miles apart shared ideas throughout the centuries. They uncover surprising convergences and divergences between these faiths on subjects including the meaning of death, the problem of desire, and their view of women. Demonstrating the incredible power of this tale, they ask not how stories circulate among religions but how religions circulate among stories.

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Japanese homes speak to the soul and provide a contemplative environment from which to experience the world.Japan Style offers rare glimpses into twenty exquisite traditional homes in Japan. The lavish photographs in this volume demonstrate how Japanese design achieves a timeless tranquility using a few very simple, natural elements.Wood is the preferred building material since it is considered a "living" material; the country's Shinto and Zen Buddhist roots have inculcated a deep respect for nature. The houses in this book are a wonderful reminder that there are alternatives to "big is beautiful"—and that neither timelessness nor modernity has to be about using cold steel, glass and concrete.The wabi-sabi ideal, translated loosely by Frank Lloyd Wright as a "rusticity and simplicity that borders on loneliness," is considered the epitome of sophistication in Japanese interior design. The houses in this book invite us to rethink the wisdom of our hurried modern lifestyle and return to a simpler, slower life.The quintessential Japanese aesthetic can be seen in a 100-year-old minka farmhouse, an old merchant's machiya townhouse in Kyoto, a sprawling country Samurai villa, and in a modern seaside cottage. This book offers insights for architects and homeowners alike by providing inspiring and surprising alternatives, relevant to the design of homes anywhere in the world today.

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Textiles were the second-most-traded commodity in all of world history, preceded only by grain. In the Ottoman Empire in particular, the sale and exchange of silks, cottons, and woolens generated an immense amount of revenue and touched every level of society, from rural women tending silkworms to pashas flaunting layers of watered camlet to merchants traveling to Mecca and beyond. Sea Change offers the first comprehensive history of the Ottoman textile sector, arguing that the trade's enduring success resulted from its openness to expertise and objects from far-flung locations. Amanda Phillips skillfully marries art history with social and economic history, integrating formal analysis of various textiles into wider discussions of how trade, technology, and migration impacted the production and consumption of textiles in the Mediterranean from around 1400 to 1800. Surveying a vast network of textile topographies that stretched from India to Italy and from Egypt to Iran, Sea Change illuminates often neglected aspects of material culture, showcasing the objects' ability to tell new kinds of stories.

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Kazim Ali’s wildly inventive novel The Secret Room asks: how does one create a life of meaning in the face of loneliness and alienation from one’s own family, culture or even sense of self? In the space of a single day, the lives of four people converge and diverge in ways they themselves may not even measure. Sonia Chang, a violinist, prepares for a concert. Rizwan Syed, a yoga teacher, makes one last panicked attempt at reconciliation with his family. Jody Merchant tries to balance a stressful work life with a dream she abandoned long ago. Pratap Patel trudges through his life trying to ignore the pain he still feels at old losses. The experiences of these four characters, woven together in the manner of a string quartet, together create a raw, fluid composition. Kazim Ali (born 1971) is an American poet, novelist, essayist and professor. Born in the UK to parents of Indian descent, and raised in Canada and the US, Ali is an assistant professor of Creative Writing at Oberlin College. He cofounded the independent press Nightboat Books.

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The Adams saga takes a stride through the first half of the nineteenth century, as Louisa Catherine Johnson Adams chronicles her life with John Quincy Adams. Born in London in 1775 to a Maryland merchant and his English wife, Louisa recalls her childhood and education in England and France and her courtship with John Quincy, then U.S. minister to the Netherlands. Married in 1797, Louisa accompanied her husband on his postings to Berlin, St. Petersburg, and London. Her memoirs of Prussia and Russia vividly portray the republican couple in the courts of Europe. Louisa came to America in 1801 and would share John Quincy’s career as U.S. senator, secretary of state, president, and congressman. Except for his presidency, her diaries for these years have been preserved, and they reveal a reluctant but increasingly canny political wife. Lamentations about loss, including the deaths of three of four children, abound. But here, too, are views of Napoleonic Europe and American sectional disputes, with witty sketches of heroes and scoundrels. John Quincy emerges in a fullness seldom seen—ambitious and exacting, yet passionate, generous, and gallant. Louisa's diaries conclude with her reckoning of an eventful life, which came to a close in 1852.

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Anthony de Rothschild: Banker and Philanthropist tells the story of the man who influenced modern history. De Rothschild was at the helm of international banking, steering the system from the chaos after the First World War into the modern world. In this evocative new book, historian David Kynaston tells the fascinating story of Anthony de Rothschild (1887–1961). Through access to never previously consulted diaries and letters, a three-dimensional picture emerges of a complex and thoughtful man guiding the City’s most famous merchant bank through the turbulent years between the 1920s and 1950s. In politics he was open-minded and constructive whilst in his philanthropy, not least through his leading role in helping Jewish refugees (especially children) to leave Nazi Germany for England, he was thoughtful and generous. Austere on the surface but warm beneath, impatient equally of fools and idealogues, always searching for how he could contribute to make a better world – Anthony de Rothschild deserves, arguably more than almost anyone else in the twentieth-century City, to be known properly by later generations.

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“I gulped down Ballistic in one long read, staying awake half the night, and now I want the next one!” —George R. R. Martin There is a personal price to pay for having aligned with the wrong side in a reckless war. For Aden Jansen it’s the need to adopt a new identity while keeping his past hidden. Now he’s integrated himself aboard the Zephyr, a merchant ship smuggling critical goods through dangerous space. But danger is imminent on planet Gretia, as well. Under occupation, torn between postwar reformers and loyalists, it’s a polestar for civil unrest. Meanwhile an occupation forces officer is pulled right back into the fray when the battle alarm is raised, an ambitious heiress is entangled in a subversive political conspiracy, and an Allied captain is about to meet the enemy head-on. As Aden discovers, the insurgents on Gretia—and in space—are connected, organized, and ready to break into full-scale rebellion. History is threatening to repeat itself. It’s time that Aden rediscovers who he is, whom he can trust, and what he must fight for now.

