Middle Eastern History
The Crusades From Another Perspective
Recently I’ve been reading Sharan Newman’s Defending The City of God: A Medieval Queen, The First Crusade And The Quest for Peace In Jerusalem. It was a perfect read for March, which was Women’s History Month.* Newman tells the story of a historical figure who was completely new to me. Melisende (1105-1161) was the first…
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Re-Run: If You Only Read One Book On Islamic History…
Last year I discovered the best general book on Islamic history I’ve ever read: Destiny Disrupted: A History of the World Through Islamic Eyes by Tanim Ansary. I underlined as I read. I annotated. I put little Post-It tabs at critical points, the durable ones so I could go back to key arguments in the…
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Re-Run: Muslim Spain–The Soundtrack
The perversity of the universe being what it is, the final stages of renovating our new-old house and finishing my book proposal have collided. Instead of driving myself mad trying to write blog posts or letting History in the Margins go blank for a few weeks, I decided to run some of my favorite posts…
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