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The Great Sea

The Great Sea

A Human History of the Mediterranean

by David Abulafia
Hardback
Publication Date: 13/10/2011

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$41.95
Connecting Europe, Asia, and Africa, the Mediterranean Sea has been for millennia the place where religions, economies, and political systems met, clashed, influenced and absorbed one another. In this brilliant and expansive book, 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 re-crossed it.

Ranging from prehistory to the 21st century, The Great Sea is above all a history of human interaction. 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."

Now available in paperback, The Great Sea is the definitive account of perhaps the most vibrant theater of human interaction in history.

ISBN:
9780195323344
9780195323344
Category:
The Earth: natural history general
Format:
Hardback
Publication Date:
13-10-2011
Language:
English
Publisher:
Oxford University Press, Incorporated
Country of origin:
United States
Dimensions (mm):
163.58x239.78x59.44mm
Weight:
1.24kg
David Abulafia

David Abulafia has written extensively on the political, economic and social history of the Mediterranean, especially Sicily, southern Italy and the Catalan world.

His books, several of which have been translated into Italian, Spanish or German, include The Two Italies, A Mediterranean Emporium and The Western Mediterranean Kingdoms 1200-1500,The New Cambridge Medieval History, volume 5, c.1198-1300, which he edited, and Frederick II. He has also written over a hundred historical articles. He had lectured in several European countries and in the United States, Israel and Japan, and he regularly visits Italy for his research.

He has been awarded the King Roger II Prize in Sicily for his books on the history of the island. He strongly believes that historians should attempt to convey the results of their research to a wider public. He is Professor of Mediterranean History at Cambridge University and he has been a Fellow of Gonville and Caius College, Cambridge, since 1974.

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