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It all started with a curse. When magical mermaid Sereia saves her little sister and overshadows brother and the sea's rightful heir, Triton, the position of next ruler of the sea is in question. Determined to keep his throne, Triton curses Sereia, transforming her into a human and stripping her of magic. Banishing her from their underwater kingdom, he gives her a final warning: if you should ever return, you will become a monster. Left for dead, Sereia washes up on the shores of Atlantis, where she is discovered by a kind merchant with a tragic past. Patient and charming, he helps her build a life on land; she realizes everything she was taught about humans may have been wrong. But legends are powerful forces, and mermaids are burned alive for their magic by humans who fear their power. Sereia is forced to keep her true identity a secret, even as her feelings for her savior deepen. Channeling her skill with a blade, she finds a place within the ranks of the Atlantean army, finally

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A terrible power struggle threatens the very core of Britain…In 1376, the Black Prince dies of a terrible sickness, closely followed by his father, King Edward III in 1377. The crown of England is left in the hands of a mere boy, and the great nobles gather like hungry wolves round the empty throne.Soon the prelates of the church and the powerful Merchant Princes of London are drawn in. One of these, Sir Thomas Springall, is foully murdered within a few days of the old king’s death.Sir John Cranston, the coroner of London, is ordered to investigate. He is assisted by Brother Athelstan, a penitent Dominican monk. From the sinister slums of Whitefriars to the barbaric splendour of the English Court, Cranston and Athelstan are drawn into a dark and terrifying web of intrigue…The first in a scintillating historical mystery series, perfect for fans of C. J. Sansom, Susanna Gregory and S. J. Parris.Praise for The Nightingale Gallery 'The best of its kind since the death of Ellis Peters' Time Out'If you like Inspector Morse, you'll love Brother Athelstan' Prima'Evocative and lyrical descriptions' New Statesman

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Desperate to strike it rich during the Western Gold Rushes and eager for the free land afforded them through the Homestead Act, men went west alone and sacrificed many creature comforts. Only after they arrived at their destinations did some of them realize how much they missed female companionship. One way for men living on the frontier to meet women was through subscriptions to heart-and-hand clubs. The men received newspapers with information, and sometimes photographs, about women, with whom they corresponded. Eventually, a man might convince a woman to join him in the West, and in matrimony. Social status, political connections, money, companionship, or security were often considered more than love in these arrangements. Complete with historic photographs and actual advertisements from both women seeking husbands and males seeking brides, Object Matrimony includes stories of courageous mail order brides and their exploits as well as stories of the marriage brokers, mercenary matchmakers looking to profit as merchants did off of the miners and settlers. Some of these stories end happily ever after; others reveal desperate situations that robbed the brides of their youth and sometimes their lives.

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A study of the literature of the 'art of travel' in eighteenth-century France, showing how consideration of who should travel and for what purpose provided an occasion for wider debate about the social status quo. Early modern educational travel is usually associated with the Grand Tour: a young nobleman's journey through the established highlights of Europe. Lessons of Travel presents how, in eighteenth-century France, this practice was heavily contested, and the idea of educational travel had far wider implications. Through the study of a huge range of both canonical and little-known sources discussing "the art of travel", from abbé Pluche's educational best seller, The Spectacle of Nature, through Rousseau's Émile to practical prospectuses for collective educational travel in the revolutionary period, Gelléri investigates what it meant to 'think about travels' in eighteenth-century France. Consideration of who should travel and for what purpose, he argues, contributed to an international intellectual tradition but also provided a pretext for debate on the social status quo, including such issues as the place of the merchant class, the necessity for professional training, the uses of travel for young women and the education of a new generation of citizens of the Revolution.

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Franz Schubert's song cycles, "Die Schone Mullerin" and "Winterreise" are cornerstones of the genre. But, as Richard Kramer argues in this book, Schubert envisioned many other songs as components of cyclical arrangements that were never published as such. By studying Schubert's original manuscripts, Kramer recovers some of these "distant cycles" and accounts for idiosyncrasies in the songs which other analyses have failed to explain. Returning the songs to their original keys, Kramer reveals linkages among songs which were often obscured as Schubert readied his compositions for publication. His analysis thus conveys even familiar songs in fresh contexts that will affect performance, interpretation and criticism. After addressing problems of multiple settings and revisions, Kramer presents a series of briefs for the reconfiguring of sets of songs to poems by Goethe, Rellstab and Heine. He deconstructs "Winterreise", using its convoluted origins to illuminate its textual contradictions. Finally, Kramer scrutinizes settings from the Abendrote cycle (on poems by Friedrich Schlegel) for signs of cyclic process. Probing the farthest reaches of Schubert's engagement with the poetics of lieder, "Distant Cycles" exposes tensions between Schubert the composer and Schubert the merchant-entrepreneur.

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Engrossing and memorable, The Sins of the Father is the second novel in international bestseller Jeffrey Archer’s celebrated the Clifton Chronicles. It takes us to New York in 1939 where our hero Harry Clifton is in desperate need of help.Only days before Britain declares war on Germany, Harry joins the Merchant Navy, unable to face long-held family secrets and the fact he will never be able to marry his true love Emma Barrington. But when his ship is sunk mid-Atlantic, Harry takes the opportunity to assume the identity of one his deceased rescuers and begin a new life.Landing in America, he quickly discovers he has made a mistake and without any way to prove his true identity, Harry is now chained to a past that could be far worse than the one he had hoped to escape . . .Brimming with intrigue, Jeffrey Archer takes readers into a world they will never want to leave as the Clifton Chronicles continues its powerful journey with family loyalties stretched to their limits and fates decided.Continue the bestselling series with Best Kept Secret and Be Careful What You Wish For.

