This volume calls attention to the worst massacre of Christians that has occurred on the African continent, a 1937 attack on the monastic village of Debre Libanos that has previously been hidden from public knowledge. Between 20 and 29 May 1937, about 2000 monks and pilgrims, considered "conniving" in the attack on the fascist Italian viceroy Rodolfo Graziani, were killed in Ethiopia. The attack on Debre Libanos, the most famous sanctuary of Ethiopian Christianity, far exceeded the logic of a strictly military operation. It represented the apex of wide-ranging repressive action, aimed at crushing the Ethiopian resistance and striking at the heart of the Christian tradition for its historical link with the imperial power of the Negus. Although known to scholars, the episode was totally removed from national historical memory. Now available in English, this book's analysis of the events culminating in the massacre, including the cover-up afterward, is a necessary record for scholars of European colonialism, Christian history, and colonial Africa.

Research on the East Slavs in the medieval period has considerably changed since the collapse of the Soviet Union. The emergence of new states forced a rethinking of many aspects of the history and culture of the early East Slavs as the subject became increasingly disentangled from the umbrella of Byzantine studies and fruitful collaboration was fostered between scholars worldwide. This book, which brings together scholars from Russia, Ukraine, western Europe and North America, of several generations, presents a broad overview of the main results of the last three decades of research and mutual collaboration. This is important work, providing a much-needed counterbalance to studies of western Europe in the period, which has been the main focus of study, with the lands of the East Slavs relatively neglected.

The concept of friends is considered broadly, as connections of mutual affection but also simply through business relationships. Families are considered in terms of how they helped or hindered local integration for foreigners and the matrimonial strategies they pursued. Networks were also deeply impacted by rivalry and hostility.

The Nazi Party and the German Communities Abroad examines the German Nazi Party's actions around the world in the 1930s and 1940s. The book particularly focuses in on the formation and development of the Auslandsorganization der NSDAP (AO) (Nazi Party/Foreign Organization), the party branch charged with the task of connecting with foreign fascist movements and, especially, with Germans living abroad. The authors follow the creation of the AO and its development in Germany, along with its actions throughout the world, including Europe, Asia, Africa and North America, before finally focusing on Latin America. The Latin American case is then presented in both general and particular aspects, including countries such as Argentina, Chile, Brazil, Mexico and Colombia. The study draws on many primary sources and is extensively referenced; an index with seven hundred references related to the action of Nazism in the American continent is presented, including the American and Canadian cases. This volume will be of interest to researchers of the history of Nazism and Latin America.

Early modern Protestant scholars closely engaged with Islamic thought in more ways than is usually recognized. Among Protestants, Lutheran scholars distinguished themselves as the most invested in the study of Islam and Muslim culture. Mehmet Karabela brings the neglected voices of post-Reformation theologians, primarily German Lutherans, into focus and reveals their rigorous engagement with Islamic thought. Inspired by a global history approach to religious thought, Islamic Thought Through Protestant Eyes offers new sources to broaden the conventional interpretation of the Reformation beyond a solely European Christian phenomenon. Based on previously unstudied dissertations, disputations, and academic works written in Latin in the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries, Karabela analyzes three themes: Islam as theology and religion; Islamic philosophy and liberal arts; and Muslim sects (Sunni and Shi'a). This book provides analyses and translations of the Latin texts as well as brief biographies of the authors. These texts offer insight into the Protestant perception of Islamic thought for scholars of religious studies and Islamic studies as well as for general readers. Examining the influence of Islamic thought on the construction of the Protestant identity after the Reformation helps us to understand the role of Islam in the evolution of Christianity.

This book provides an original, impassioned exploration of memory studies and the uses of the past in the present. It capitalises on London's global appeal and Big Ben's iconic status. Moving beyond this familiar facade the reader will journey around the hidden histories of Westminster's streets, squares and statues. This tangible heritage supports a diversity of contested memories. The rationale for this approach is that, by linking theory with empirical examples, it becomes possible to tackle complex issues in a grounded, accessible manner. Readers will be encouraged to use this case study as a framework for addressing the politics of memory in their own lives as well as in other places, not just in Britain but around the world. This book will be of interest to scholars and students from a wide variety of disciplines including, but not limited to, sociology, culture and media studies, English literature, film and television studies, global studies, heritage studies, history, politics and human geography.

