In 1583, five Jesuit brothers set out with the intention of founding a new church and mission in India. Their dream was almost immediately, and brutally, terminated by local opposition. When their massacre was announced in Rome, it was treated as martyrdom. Francesco Benci, professor of rhetoric at the Collegium Romanum, immediately set about celebrating their deaths in a new type of epic, distinct from, yet dependent upon, the classical tradition: Quinque martyres e Societate Iesu in India. This is the first critical edition and translation of this important text. The commentary highlights both the classical sources and the historical and religious context of the mission. The introduction outlines Benci's career and stresses his role as the founder of this vibrant new genre. This volume is the first one for a new subseries in the 'Jesuit Studies' series: 'Jesuit Neo-Latin Library'.

The Syrian Social Nationalist Party (SSNP) is one of the most enigmatic and active political forces in the Middle East. For observers in the West, the SSNP is regarded as a far-right organization, subservient to the Baathist government of Syrian President Bashar al-Assad, which dictates its activities from Damascus. However, the SSNP's complicated history and its ideology of Pan-Syrianism has meant the party has been overlooked and forgotten by the daily output of news, analysis, studies and policy recommendations. Very little academic scholarship has been dedicated to understanding its origins, identity, and influence. Addressing the need for scholarship on the SSNP, this book is a political history from the party's foundation in 1932 to today. A comprehensive and objective study on the little known nationalist group, the author uses interviews from current members to gain insights into its everyday activities, goals, social interstices and nuances. Given the SSNP's history of violence, their own persecution, influence on other secular parties in the region, and their impact in Syria and Lebanon's politics, the book's analysis sheds light on the party's status in Lebanon and its potential role in a future post-war Syria. The SSNP is gaining popularity among regime supporters in Syria and will be one part of understanding the political developments on the ground. This book is essential reading for those wanting to understand the SSNP, its motives, and prospects.

After the Armenian genocide of 1915, in which over a million Armenians died, thousands of Armenians lived and worked in the Turkish state alongside those who had persecuted their communities. Living in the context of pervasive denial, how did Armenians remaining in Turkey record their own history? Here, Talin Suciyan explores the life experienced by these Armenian communities as Turkey's modernisation project of the twentieth century gathered pace. Suciyan achieves this through analysis of remarkable new primary material: Turkish state archives, minutes of the Armenian National Assembly, a kaleidoscopic series of personal diaries, memoirs and oral histories, various Armenian periodicals such as newspapers, yearbooks and magazines, as well as statutes and laws which led to the continuing persecution of Armenians. The first history of its kind, The Armenians in Modern Turkey is a fresh contribution to the history of modern Turkey and the Armenian experience there.

