Turkey

The quest for spiritual virtue through personal austerity drove many Eastern Christians to lead solitary lives as hermits surviving in the wilderness. Andrew Jotischky describes how indifference to food became an integral part of the monastic ideal in the Byzantine era, one revived in the West in the 11th and 12th centuries.

Bernard Lewis writes that the fall of Constantinople in was no “victory of barbarism, but rather of another and not undistinguished civilization.” First published in History Today magazine, October 1953, historiographically analysed by Roger Crowley in the October 2010 issue.

The Turkish government’s plans to flood two ancient towns with the reservoirs created by two dams are being fiercely resisted – but time is rapidly running out, as Pinar Sevinclidir reports.

Robert Johnson puts the decline of a once-great Empire into an international context.

Clive Foss looks at the way in which Kemal Atatürk rewrote history as part of his radical modernization of the Turkish nation.

Mark Rathbone compares Gladstone's and Disraeli's differing approaches to a crucial foreign policy issue.

Matthew Stewart traces the roots of the Greco-Turkish war of 1921-22, and the consequent refugee crisis, to the postwar settlements of 1919-20.

Jonathan Phillips sees one of the most notorious events in European history as a typical ‘clash of cultures’.

Roman Golicz looks at English attitudes to Russia during the Eastern Crisis of 1870-78.

Judith Herrin tells the dramatic story of the final moments of Byzantine control of the imperial capital.

Philip Mansel explores the City of the Sultans from 1453 onwards, and finds it characterised by a vibrant multi-culturalism until the Ottoman demise of 1922.

Geoffrey Woodward assesses how great an impact the Turks had on sixteenth-century Europe.

Philip Mansel looks at interchange and intrigue in the cross-currents of 18th-century culture between East and West.