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The end of the Oregon Trail is near, young pioneer - the fourth and final leg of your journey starts here. But, do you have the grit to make it to Oregon City? The wild frontier is full of risks and unpredictable surprises! This is the final installment of four books that will take you all the way to Oregon Territory - if you make the right choices. In the fourth and final book of this exciting choose-your-own-adventure series, it's 1850 and you've traveled for more than three months on foot for fifteen miles a day with your family, covered wagon, and oxen. There are holes in the bottoms of your shoes. You've faced grizzly bears, traded with merchants, and wild bandits. Oregon City is so close - you can taste it. But you still have a ways to go on the Trail. There are still weeks of adventure ahead of you - if you can survive the dangerous frontier. Trust yourself. Which path will you choose? With twenty-two possible endings, every decision counts. Choose wisely and make it all the way to Oregon City! AGES: 7 to 10

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Investigation of unjustly neglected opera. Hans Pfitzner's `musical legend' Palestrina is considered in the German-speaking countries to be one of the supreme masterpieces of music, and yet it is all but unknown elsewhere. The opera, first performed in 1917, tells the story of the composer Palestrina, his struggle to compose following the death of his wife and in the face of anti-musical decrees from the Church, and his eventual composition of the Missa Papae Marcelli, which, it is said, wasdictated to him by angles and reconciled the Church to contrapuntal music. The story, set against the historical background of the Council of Trent, is an allegory of the individual artist in society, as well as a statement of Pfitzner's own beliefs about the musical climate of his time. Toller discusses the music and the dramatic structure, and presents a comprehensive introduction to the background material in the many diverse fields encompassed by the opera. OWEN TOLLER is Head of Mathematics at Merchant Taylor's School; he is a member of the London Symphony Chorus and sings with a number of other groups. His interest in Pfitzner began when he sang in the first British performance of Palestrina, a semi-professional production by Abbey Opera in London in 1979.

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Shakespeare's poems and plays are rich in reference to "measure, number, and weight," which were the key terms of an early modern empirical and quantitative imagination. Shakespeare's investigation of Renaissance measures of reality centers on the consequences of applying principles of measurement to the appraisal of human value. This is especially true of efforts to judge people as better or worse than, or equal to, one another. With special attention to the Sonnets, Measure for Measure, Merchant of Venice, Othello, King Lear, and Hamlet, Paula Blank argues that Shakespeare, in his experiments with measurement, demonstrates the incommensurability of the aims and operations of quantification with human experience. From scales and spans to squares and levels to ratings and rules, Shakespeare's rhetoric of measurement reveals the extent to which language in the Renaissance was itself understood as a set of alternative measures for figuring human worth. In chapters that explore attempts to measure human feeling, weigh human equalities (and inequalities), regulate race relations, and deduce social and economic merit, Blank shows why Shakespeare's measures are so often exposed as "mismeasures"—equivocal, provisional, and as unreliable as the men and women they are designed to assess.

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Like many of the families in this book, Rex Sly follows in the footsteps of his ancestors who were also farmers in the Fens. The land was reclaimed by forebears, giving this unique bond between ‘soil and soul’ - each generation wishing to leave their soils as a sustainable inheritance to the next. The variety of crops which are grown has changed little over the past half-century, but the traditional farms have been largely replaced by high-tech agro-businesses. Not all farms in the fens are large, though, and the richness of the soils still enables the small grower to survive in a niche marketplace. The greatest change has been from the grower to the consumers’ shopping baskets. The marketing chain has changed from markets and merchants to the vast supermarket network: fast and efficient for the grower and value for money for the public. The corn exchanges which witnessed the rise and fall of agriculture over one and a half centuries of history are now no more than farming monuments. The ever-increasing demands on our soils are of concern to those in the Fens. Each generation is replaceable - fen topsoil is not.

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The Dutch East India Company was a hybrid organization combining the characteristics of both corporation and state that attempted to thrust itself aggressively into an Asian political order in which it possessed no obvious place and was transformed in the process. This study focuses on the company's clashes with Tokugawa Japan over diplomacy, violence, and sovereignty. In each encounter the Dutch were forced to retreat, compelled to abandon their claims to sovereign powers, and to refashion themselves again and again-from subjects of a fictive king to loyal vassals of the shogun, from aggressive pirates to meek merchants, and from insistent defenders of colonial sovereignty to legal subjects of the Tokugawa state. Within the confines of these conflicts, the terms of the relationship between the company and the shogun first took shape and were subsequently set into what would become their permanent form. The first book to treat the Dutch East India Company in Japan as something more than just a commercial organization, The Company and the Shogun presents new perspective on one of the most important, long-lasting relationships to develop between an Asian state and a European overseas enterprise.

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The Dutch East India Company was a hybrid organization combining the characteristics of both corporation and state that attempted to thrust itself aggressively into an Asian political order in which it possessed no obvious place and was transformed in the process. This study focuses on the company's clashes with Tokugawa Japan over diplomacy, violence, and sovereignty. In each encounter the Dutch were forced to retreat, compelled to abandon their claims to sovereign powers, and to refashion themselves again and again-from subjects of a fictive king to loyal vassals of the shogun, from aggressive pirates to meek merchants, and from insistent defenders of colonial sovereignty to legal subjects of the Tokugawa state. Within the confines of these conflicts, the terms of the relationship between the company and the shogun first took shape and were subsequently set into what would become their permanent form. The first book to treat the Dutch East India Company in Japan as something more than just a commercial organization, The Company and the Shogun presents new perspective on one of the most important, long-lasting relationships to develop between an Asian state and a European overseas enterprise.

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Winner of the Mr. Christie's Book Award and the IODE Violet Downey Book Award For young Jack, life is tough at the Opportunities School for Orphans. But Jack is good at staying out of trouble. He has skipped over trouble, danced around trouble, slid under trouble, melted away from trouble, talked his way out of trouble and slipped between two close troubles like a cat through a picket fence. When Jack turns twelve, he is given the biggest opportunity of all, but suddenly his life is nothing but trouble. Still, he is a clever and resilient boy, and eventually he makes his way into the big world. Jack is rich in ideas, and soon he finds there is a place for an enterprising boy who has whims, concepts, plans, opinions, impressions, notions and fancies to spare. In the tradition of Natalie Babbitt, Sarah Ellis brings her quirky sense of humor and imagination to bear in this witty, warm fable. Bruno St-Aubin's evocative black-and-white illustrations capture perfectly the dreadful Schoolmaster Bane, the crowlike accountant Mr. Ledger, Lou the skinny bun merchant, and Christabel, the miller's little daughter.

