The new edition of the Blue Guide to this fascinating city, which straddles Europe and the Orient and whose history goes back to the days of ancient Greece, offers superb coverage of all the major monuments Classical, Christian, and Islamic with details on what to eat and where to stay."

This book is a history of the architecture produced in Turkey under the Ottoman Empire. It focuses on extant buildings in the Republic of Turkey, particularly those in Istanbul and the empire's earlier capitals in Bursa and Edirne. The book begins with a brief history of the Ottoman Empire, followed by an outline of the main features of Ottoman architecture and its decoration, then a brief biography of the great Ottoman architect Sinan. Successive chapters follow the development of Ottoman architecture from 1453 until 1923. The book is intended for the general reader with an interest in...

In the spring of 1500, at the apex of the Renaissance, a papal secretary to the Borgia Pope, Alexander VI, wrote that ""All the world is in Rome."" Though no one knew it at the time, this included a young scholar by the name of Nicolaus Copernicus who would one day change the world.

One of the greatest polymaths of his or any age - linguist, lawyer, doctor, diplomat, politician, mathematician, scientist, astronomer, artist, cleric - Copernicus gave the world arguably the most important scientific discovery of the modern era: that earth and the planets revolve around the sun and that...

The Cyclades are the quintessential Greek isles, renowned for the beauty of their seascapes, their historical monuments, and a unique way of life deeply rooted in the remote past of the Aegean. Over the course of more than 7,000 years the Cyclades have seen a succession of civilizations, the earliest of them perpetuated in legends such as that of Atlantis, which has been identified with volcanic Santorini. The islands are arrayed around their sacred centre on Delos, where Leto was said to have given birth to the divine twins Apollo and Artemis, children of Zeus. Dionysus was born on...

Legend has it that the Ionian Islands were created as Zeus' beautiful lover, Io, raced through the Ionian Sea escaping Hera's wrath. Rising from the waters between Greece and Italy, the Ionians - peaks of an underwater mountain range - are quite unlike any of the other Greek islands and are some of the most culturally, historically and mythologically rich in all Greece. Consisting of Corfu, Paxos, Ithaka, Lefkas, Cephalonia, Zakynthos (Zante) and Kythera, they have been inhabited since Paleolithic times and have a colourful and often turbulent past. Variously invaded and occupied by the...