This volume addresses the question of 'identity' in East-Central Europe. It engages with a specific definition of 'sub-cultures' over the period from c. 1900 to the present and proposes novel ways in which the term can be used with the purpose of understanding identities that do not conform to the fixed, standard categories imposed from the top down, such as 'ethnic group', 'majority' or 'minority'. Instead, a 'sub-culture' is an identity that sits between these categories. It may blend languages, e.g. dialect forms, cultural practices, ethnic and social identifications, or religious affiliations as well as concepts of race and biology that, similarly, sit outside national projects.

This book tells the story of the Del Riccio family in Florence in the early modern period, investigating the cultural mediations fostered by the family between Florence, Rome, and Naples, as well as shedding light on the intellectual and social exchanges between different regions of Italy and on the creation of foreign nations within the main Italian cities. These social and cultural dimensions are further explored through the study of the obsessive persistence of the family's relationship with Michelangelo Buonarroti, exhibited both publicly, in the Florentine and Neapolitan family chapels, and privately in their homes. The main achievement of this study is to move the focus from the ruling power, the Medici family and the immediate members of their court, to a Florentine middle-class family and its social mobility: this shift from the conventional narrative to a distributed microhistory is fundamental to better assess the use of images and artworks in early modern Florence and abroad. The aesthetic and stylistic choices in the use of art and art display made by the Del Riccio reveal a deep awareness of the substantial differences in taste and meaning between different cities of the Italian peninsula. The book will be of interest to scholars working in art history, visual culture, and Renaissance studies.

The fascinating untold story of how Nazi architects and planners envisioned and began to build a model "Aryan" society in Norway during World War II Between 1940 and 1945, German occupiers transformed Norway into a vast construction zone. This remarkable building campaign, largely unknown today, was designed to extend the Greater German Reich beyond the Arctic Circle and turn the Scandinavian country into a racial utopia. From ideal new cities to a scenic superhighway stretching from Berlin to northern Norway, plans to remake the country into a model "Aryan" society fired the imaginations of Hitler, his architect Albert Speer, and other Nazi leaders. In Hitler's Northern Utopia, Despina Stratigakos provides the first major history of Nazi efforts to build a Nordic empire-one that they believed would improve their genetic stock and confirm their destiny as a new order of Vikings. Drawing on extraordinary unpublished diaries, photographs, and maps, as well as newspapers from the period, Hitler's Northern Utopia tells the story of a broad range of completed and unrealized architectural and infrastructure projects far beyond the well-known German military defenses built on Norway's Atlantic coast. These ventures included maternity centers, cultural and recreational facilities for German soldiers, and a plan to create quintessential National Socialist communities out of twenty-three towns damaged in the German invasion, an overhaul Norwegian architects were expected to lead. The most ambitious scheme-a German cultural capital and naval base-remained a closely guarded secret for fear of provoking Norwegian resistance. A gripping account of the rise of a Nazi landscape in occupied Norway, Hitler's Northern Utopia reveals a haunting vision of what might have been-a world colonized under the swastika.

Histories you can trust. At age thirty in 1919, Adolf Hitler had no accomplishments. He was a rootless loner, a corporal in a shattered army, without money or prospects. A little more than twenty years later, in autumn 1941, he directed his dynamic forces against the Soviet Union, and in December, the Germans were at the gates of Moscow and Leningrad. At that moment, Hitler appeared - however briefly - to be the most powerful ruler on the planet. Given this dramatic turn of events, it is little wonder that since 1945 generations of historians keep trying to explain how it all happened. This rich history provides a readable and fresh approach to the complex history of the Third Reich, from the coming to power of the Nazis in 1933 to the final collapse in 1945, distilling our ideas about the period and providing a balanced and accessible account of the whole era.