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The Sunday Times bestseller!It is AD 25. Pirate ships strike terror in the hearts of those who brave the seas of the Roman Empire. When young Telemachus joins the crew of the merchant ship Selene, he's delighted to escape the rough streets of Piraeus. He knows little of the dangers of life at sea. And even past hardship has not prepared him for the terror on board when a pirate ship appears . . . The fight is bloody, but the result is never in doubt. Then the victorious pirate chief, Bulla, offers the beaten men a cruel choice: join us, or die. After surviving a brutal initiation rite, Telemachus impresses his new captain with his resourcefulness and strength, and swiftly rises through the pirate ranks. But dangerous rivals talk of mutiny and murder. While Prefect Canis, notorious commander of the imperial fleet, is relentless in his pursuit of the pirate brotherhood.Could Telemachus be the man to lead the pirates and challenge Rome? PIRATA is also available in five ebook novella parts. What readers are saying about PIRATA'I strongly recommend you read this' Amazon reviewer, 5 stars'A great gripping read' Amazon reviewer, 5 stars'Fast-paced and exiting throughout' Amazon reviewer, 5 stars

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In 1798 Robert Morris—“financier of the American Revolution,” confidant of George Washington, former U.S. senator—plunged from the peaks of wealth and prestige into debtors' prison and public contempt. How could one of the richest men in the United States, one of only two founders who signed the Declaration of Independence, the Articles of Confederation, and the Constitution, suffer such a downfall? This book examines for the first time the extravagant Philadelphia town house Robert Morris built and its role in bringing about his ruin. Part biography, part architectural history, the book recounts Morris’s wild successes as a merchant, his recklessness as a land speculator, and his unrestrained passion in building his palatial, doomed mansion, once hailed as the most expensive private building in the United States but later known as “Morris’s Folly.” Setting Morris’s tale in the context of the nation’s founding, this volume refocuses attention on an essential yet nearly forgotten American figure while also illuminating the origins of America’s ongoing, ambivalent attitudes toward the superwealthy and their sensational excesses.

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“A thick, tangled and deliciously idiosyncratic history of hair.” Times Literary Supplement The Middle Ages were a time of great innovation, artistic vigor, and cultural richness. Appearances mattered a great deal during this vibrant era and hair was a key marker of the dynamism and sophistication of the period. Hair became ever more central to religious iconography, from Mary Magdalen to the Virgin Mary, while vernacular poets embellished their verses with descriptions of hairstyles both humble and elaborate, and merchants imported the finest hair products from great distances. Drawing on a wealth of visual, textual and object sources, the volume examines how hairstyles and their representations developed—often to a degree of dazzling complexity—between the years AD 800 and AD 1450. From wimpled matrons and tonsured monks to adorned noblewomen, hair is revealed as a potent cultural symbol of gender, age, sexuality, health, class, and race. Illustrated with approximately 80 images, A Cultural History of Hair in the Middle Ages brings together leading scholars to present an overview of the period with essays on politics, science, religion, fashion, beauty, the visual arts, and popular culture.

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In Espresso Tales, Alexander McCall Smith returns home to Edinburgh and the glorious cast of his own tales of the city, the residents of 44 Scotland Street, with a new set of challenges for each one of them. Bruce, the intolerably vain and perpetually deluded ex-surveyor, is about to embark on a new career as a wine merchant, while his long-suffering flatmate Pat MacGregor, set up by matchmaking Domenica Macdonald, finds herself invited to a nudist picnic in Moray Place in the pursuit of true love. Prodigious six-year-old Bertie Pollock wants a boy's life of fishing and rugby, not yoga and pink dungarees, and he plots rebellion against his bossy, crusading mother Irene and his psychotherapist Dr Fairbairn. But when Bertie's longed-for trip to Glasgow with his ineffectual father Stuart ends with Bertie taking money off legendary Glasgow hard man Lard O'Connor at cards, it looks as though Bertie should have been more careful what he wished for. And all the time it appears that both Irene Pollock and Dr Fairbairn are engaged in a struggle with dark secrets and unconscious urges of their own.

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*A THE TIMES BOOK OF THE YEAR 2020*'Brilliant and gripping, here is the full true Renaissance in a history of compelling originality and freshness' Simon Sebag MontefioreThe Italian Renaissance shaped Western culture - but it was far stranger and darker than many of us realise. We know the Mona Lisa for her smile, but not that she was married to a slave-trader. We revere Leonardo da Vinci for his art, but few now appreciate his ingenious designs for weaponry. We visit Florence to see Michelangelo's David, but hear nothing of the massacre that forced the republic's surrender. In fact, many of the Renaissance's most celebrated artists and thinkers emerged not during the celebrated 'rebirth' of the fifteenth century but amidst the death and destruction of the sixteenth century.The Beauty and the Terror is an enrapturing narrative which includes the forgotten women writers, Jewish merchants, mercenaries, prostitutes, farmers and citizens who lived the Renaissance every day. Brimming with life, it takes us closer than ever before to the reality of this astonishing era, and its meaning for today.'Terrifying and fascinating' Sunday Times'Enlightening...exactly the alternative history you might wish for' Daily Telegraph

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Those who lived through the Second World War have many stories of bravery, sadness, horror, doubt and longing. Inspired by conversations with veterans following the publication of her grandfather’s wartime memoir, Victoria Panton Bacon has gathered a moving collection of their experiences. Their recollections tell of a different time and reveal the courage, actions and sentiments of those whose wartime experiences changed the course of history; stories of ordinary people who lived under the long shadows cast by the war and whose young lives were changed irrevocably. Though many tales are sad, describing being sent into war and the loss of friends and family, there are also stories of joy and love found in the darkest of times. For them, war, the ultimate leveller, threw them into remarkable times, whether they were a merchant seaman, army officer, pilot, young Jewish girl, code breaker or Home Guard recruit. From one extraordinary story to the next, Remarkable Journeys of the Second World War immerses the reader in the lives of real people who lived through conflict.

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Long ignored by historians and repudiated in their time, practitioners of private law opened the way toward Japan’s legal modernity. From the seventeenth to the turn of the twentieth century, lawyers and their predecessors changed society in ways that first samurai and then the state could not. During the Edo period (1600–1868), they worked from the shadows to bend the shogun’s law to suit the market needs of merchants and the justice concerns of peasants. Over the course of the nineteenth century, legal practitioners changed law from a tool for rule into a new epistemology and laid the foundation for parliamentary politics during the Meiji era (1868–1912).This social and political history argues that legal modernity sprouted from indigenous roots and helped delineate a budding nation’s public and private spheres. Tracing the transition of law regimes from Edo to Meiji, Darryl E. Flaherty shows how the legal profession emerged as a force for change in modern Japan and highlights its lasting contributions in founding private universities, political parties, and a national association of lawyers that contributed to legal reform during the twentieth century.