A unique on-the-ground account of a country shattered
Iraqi playwright Issam Jameel returned to Iraq after a 12-year exile. Giving up the relative safety of Jordan, he made a perilous journey to Baghdad for a reunion. Unfortunately, the reason for his trip was to grieve for his nephew, recently killed by American forces while guarding an Iraq parliament member from insurgents. Jameel also mourns the loss of a formerly secular civil society replaced by vehement sectarianism, intolerance, and ignorance. Basic human needs like food, water, and power have become an endless daily struggle amidst the shards of infrastructure. Routine tasks, such as selling a house or getting a job are fraught with peril as old scores continue to be settled on religious, ethnic, and political fronts. Everywhere he turns, people are desperate to leave, but fear for the worst. After escaping this madness, he recorded his eyewitness report, desperate to provide an honest and impartial tale of an epic tragedy which has killed more than 100,000 people and displaced many more.
Today, the US government gambles with Iraq's stability by turning a blind eye to Al-Maliki's internal policy, especially after Wikileaks revealed his complicity in death squads. We are jeopardizing the hard-won political gains that the US achieved by neutralizing the Sunnis of Iraq when it converted them from fighters and boycotters to voters. The US administration fails to show much real concern for the future of democracy in Iraq except perhaps for its anxiety about Obama's promises of military withdrawal.
Critics Praise "Iraq Through A Bullet Hole"
"Issam Jameel's "Iraq Through A Bullet Hole" is evocative in the best sense of the word. A native Iraqi, he describes with measured sadness and authenticity the dismemberment of his country by a senseless war. His perspective on events there-both personal and general-will not be found in reporting done by the Western press. His tale reminds us that the things that matter most-family, friends, and faith can and will endure even the most severe trials. I highly recommend this book for its relevance and timelessness."
--Cristobal Krusen, Author and Filmmaker
"Iraq has been a focus for our attention for years now, since our armed forces went looking for nonexistent weapons of mass destruction there. The media have presented a picture-but how real is it? What is life really like in that unfortunate country? Find out by reading this book."
--Robert Rich, PhD, Author of "Cancer: A Personal Challenge"
"Going home is such a trivial thing to so many people in the world. This story is the revealing statement of one man that went home to find it lost in such a strife-filled region, considered by historians as the origin of modern civilization. For those who do know how difficult his journey was, they will relate to Issam's message which is one of perseverance, shared hope and a common faith in mankind that in the end, all could eventually be well. If only men would let it..."
--Bill Evans, civilian contractor in Iraq
More info at www.IraqThruABulletHole.com
Book #5 in the Reflections of History Series from Modern History Press www.ModernHistoryPress.com
BIO000000 Biography & Autobiography: General
HIS027170 History: Military - Iraq War (2003-)
HIS026000 History: Middle East - General

This book deals with Singapore's transition from a British Crown Colony to a state in the Federation of Malaysia, and expulsion from the Federation to become a separate independent nation. For the leaders of Singapore's PAP Government, Malaysia was a traumatic experience. Yet, but for it, they might never have found the resolve and the secret of building this extraordinary nation, this nation based on Singapore alone that they and an entire generation had once believed an impossibility. This story of nation-building deals with topics on national (army) service, economic development, education in schools and in universities, housing and home ownership. It deals also with issues of ethnicity and national identity in the context of challenges from within and without, in the latter case from globalization and global Islamism.

The Iranian cleric Ayatollah Montazeri (1922-2009) played an integral role in the founding of the Islamic Republic in the wake of the Iranian Revolution of 1978/9. Yet at the time of his death, Montazeri was considered one of the Islamic Republic's fiercest critics. What made this man, who was once considered the leading advocate of the state doctrine of the 'Guardianship of the Jurist' (velayat-e faqih) and the designated successor to the supreme leader Ayatollah Khomeini, change his views? How did his political theory incorporate issues such as civil rights, pluralism and popular participation? And what influence did his ideas have on others? Ulrich von Schwerin's book answers these questions by examining the evolution of Montazeri's political thought over the course of five decades, and studies his role in the discourse on religion and politics in Iran. In doing so, he sheds a new light on some of the most crucial events and vital protagonists of recent Iranian history.

El autor es Carlo Emanuele Ruspoli. Roma, 1949. Es doctor arquitecto y autor de numerosos t tulos t cnicos y cat logos, as como de proyectos de edificaci n e industriales. Ensayista de art culos de ndole t cnica y cultural en varias revistas, asimismo colabora con la Real Academia Matritense de Her ldica y Genealog a. En mayo de 2011 edit con dicha Real Academia su primer libro de historia Retratos, an cdotas y secretos de los linajes Borja, T llez-Gir n, Marescotti y Ruspoli. Ha escrito adem?'s libros de historia, antropolog a, an cdotas de vida profesional y genealog a. Adem?'s ha publicado varias novelas hist ricas como: El Confaloniero, El Profeso, Asesinato en el Letr n, Muerte de Profesos, El Profeso en T bet y est preparando una nueva novela de la serie que se titular: El Profeso y el diablo. Su larga trayectoria profesional y su inquietud como viajador le ha permitido viajar a casi todos los lugares mencionados en este libro.