'The Hitler Years ~ Disaster and its companion volume, The Hitler Years ~ Triumph, are not just informative on a nearly encyclopaedic level, they are well-researched, well-structured, and well-written. What's more, they are relevant and challenging. Through questioning the myths that still exist, they encourage the reader to think in a new way, not just about the past, but about the present and the future' Get History At the beginning of 1940 Germany was at the pinnacle of its power. By May 1945 Hitler was dead and Germany had suffered a disastrous defeat. Hitler had failed to achieve his aim of making Germany a super power and had left her people to cope with the endless shame of the Holocaust. In The Hitler Years ~ Disaster 1940-1945, Professor Frank McDonough charts the dramatic change of fortune for the Third Reich, and challenges long-held accounts of the Holocaust and Germany's ultimate defeat. Despite Hitler's grand ambitions and the successful early stages of the Third Reich's advances into Europe, Frank McDonough argues that Germany was only ever a middle-ranking power and never truly stood a chance against the combined forces of the Allies. Praise for Frank McDonough: 'Superbly scholarly and just as readable' DAN SNOW 'McDonough has provided fascinating insights into the experiences of Germans in a fickle and frightening world' THE TIMES, on THE GESTAPO

Triumph and Illusion is the final volume of Jonathan Sumption's epic history of the Hundred Years War. It tells the story of the collapse of the English dream of conquest from the opening years of the reign of Henry VI, when the battles of Cravant and Verneuil consolidated their control of most of northern France, until the loss of all their continental dominions except Calais thirty years later. This sudden reversal of fortune was a seminal event in the history of the two principal nation-states of western Europe. It brought an end to four centuries of the English dynasty's presence in France, separating two countries whose fortunes had once been closely intertwined. It created a new sense of national identity in both countries. The legacy of these events would influence their divergent fortunes for centuries to come. Behind the clash of arms stood some of the most remarkable personalities of the age: the Duke of Bedford, the English Regent who ruled much of France from Paris and Rouen; Charles VII of France, underrated in both countries, who patiently rebuilt his kingdom after the disasters of his early years; the captains who populate the pages of Shakespeare - Fastolf, Montagu, Talbot, Dunois and, above all, the extraordinary figure of Joan of Arc who changed the course of the war in a few weeks at the age of seventeen.

The influence of the Roman Empire lives on in civilized life and this book offers an insight into a remarkable era of history, including the rich legacy of attitudes and styles in government, civic life, morality, technology and the arts. Look out for more Pitkin Guides on the very best of British history, heritage and travel.

Due to high adult mortality and the custom of remarriage, stepfamilies were a common phenomenon in pre-industrial Europe. Focusing on East Central Europe, a neglected area of western historiography, this book draws essential comparisons in terms of remarriage patterns and stepfamily life with Northwestern Europe. Why were women in the 'east' more ready to remarry? What were the responsibilities of a stepfather or a stepmother? By drawing on quantitative as well as qualitative approaches, the book offers an historical demographical narrative of the frequency of stepfamilies in a comparative framework, and also assesses the impact of stepparents on the mortality and career prospects of their stepchildren. The ethnic and religious diversity of East Central Europe also allows for distinctions and comparisons to be made within the region. Remarriage and Stepfamilies in East Central Europe, 1600-1900 will appeal to researchers and students alike interested in the history of family, marriage, and society in East Central Europe.

When on Christmas Day, 1130, Roger de Hauteville was crowned first King of Sicily, the island entered a golden age. Norman and Italian, Greek and Arab, Lombard, Englishman and Jew all contributed to a culture that was fantastically cosmopolitan; and to an atmosphere of racial and religious toleration unparalleled in Europe. But sixty-four years later, to the day, when the bastard King Tancred was defeated, the sun set on the Sicilian Kingdom. In this second volume of John Julius Norwich's scintillating history of the Normans in Sicily, Norwich describes the 'happiest and most glorious chapter of the island's history.'

This, quite simply, is the definitive book on the life of the man who prepared the ground for victory in the Battle of Britain. Without him, Britain and the world would have entered a dark age. Making full use of archival sources and information provided by family members, respected historian Professor Vincent Orange has produced a masterful biography of a truly remarkable man.

Chronicling the 'other Norman invasion', The Normans in the South is the epic story of the House of Hauteville, and in particular Robert Guiscard, perhaps the most extraordinary European adventurer between the times of Caesar and Napoleon. In one year, 1084, he had both the Eastern and Western Emperors retreating before him and one of the most formidable of medieval Popes in his power. His brother, Roger, helped him to conquer Sicily from the Saracens, and his nephew Roger II went on to create the cosmopolitan kingdom whose remaining monuments still dazzle us today. The Normans in the South is the first of two volumes that recount an extraordinary chapter in Italian history.