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Founded as an ecclesiastical center, trading hub, and intended capital of a feudal state, Riga was Old Livonia's greatest city and its indispensable port. Because the city was situated in what was initially remote and inhospitable territory, surrounded by pagans and coveted by regional powers like Poland, Sweden, and Muscovy, it was also a fortress encased by a wall. The House of Hemp and Butter begins in the twelfth century with the arrival to the eastern Baltic of German priests, traders, and knights, who conquered and converted the indigenous tribes and assumed mastery over their lands. It ends in 1710 with an account of the greatest war Livonia had ever seen, one that was accompanied by mass starvation, a terrible epidemic, and a flood of nearly biblical proportions that devastated the city and left its survivors in misery. Readers will learn about Riga's people—merchants and clerics, craftsmen and builders, porters and day laborers—about its structures and spaces, its internal conflicts and its unrelenting struggle to maintain its independence against outside threats. The House of Hemp and Butter is an indispensable guide to a quintessentially European city located in one of the continent's more remote corners.

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Big businesses have faced a persistent dilemma in China since the nineteenth century: how to retain control over corporate hierarchies while adapting to local social networks. Sherman Cochran, in the first study to compare Western, Japanese, and Chinese businesses in Chinese history, shows how various businesses have struggled with this issue as they have adjusted to dramatic changes in Chinese society, politics, and foreign affairs. Cochran devotes a chapter each to six of the biggest business ventures in China before the Communist revolution: two Western-owned companies, Standard Oil and British-American Tobacco Company; two Japanese-owned companies, Mitsui Trading Company and Naigai Cotton Company; and two Chinese-owned firms, Shenxin Cotton Mills and China Match Company. In each case, he notes the businesses' efforts to introduce corporate hierarchies for managing the distribution of goods and the organization of factory workers, and he describes their encounters with a variety of Chinese social networks: tenacious factions of English-speaking compradors and powerful trade associations of non-English-speaking merchants channeling goods into the marketplace; and small cliques of independent labor bosses and big gangs of underworld figures controlling workers in the factories. Drawing upon archival sources and individual interviews, Cochran describes the wide range of approaches that these businesses adopted to deal with Chinese social networks. Each business negotiated its own distinctive relationship with local networks, and as each business learned about marketing goods and managing factory workers in China, it adjusted this relationship. Sometimes it strengthened its hierarchical control over networks and sometimes it delegated authority to networks, but it could not afford to take networks for granted or regard them as static because they, in turn, took their own initiative and made their own adjustments. In this book Cochran calls into question the idea that the spread of capitalism has caused business organizations to converge over time. His cases bring to light numerous organizational forms used by Western, Japanese, and Chinese corporations in China's past, and his conclusions suggest that businesses have experimented with new forms on the basis of their historical experiences--especially their encounters with social networks.

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In the Footsteps of a Roman Legion - Walking the Via Egnatia (2021) On a blistering September morning in 2016, intrepid friends in their sixties – Kim and Pat – set off on foot from Durrës, Albania towards Istanbul, Turkey. Tracing the route of a Roman road, the Via Egnatia, they dedicate their endeavour to raising funds for refugee relief. Owing to a guidebook that overstates amenities, the trek becomes more challenging than expected. As they negotiate hurdles, test their endurance, and encounter human smugglers and feral dogs, an indomitable sense of humour, a personified GPS, and an imagined Roman legionnaire see them through daily adventures. The Via Egnatia holds over two thousand years of stories - of soldiers, merchants, farmers, refugees and travellers. And this is a gripping one – two travellers (sometimes three?) meet both generous hospitality and surprising hostility with resilience, cold beer and hot coffee. Atlas in one hand and this book in the other - I was transported! Evelyn Gillespie, owner Laughing Oyster Bookshop, Comox Valley. Fun, funny, and endlessly thought-provoking, Kim Letson pulls no punches as she explores some of the bumpier corners of humanity, all while finding the time to celebrate life’s small, simple pleasures. If you like the idea of lacing up your shoes to embark on a grand adventure from the comforts of your favourite reading chair, you couldn’t pick a more capable guide than Letson. Brimming with passion for the road less travelled, Kim Letson has written a page-turner. Joshua Levy, CBC/QWF Writer in Residence 2018, winner of the CBC/QWF Fiction Prize, Prairie Fire Nonfiction Prize, CNFC/Carte Blanche Nonfiction Prize, Grain Fiction Prize, and SLS Nonfiction Prize, poet. Kim Letson first presented her Via Egnatia journey in various draft forms to our writing group. Now, in this compelling book, we accompany her and Pat as they tramp through three Balkan states on their way to Turkey. Readers will learn about Albania’s concrete bunkers as the adventurers endure blisters, encounter poisonous vipers, vicious dogs, human traffickers and armed helicopters before finally relaxing in a steaming Istanbul hammam. Thank you, Kim, for including us on your intrepid walk. Janet Miller, past-president Comox Valley Writer’s Society, author.

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In the summer of 1956, while on shore leave from the Merchant Navy, Thomas Hicks was spotted playing a new type of music in a coffee bar in London. Having never heard anything like this 'rock' performed in Britain, he became an overnight sensation--never returning to his ship. He changed his name to Tommy Steele and for 65 years he has been Britain's greatest showman. In a remarkable career spanning radio, records, Broadway and Hollywood, Tommy Steele started the rock revolution in the UK before moving to lighter, family entertainment and becoming a well-loved household name. He received an OBE for Services to Entertainment in 1979 and a knighthood for Services to Entertainment and Charity in 2020. He has conquered the West End, Hollywood and Broadway; holds records for the longest-running one-man-show in the London's West End and also the record for most appearances at the hallowed London Palladium. However, his remarkable career has never been detailed accurately and comprehensively--until now. Authorised by Sir Tommy Steele himself, 'A Life in the Spotlight' offers readers a detailed insight into the career of an unrivalled entertainment legend, with countless facts, stories, details and anecdotes never before committed to print.

