Tag Archives: Ottoman Empire

second awakenings

Posted on August 19, 2012 by Dave

Looking today upon the wide crescent of the Arab world, whatever its disabilities, it does not stagnate. Squabbling, bickering, half-cocked, it remains, but it bursts with life. The great world listens to each successive assertion of the undying, united, un-extinguishable … Continue reading →

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room with a view: long-term lease

Posted on June 13, 2012 by Dave

Separate deals. Back room deals. Secret deals. off the books deals. The last Supper: a second sitting? the line up is around the block from Zion’s gate… Who owns what and where and the mirage and myriad of ownership rights, … Continue reading →

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wild and wooly: oh effendi!

Posted on May 18, 2012 by Dave

the Turks. The young turks,the old turks, they were all wild; from the quiet tranquility of the garden to the live action slicing and dicing of the human body, there was rarely a dull moment in the Ottoman Turkish empire. … Continue reading →

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true in the sweep

Posted on May 3, 2012 by Dave

Six and a half centuries ago, the Islamic world saw itself as the unquestioned pinnacle of civilization. What was it really like? The only answer we really have is in the diaries of Ibn Battuta, the wanderlust scholar who clocked … Continue reading →

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palace intrigue: little castle on the prairie

Posted on April 15, 2012 by Dave

The court artists who were called upon to depict so august and all-powerful a personage as a sultan  were faced with a challenging task. The represented the sultan larger than those around him, their rich robes expansively filling out the … Continue reading →

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in and around the seraglio

Posted on April 14, 2012 by Dave

….Turkey is putting up good economic numbers, and flourishing without the militarily imposed corruption that the Kemalist guarantors of secularism wallowed in as the price of preserving modern Turkey. Tiresome though Turkey’s anti-Israel posturing and pandering to the Arabs is, … Continue reading →

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THE HAREM, THE SULTAN, THE PAINTER, THE EUNICH & HIS LOVER

Posted on June 23, 2010 by Dave

”The pressures of being prince aren’t easy in any royal family, and history is full of eccentric rulers, warped by a childhood spent under a golden thumb. But the stakes in the house of Osman were higher then in any … Continue reading →

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AXIS: BOLD AS MARKETING WITH SULTANS, SAINTS, & SINNERS

Posted on June 23, 2010 by Dave

”Which multinational brand has the biggest image problem these days? BP? Toyota? Goldman Sachs? How about Islam? Say what you will about those other entities: They don’t have to deal with the public’s fear of terrorism. Last month, an opinion poll conducted … Continue reading →

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