The Sultan and the Queen from Penguin Random House at the Book Checkout

The Sultan And The Queen
The Sultan and the Queen
Subtitle:
The Untold Story of Elizabeth and Islam
Book Category:
History > Middle East > Turkey & Ottoman Empire
Author:
Brotton, Jerry
ISBN 13:
9780143110620
Price:
USD $18.00
Publication Year:
2017

Publisher Info

Penguin Random House.

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Book Description

Long before Thomas Jefferson confronted the Barbary Pirates, Queen Elizabeth sent a secret message to the Ottoman Sultan, inviting him to open his markets to her merchants. Islam and the West had a far more fertile relationship than we generally imagine--and for a long time the Muslims had the upper hand.

When Elizabeth was excommunicated by the pope for refusing to renounce her Protestant faith, she found herself in an awkward predicament. England had always depended on trade. Now its key markets were suddenly closed to her merchants, while the staunchly Catholic king of Spain vowed to take her throne. In a bold decision with far-reaching consequences, she set her sights on the East, sending an emissary to the shah of Iran, wooing the king of Morocco, and entering into an unprecedented alliance with the powerful Ottoman Sultan Murad III.

This marked the beginning of an extraordinary alignment with Muslim powers and of economic and political exchanges with the Islamic world of a depth not again experienced until the modern age. By the late 1580s, thousands of English merchants, diplomats, sailors, and privateers were plying their trade from Morocco to Persia. To finance these expeditions, English merchants created the first ever joint stock company, a revolutionary new business model that balanced risk and reward.

Jerry Brotton reveals that Elizabethan England's relationship with the Muslim world was far more amicable--and far more extensive--than we have ever appreciated as he tells the riveting story of the adventurers and traders who first went East to seek their fortunes. The Levant Company served as a model for the Virginia Company and East India Company and fueled the creation of the British Empire.