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'[Sumayya Usmani is] the go-to expert in Pakistani cuisine' - BBC Good Food Magazine'Sumayya Usmani is a brilliant storyteller. She transports us with her delicious descriptions of the smells and flavours of the kitchen.' - Jay Rayner, award-winning writer and food critic Award-winning food writer Sumayya Usmani's stunning memoir conjures a story of what it was like growing up in Pakistan and how the women in her life inspired her to trust her instincts in the kitchen. From a young age, food was Sumayya's portal to nurturing, love and self-expression. She spent the first eight years of her life at sea, with a father who captained merchant ships and a mother who preferred to cook for the family herself on a tiny electric stove in their cabin rather than eat in the officer's mess.When the family moved to Karachi, Sumayya grew up torn between the social expectations of life as a young girl in Pakistan, and the inspiration she felt in the kitchen, watching her mother, and her Nani Mummy (maternal grandmother) and Dadi's (paternal grandmother) confidence, intuition and effortless ability to build complex, layered flavours in their cooking.This evocative and moving food memoir - which includes the most meaningful recipes of Sumayya's childhood - tells the story of how Sumayya's self-belief grew throughout her young life, allowing her to trust her instincts and find her own path between the expectations of following in her father's footsteps as a lawyer and the pressures of a Pakistani woman's presumed place in the household. Gradually, through the warmth of her family life, the meaning of 'andaza' comes to her: that the flavour and meaning of a recipe is not a list of measured ingredients, but a feeling in your hands, as you let the elements of a meal come together through instinct and experience.Recipes include: Nani Mummy's prawn karahiPotatoes with curry leaves and turmericChicken boti tikka, Bundoo Khan styleMummy's wedding-style chicken kormaBitter lemon, mustard seed and garlic pullaoDadi's banana and fennel seed gulgulay doughnut'I can't decide whether I want to devour Sumayya's story or her recipes first, but this has left me hungry to travel, to explore... and, of course, to eat.' Felicity Cloake, Guardian food columnist and author of Perfect, The A-Z of Eating and One More Croissant for the Road

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In Capitalism and Cartography in the Dutch Golden Age, Elizabeth A. Sutton explores the fascinating but previously neglected history of corporate cartography during the Dutch Golden Age, from ca. 1600 to 1650. She examines how maps were used as propaganda tools for the Dutch West India Company in order to encourage the commodification of land and an overall capitalist agenda. Building her exploration around the central figure of Claes Jansz Vischer, an Amsterdam-based publisher closely tied to the Dutch West India Company, Sutton shows how printed maps of Dutch Atlantic territories helped rationalize the Dutch Republic's global expansion. Maps of land reclamation projects in the Netherlands, as well as the Dutch territories of New Netherland (now New York) and New Holland (Dutch Brazil), reveal how print media were used both to increase investment and to project a common narrative of national unity. Maps of this era showed those boundaries, commodities, and topographical details that publishers-state-sponsored corporate bodies-and the Dutch West India Company merchants and governing Dutch elite deemed significant to their agenda. In the process, Sutton argues, they perpetuated and promoted modern state capitalism.

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Although there are specialist studies on the mobility of the inhabitants of the cities and regions of the Black Sea, we lack a comprehensive prosopography of those of them active abroad. This work, containing 3358 entries, is a first attempt, casting light on the mobility of different social and professional groups, not only mercenaries and merchants but also itinerant philosophers and artists. It demonstrates that the Black Sea was well integrated into the main circles of the Greek, Roman and Early Byzantine world. Chronologically, the work starts with the earliest attestations and finishes with the end of the 6th century AD. It includes not only people attested by external documents but also persons mentioned by internal inscriptions as having travelled or died outside their country. The area of investigation covers the entire Black Sea coast. The Prosopographia Ptolemaica is used as a model. Each entry follows a set form: name; family relationships (father/mother, son/daughter, brother/sister); type of inscription or category of papyrus; profession or further data on the person's activity; form of the ethnic; dating; testimonies and bibliographical references. For each heading the geographical order of attestations is that of the SEG. There are very detailed indexes (names, cases of double or multiple citizenship, proxenies or other honours awarded abroad, professional categories, etc.).

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A clear and accessibly written guide to the medieval cloth-making trade in England. Cloth-making became England's leading industry in the late Middle Ages; clothiers co-ordinated its different stages, in some cases carrying out the processes themselves, and found markets for their finished cloth, selling to merchants, drapers and other traders. While many clothiers were of only modest status or "jacks of all trades", a handful of individuals amassed huge fortunes through the trade, becoming the multi-millionaires of their day. This book offers the first recent survey of this hugely important and significant trade and its practitioners, examining the whole range of clothiers across different areas of England, and exploring their impact within the industry andin their wider communities. Alongside the mechanics of the trade, it considers clothiers as entrepreneurs and early capitalists, employing workers and even establishing early factories; it also looks at their family backgrounds and their roles as patrons of church rebuilding and charitable activities. It is completed with extracts from clothiers' wills and a gazetteer of places to visit, making the book invaluable to academics, students, and local historians alike. JOHN S. LEE is a Research Associate at the Centre for Medieval Studies at the University of York.

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Over the course of the Middle Ages, the economies of Europe, Asia, and northern Africa became more closely integrated, fostering the international and intercontinental journeys of merchants, pilgrims, diplomats, missionaries, and adventurers. During a time in history when travel was often difficult, expensive, and fraught with danger, these wayfarers composed accounts of their experiences in unprecedented numbers and transformed traditional conceptions of human mobility. Exploring this phenomenon, The Medieval Invention of Travel draws on an impressive array of sources to develop original readings of canonical figures such as Marco Polo, John Mandeville, and Petrarch, as well as a host of lesser-known travel writers. As Shayne Aaron Legassie demonstrates, the Middle Ages inherited a Greco-Roman model of heroic travel, which viewed the ideal journey as a triumph over temptation and bodily travail. Medieval travel writers revolutionized this ancient paradigm by incorporating practices of reading and writing into the ascetic regime of the heroic voyager, fashioning a bold new conception of travel that would endure into modern times. Engaging methods and insights from a range of disciplines, The Medieval Invention of Travel offers a comprehensive account of how medieval travel writers and their audiences reshaped the intellectual and material culture of Europe for centuries to come.

