Looking for a good read? Here is a recommendation. I have an unusual approach to reviewing books. I review books I feel merit a review. Each review is an opportunity to recommend a book. If I do not think a book is worth reading, I find another book to review. You do not have to agree with everything every author has written (I do not), but the fiction I review is entertaining (and often thought-provoking) and the non-fiction contain ideas worth reading.
Book Review
The Rise of the Turk
Reviewed by Mark Lardas
March 9, 2025
“Crescent Dawn: The Rise of the Ottoman Empire and the Making of the Modern Age,” by Si Sheppard, Osprey Publishing, February 2025, 528 pages, $40.00 (Hardback), $28.00 (E-book)
For over 300 years the Ottoman Empire dominated the Old World as no power had since Rome. From 1300 to 1600 it sat astride Eurasia’s trade routes, challenging all comers and generally dominating them. The chief adversary of European Christianity, it projected power into Africa, India, Persia, and Russia.
“Crescent Dawn: The Rise of the Ottoman Empire and the Making of the Modern Age,” by Si Sheppard, follows the rise of the Ottoman Empire from its beginning to its zenith. It documents its rise to world domination.
It shows they began as an obscure high steppes tribe pushed into Syria as refugees by the Mongols in the 12th and 13th centuries. After conversion to Islam they became a power in eastern Anatolia, starting their path to imperial hegemony by defeating the Byzantines in battle in 1302. As Sheppard shows, an inexorable growth followed. Initially against the Byzantines, they erupted into Europe in the late 1300s.
From there they became the dominant regional power. Over 200 years they spread into the Balkans, the Holy Lands and the Tigris-Euphrates valley. They extinguished the Byzantine Empire and threatened the major Eastern European and Mediterranean powers in the west and the Persians in the east. They did so through skillful use of technology. Sheppard reveals they were early adaptors of gunpowder, with the world’s best siege warfare capability.
The story Sheppard relates is a fascinating kaleidoscope of nations and personalities. Memmed I and II and Suleiman the Magnificent share the stage with Skanderberg of Albania, Vlad Tepes (Dracula), Manuel II of Portugal, Charles V of Spain and Archduke Ferdinand of Austria. It spans from Tangiers in the west to Ethiopia in the south, the gates of Vienna in the north and the Indian subcontinent in the east.
Sheppard shows how the Ottomans stamp on the world still influences the modern world. None of what happened was inevitable. Near-run things dominate. The Ottomans almost lost the siege where they conquered Constantinople and almost won the siege of Vienna.
Their decline started when their eventual victory seemed inevitable. Voyages to the New World and the Portuguese ventures into the Indian Ocean were fueled by fear of the Turk. Yet they opened up market and lands which allowed Europe to outflank the Ottomans.
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“Crescent Dawn” is a fascinating read. It has relevance to the power politics of today’s world offering lessons best heeded by 21st century leaders.
Mark Lardas, an engineer, freelance writer, historian, and model-maker, lives in League City. His website is marklardas.com.