Colonial agents worked for fifty years to make a Japanese Taiwan, using technology, culture, statistics, trade, and modern ideologies to remake their new territory according to evolving ideas of Japanese empire. Since the end of the Pacific War, this project has been remembered, imagined, nostalgized, erased, commodified, manipulated, idealized and condemned by different sectors of Taiwan's population. ""The volume covers a range of topics, ""including colonial-era photography, exploration, postwar deportation, sport, film, media, economic planning, contemporary Japanese influences on Taiwanese popular culture, and recent nostalgia for and misunderstandings about the colonial era. "Japanese Taiwan" provides an inter-disciplinary perspective on these related processes of colonization and decolonization, explaining how the memories, scars and traumas of the colonial era have been utilized during the postwar period. It provides a unique critique of the 'Japaneseness' of the erstwhile Chinese Taiwan, thus bringing new scholarship to bear on problems in contemporary East Asian politics.

A special agency of censors was also organized for the purpose of enforcing the regulations concerning the sanctity of animal life and the observance of filial piety, in the most extended sense. These officers were expressly enjoined to concern themselves with all sects, and with every class of society, not excluding the royal family, while separate officials were charged with the delicate duty of supervising female morals. In practice, this system must have led to much espionage and tyranny] from Chapter VII: Asoka Maurya and His Successors First published in 1906, this classic nine-volume history of the nation of India places it among the storied lands of antiquity, alongside Egypt, China, and Mesopotamia. Edited by American academic ABRAHAM VALENTINE WILLIAMS JACKSON (18621937), professor of Indo-Iranian languages at Columbia University, it offers a highly readable narrative of the Indian people and culture through to the time of its publication, when the nation was still part of the British Empire. Volume II, From the Sixth Century B.C. to the Mohammedan Conquest, Including the Invasion of Alexander the Great, by British scholar VINCENT ARTHUR SMITH (1848-1920), features entertaining and enlightening treatments of: the dynasties before Alexander Alexanders Indian campaign imperial monarch Asoka Maurya the Indo-Greek and Indo-Parthian dynasties the Gupta Empire and the white Huns the reign of Harsha the medieval kingdoms of the north and much more. This beautiful replica of the 1906 first edition includes all the original illustrations.

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aAn excellent resource.a
--"Library Journal"

China's dramatic transformation over the past fifteen years has drawn its share of attention and fear from the global community and world leaders. Far from the inward-looking days of the Cultural Revolution, modern China today is the world's fourth largest economy, with a net product larger than that of France and the United Kingdom. And China's dynamism is by no means limited to its economy: enrollments in secondary and higher education are rapidly expanding, and new means of communication are vastly increasing information available to the Chinese public. In two decades, the Chinese government has also transformed its foreign relations--Beijing is now consulted on virtually every key development within the region. However, the Communist Party of China still dominates all aspects of political life. The Politburo is still self-selecting, Beijing chooses province governors, censorship is widespread, and treatment of dissidents remains harsh.

In China, leading experts provide an overview of the region, highlighting key issues as they developed in the People's Republic of China, Hong Kong, and Taiwan. Edited with an introduction by David B. H. Denoon, an authority on China, this volume of articles covers recent events and key issues in understanding this growing superpower. Organized into three thematic sections--foreign policy and national security, economic policy and social issues, and domestic politics and governance--the essays cover salient topics such as China's military power, de-communization, growing economic strength, nationalism, and the possibility for democracy. Thevolume also contains current maps as well as a "Recent Chronology of Events" which provides a decade's worth of information on the region, organized by year and by country.

Contributors: Liu Binyan, David B.H. Denoon, Bruce J. Dickson, June Teufel Dreyer, Michael Dutton, Elizabeth Economy, Barry Eichengreen, Edward Friedman, Dru C. Gladney, Paul H. B. Godwin, Merle Goldman, Richard Madsen, Barry Naughton, Lucian W. Pye, Tony Saich, David Shambaugh, Robert Sutter, Michael D. Swaine, and Tyrene White.