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This innovative book explores how the making of Edinburgh as an influential Enlightenment capital depended on a series of spatial processes that extended across urban, regional, national and global scales. Edinburgh was an Enlightenment city of regional, national and global influence. But how did the people of Enlightenment Edinburgh understand and order their world? How did they encounter, compare and produce different kinds of spaces, from the urban to the world scale? And how did this city set the universal standards by which other places should be judged and transformed? The Geographies of Enlightenment Edinburgh answers these questions by exploring the thousands of urban plans, county surveys, travel accounts and encyclopaedias that passed through a busy Edinburgh bookshop over four decades. It reveals how these geographical publications were produced and shared, and sheds light on the people who bought and used them - including moral philosophers, silk merchants, school teachers, ship's surgeons and slave owners. This is the story of how specific methods of mapping space came ultimately to predict and organize it, creating a new world in Edinburgh's image. By connecting global processes of knowledge production to intimate accounts of its reception in the city, this book deepens our understanding of the Scottish Enlightenment and the world it made.

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Readers of this book will gain a clear appreciation of the growing importance of the aircraft carrier during World War Two and proposals thereafter for the future composition of Royal Navy's surface fleet together with the nature of the Fleet Air Arm's expansion programmes. This second book of three focuses on the Fleet Air Arm during the middle years of the Second World War. It covers the transitional period moving from a small number of carriers to a naval air arm with modern aircraft types capable of operating a number of Fleet Carriers in the Pacific Ocean following Japan's entry into the War in December 1941. The struggle in the Mediterranean continued and reached its peak with the efforts to relieve the siege of Malta in the summer of 1942 and the subsequent landings in North Africa and Italy. The increasing role played by the Fleet Air Arm aircraft operating from Escort Carriers and Merchant Aircraft Carriers in the Battle of the Atlantic during 1943 is also apparent. The aim of these volumes is to present an insight into the major planning and policy issues of concern to the Admiralty and extensive coverage of naval air operations. Difficulties of operating aircraft at sea, the nature of air combat and the complexities involved in expanding an organisation such as the Fleet Air Arm under wartime conditions are discussed.

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In January 1885, the powers of Europe gathered in Berlin to set ground rules for dividing Africa and its lucrative natural resources among themselves. In the years that followed, they rapidly laid claim to nearly all of the continent. Africa's division and conquest might appear today to have been inevitable. But the outcome was far from certain. Drawing upon decades of research, esteemed historian Robert Harms shows how outsiders from Europe, America, and the Arab world competed for resources, money, fame, and power in the Congo rainforest. Reconstructing this chaotic process, Land of Tears provides a comprehensive depiction of how invaders into the Congo basin transformed the region in just a few decades from terra incognita to the most brutally exploited region of Africa.For many centuries, the peoples of the Congo rainforest kept the disruptive forces of the global economy at arm's length, shielded on the west by the cataracts of the lower Congo River and on the east by the lakes and mountains of the Albertine rift. During the second half of the nineteenth century-in a process known as the "Scramble for Africa"-traders, explorers, and empire builders breached the barriers and moved rapidly into the Congo basin, first from the east and then from the west. By the 1880s, merchants of ivory, slaves, and rubber, operating under the authority of the Sultan of Zanzibar, the King of Belgium, and the government of France, were methodically stripping the rainforest of its rapidly-depleting natural bounty in order to satisfy growing demand in Europe and the United States. Central to this process were three men: Henry Morton Stanley, a Welsh explorer working on behalf of King Leopold of Belgium; Pierre savourgnan de Brazza, an Italian from the Papal States who carved out an empire for France; and Hamid bin Muhammad (known as Tippu Tip), a man of mixed African and Arab descent who built a vast trading empire, first as a client of the Sultan of Zanzibar and later in the employ of Leopold. These men were representative of the interests vying for resources in the region, and the drama of their lives was contoured by the devastation their exploits visited upon the Congo. Swivelling between events in Africa and those in Europe and the United States, Land of Tears reveals the complex ways worldwide networks of trade, travel, and communication reshaped and ruined Equatorial Africa.Offering vivid descriptions of African ivory and slave caravans, rubber hunters, and local governance in Africa and piano key factories, humanitarian conferences, and diplomatic meetings in Europe and America, Harms demonstrates how the Congo became fully and fatefully enmeshed within our global world.

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A deluxe Harper Perennial Legacy Edition, with an introduction from John Swansburg, Deputy Editor at Slate One of the best-selling books of all time, Lew Wallace's enduring epic is a tale of revenge, betrayal, honor, compassion and the power of forgiveness, set during the life of Christ. At the beginning of the first century, Judah Ben-Hur lived as a prince, descended from the royal line of Judea and one of Jerusalem's most prosperous merchant families. But his world falls apart when he is betrayed by his best friend, Messala, who falsely accuses him of an attempt to assassinate the Roman governor. Convicted without trial, Judah is sentenced to slavery on a Roman galley, while his mother and sister are imprisoned and his family's assets are seized. All seems lost, but just before boarding the ship, Ben-Hur has his first interaction with the Christ, who offers him water and hope. Their lives continue to intersect as Ben-Hur miraculously survives his time as a slave to become a charioteer, confront his betrayer, Messala, in an epic race, fall in love with the beautiful Esther, avenge his family, and become a follower of the Christ. A true epic, Ben-Hur weaves biblical history and a rich adventure plot into a timeless tale certain to entertain a new generation of readers.

