In this exemplary study, Faisal H. Husain analyzes the Ottoman Empire's management of the Tigris and Euphrates. Rivers of the Sultan reconstructs insightfully the ecological relations between the imperial center and its Eastern periphery and brings to life a lively history of various historical actors, from Ottoman governors, to cultivators of crops, to tribal confederations, who benefited from the rivers and their management. The book reminds us how the
maintenance of law and order, the control of wealth, the politics of infrastructure, and the movements of grains and arms were deeply intertwined into the history of water itself. A fascinating exploration of irrigation, wetland exploitation as well as of natural disaster, famine and floods, this book changes
the ways in which we evaluate Iraq's past and present.
Faisal H. Husain is Assistant Professor of History at the Pennsylvania State University. His articles have won prizes from the American Society for Environmental History and the Ottoman and Turkish Studies Association.