Overwhelmed with shame and anger, the old Sultan himself led a third campaign. Leaving the marches over against the Mongols in the care of Prince Mohammad, and placing trusty deputies in charge of Delhi and Samana, he took his second son Bughra Khan with him, and crossing the Ganges made straight for Lakhnauti, in total disregard of the rains which were then in season. from Chapter IV: The Slave Kings - The Turks in Delhi First published in 1906, this classic nine-volume history of the nation of India places it among the storied lands of antiquity, alongside Egypt, China, and Mesopotamia. Edited by American academic ABRAHAM VALENTINE WILLIAMS JACKSON (18621937), professor of Indo-Iranian languages at Columbia University, it offers a highly readable narrative of the Indian people and culture through to the time of its publication, when the nation was still part of the British Empire. Volume III, Part 1 of Medi]val India from the Mohammedan Conquest to the Reign of Akbar the Great, by British scholar STANLEY LANE-POOLE (1854-1931), features entertaining and enlightening treatments of: the Mohammedan invasion the idol-breaker, Mahmud of Ghazni the men of the mountain: Ghazni and Ghor the slave kings: the Turks in Delhi zenith of the slave dynasty the coming of the Moghuls and much more. This beautiful replica of the 1906 first edition includes all the original illustrations.

Belonging across the Bay of Bengal discusses themes connecting the regions bordering the Bay of Bengal, mainly covering the period from the mid-19th through the mid-20th centuries - a crucial period of transition from colonialism to independence. Focusing on the notion of 'belonging', the chapters in this collection highlight themes of ethnicity, religion, culture and the emergence of nationalist politics and state policies as they relate to the movement of peoples in the region. While the Indian Ocean has been of interest to scholars for decades, there has been a notable tilt towards historicizing the Western half of that space, often prioritizing Islamic trade as the key connective glue prior to the rise of Western power and the later emergence of transnational Indian nationalism. Belonging across the Bay of Bengal enriches this story by drawing attention to Buddhist and migrant connectivities, introducing discussions of Lanka, Burma and the Straits Settlements to establish the historical context of the current refugee crises playing out in these regions. This is a timely and innovative volume that offers a fresh approach to Indian Ocean history, further enriching our understanding of the current debates over minority rights and refugee problems in the region. It will be of great significance to all students and scholars of Indian Ocean studies as well as historians of modern South and Southeast Asia.

Few gave tiny Singapore much chance of survival when it was granted independence in 1965. How is it, then, that today the former British colonial trading post is a thriving Asian metropolis with not only the world's number one airline, best airport, and busiest port of trade, but also the world's fourth-highest per capita real income? The story of that transformation is told here by Singapore's charismatic, controversial founding father, Lee Kuan Yew. Rising from a legacy of divisive colonialism, the devastation of the Second World War, and general poverty and disorder following the withdrawal of foreign forces, Singapore now is hailed as a city of the future. This miraculous history is dramatically recounted by the man who not only lived through it all but who fearlessly forged ahead and brought about most of these changes. Mr. Lee is one of the most respected political figures in the world today ("Time" and "Newsweek" regularly profile his socio-economic strategies and his regime), and recognition of his name among academic, political, historical and sociological circles is guaranteed. This volume also features a foreword from Dr. Henry Kissinger.

To understand contemporary Irana??s notoriously complex politics, it is essential to grasp the monumental changes initiated by Mohammad Khatami. The previously little-known cleric stormed to victory in Irana??s 1997 presidential elections with nearly 70 percent of the vote, encouraging Irana??s reform movement to flourish during his eight year tenure as president. Ghoncheh Tazminia??s book offers a thought-provoking, astutely close-up yet systematic analysis of Khatami the man and the reform movement that supported him. She provides us with the first insight into Khatami and his politics, unravelling from the inside the dramatic emergence and consequences of Irana??s vibrant reform movement. Balanced and analytical, this book provides a comprehensive and finely detailed introduction to the subtleties of contemporary Irana??s complex political culture. At the same time it is an important reference point for a critical period of Irana??s post-revolutionary trajectory, especially given the controversial Post-Khatami developments in the country following the election of President Ahmadinejad.And with the Ahmadinejad view of Iranian politics creating a measure of discord in the country, Khatamia? ?s role as a player on the Iranian political scene remains firm.