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In Shakespeare's Foreign Worlds, Carole Levin and John Watkins focus on the relationship between the London-based professional theater preeminently associated with William Shakespeare and an unprecedented European experience of geographic, social, and intellectual mobility. Shakespeare's plays bear the marks of exile and exploration, rural depopulation, urban expansion, and shifting mercantile and diplomatic configurations. He fills his plays with characters testing the limits of personal identity: foreigners, usurpers, outcasts, outlaws, scolds, shrews, witches, mercenaries, and cross-dressers. Through parallel discussions of Henry VI, The Taming of the Shrew, and The Merchant of Venice, Levin and Watkins argue that Shakespeare's centrality to English national consciousness is inseparable from his creation of the foreign as a category asserting dangerous affinities between England's internal minorities and its competitors within an increasingly fraught European mercantile system. As a women's historian, Levin is particularly interested in Shakespeare's responses to marginalized sectors of English society. As a scholar of English, Italian Studies, and Medieval Studies, Watkins situates Shakespeare in the context of broadly European historical movements. Together Levin and Watkins narrate the emergence of the foreign as portable category that might be applied both to "strangers" from other countries and to native-born English men and women, such as religious dissidents, who resisted conformity to an increasingly narrow sense of English identity. Shakespeare's Foreign Worlds will appeal to historians, literary scholars, theater specialists, and anyone interested in Shakespeare and the Elizabethan Age.

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Set like a stronghold south-west of the Caucasus mountains, Armenia is caught between East and West. Briefly a great empire in the first century BCE under King Tigranes the Great, Armenia was later incorporated first by the Sasanian and then the Byzantine Empires. Armenian art, literature, religion and material culture have reinterpreted elements of a wide variety of cultures. Spanning over two and a half millennia, the history of Armenia and the Armenian people is a series of riveting tales, from its first mention under the Achaemenid King Darius I to the independence of the Republic of Armenia from the Soviet Union. With the help of the Bodleian Libraries' magnificent collection of Armenian manuscripts and early printed books, this volume tells the story of the region through the medium of its cultural output. Together with introductions written by experts in their fields, close to one hundred manuscripts, works of art and religious artefacts serve as a guide to Armenian culture and history. Gospel manuscripts splendidly illuminated by Armenian masters feature next to philosophical tractates and merchants' handbooks, affording us an insight into what makes the Armenian people truly unique, especially in the shadow of the genocide that threatened their annihilation a hundred years ago: namely their spirituality, language and perseverance in the face of adversity. VISIT THE EXHIBITION Armenia: Treasures from an Enduring Culture October 2015 – January 2016 Bodleian Library, Oxford

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Set like a stronghold south-west of the Caucasus mountains, Armenia is caught between East and West. Briefly a great empire in the first century BCE under King Tigranes the Great, Armenia was later incorporated first by the Sasanian and then the Byzantine Empires. Armenian art, literature, religion and material culture have reinterpreted elements of a wide variety of cultures. Spanning over two and a half millennia, the history of Armenia and the Armenian people is a series of riveting tales, from its first mention under the Achaemenid King Darius I to the independence of the Republic of Armenia from the Soviet Union. With the help of the Bodleian Libraries' magnificent collection of Armenian manuscripts and early printed books, this volume tells the story of the region through the medium of its cultural output. Together with introductions written by experts in their fields, close to one hundred manuscripts, works of art and religious artefacts serve as a guide to Armenian culture and history. Gospel manuscripts splendidly illuminated by Armenian masters feature next to philosophical tractates and merchants' handbooks, affording us an insight into what makes the Armenian people truly unique, especially in the shadow of the genocide that threatened their annihilation a hundred years ago: namely their spirituality, language and perseverance in the face of adversity. VISIT THE EXHIBITION Armenia: Treasures from an Enduring Culture October 2015 – January 2016 Bodleian Library, Oxford

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Discover the complexity of China’s past with this multi-faceted portrayal of the storied nation from a leading expert in the field The newly revised Second Edition of A History of China delivers a comprehensive treatment of the political, economic, social, and cultural history of China that covers all major events and trends that have shaped the country over the centuries. The book is written in a clear and uncomplicated style, sure to be of assistance to undergraduate students with little prior background knowledge in the subject matter. The text examines Chinese history through a global lens to better understand how foreign influences affected domestic policies and practices. It includes discussions of the roles played by non-Chinese ethnic groups in China, like the Tibetans and Uyghurs, and the Mongol and Manchu rulers who held power in China for several centuries. The distinguished author takes pains to incorporate the perspectives and narratives of people traditionally left out of Chinese history, including women, peasants, merchants, and artisans. Readers will also enjoy the inclusion of: A thorough introduction to early and ancient Chinese history, including classical China, the first Chinese empires, and religious and political responses to the period between 220 and 581 CE An exploration of the restoration of Empire under Sui and Tang, as well as post-Tang society and Glorious Song A discussion of China and the Mongol world, including Mongol rule in China and the isolationism and involvement on the global stage of the Ming dynasty A treatment of China in global history, including the Qing era, the Republican period, and the Communist era Perfect for undergraduate students of courses on Chinese history and Central Asian History, the Second Edition of A History of China will also earn a place in the libraries of students studying global history and related classes in history departments and departments of Asian studies.The Blackwell History of the World Series The goal of this ambitious series is to provide an accessible source of knowledge about the entire human past, for every curious person in every part of the world. It will comprise some two dozen volumes, of which some provide synoptic views of the history of particular regions while others consider the world as a whole during a particular period of time. The volumes are narrative in form, giving balanced attention to social and cultural history (in the broadest sense) as well as to institutional development and political change. Each provides a systematic account of a very large subject, but they are also both imaginative and interpretative. The Series is intended to be accessible to the widest possible readership, and the accessibility of its volumes is matched by the style of presentation and production.

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Wood was essential to the survival of the Venetian Republic. To build its great naval and merchant ships, maintain its extensive levee system, construct buildings, fuel industries, and heat homes, Venice needed access to large quantities of oak and beech timber. The island city itself was devoid of any forests, so the state turned to its mainland holdings for this vital resource. A Forest on the Sea explores the history of this enterprise and Venice's efforts to extend state control over its natural resources. Karl Appuhn explains how Venice went from an isolated city completely dependent on foreign suppliers for wood to a regional state with a sophisticated system of administering and preserving forests. Intent on conserving this invaluable resource, Venice employed specialized experts to manage its forests. The state bureaucracy supervised this work, developing a philosophy about the environment-namely, a mutual dependence between humans and the natural world-that was far ahead of its time. Its efforts kept many large forest preserves under state protection, some of which still stand today. A Forest on the Sea offers a completely novel perspective on how Renaissance Europeans thought about the natural world. It sheds new light on how cultural conceptions about nature influenced political policies for resource conservation and land management in Venice.

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