Presented here for the first time is the complete history of the German combat divers in World War II. The author discusses military diving, the development of technical equipment, the establishment and organization of the German combat diver units, and their use in sabotage operations. Also, the completely unknown story of the creation of the Sea Commando Battalion Brandenburg and the navy's Combat Diver Training Detachment 700 which emerged from it is discussed.

Nationalising the Crusades contributes greatly to new and increasing discussion on the crusades and draws together cutting-edge research by numerous expert contributors that opens up new national contexts for further comparison and also offers methodological variety through dynamic case studies. This advanced text is at the forefront of current historical debate and is an invaluable source for researchers and high level students, giving them the tools and understandings needed to follow and participate in ongoing discourse surrounding the Crusades and the history of memory and modern memorialisation of the medieval period.

This book seeks to understand the complex ways in which the Foreign Office adapted to the rise of identity politics in Britain as it administered British foreign policy during the Cold War and the end of the British Empire. After the Second World War, cultural changes in British society forced a reconsideration of erstwhile diplomatic archetypes, as restricting recruitment to white, heterosexual, upper- or middle-class men gradually became less socially acceptable and less politically expedient. After the advent of the tripartite school system and then mass university education, the Foreign Office had to consider recruiting candidates who were qualified but had not been 'socialized' in the public schools and Oxbridge. Similarly, the passage of the 1948 Nationality Act technically meant nonwhites were eligible to join. The rise of the gay rights movement and postwar women's liberation both generated further, unique dilemmas for Foreign Office recruiters. Diplomatic Identity in Postwar Britain seeks to destabilize concepts like 'talent', 'merit', 'equality' and 'representation', arguing that these were contested ideas that were subject to political and cultural renegotiation and revision throughout the period in question.

An exploration of trends and cultures connected to electrical telegraphy and recent digital communications, this collection emerges from the research project Scrambled Messages: The Telegraphic Imaginary 1866-1900, which investigated cultural phenomena relating to the 1866 transatlantic telegraph. It interrogates the ways in which society, politics, literature and art are imbricated with changing communications technologies, from the mid-nineteenth century to the present. Contributors consider control, imperialism and capital, as well as utopianism and hope, grappling with the ways in which human connections (and their messages) continue to be shaped by communications infrastructures.

Social Aspects of Memory presents a compelling study of how ordinary people remember war. Whilst the book focuses on the cities of Sarajevo and East Sarajevo during the 1992-1995 war in Bosnia-Herzegovina, Jeftic also presents narratives from other war-torn cities and countries around the world. This book adopts a unique approach, by looking at how perpetrators and victims (as well as new generations who may not remember the war directly) manage in the aftermath of war. Jeftic explores how our memories of war and violence are formed, and how we can learn to reconcile those memories, individually and as a collective. Drawing on the author's own extensive empirical research, the book explores the connections between memories for significant war events, transgenerational transmission of memories, bias for in-group wrongdoings and readiness for reconciliation between two groups. Giving a voice to underrepresented narratives and prioritising the importance of expression as a necessary catalyst for reconciliation, this book is essential reading for those interested in collective and transgenerational memory and memory studies, especially in relation to the aftermath of the 1992-1995 war in Bosnia-Herzegovina.

Konstantin Ustinovich Chernenko. a fig ure wtm appeared to the outside worid as a commonplace Russian bureaucrat cut from the mold of a Gogol short story, was elevated in 1984 to the post of general sec retary of the Communist party of the So viet Union. Thus, a post held by such awesome, fearsome figures as Lenin and Stalin passed into the hands of someone perceived as a nondescript bureaucrat, de void of ideas or initiative, and crippled by old age and infirmity.A singular merit of this work is that it shows how far from the mark were these perceptions. This is the only full-length treatment of Chernenko. in contrast to the vast tomes written on his five predecessors as well as on the present incumbent, Mkrhail Gorbachev. The work delves into archival materials never before reported in either the East or West. The picture that emerges is not of some run-of-the-mill ap paratchik, but of a figure who in the con text of the Brezhnev era came forth with ideas that were revolutionary, at least in the sense of a realization of the deep mal aise into which Soviet economy and so ciety had fallen.Zemtsov's volume explains the paradox of a servile conservative member of th Politburo becoming an innovative, even courageous, leader during the thirteen fateful months he held Soviet power, ft is a tribute to this effort at reconstruction that what emerges is a rounded human being and not simply a political actor. This ana lytical study of the transformation of a peasant into a politician fills out a missing link without which the current impulse to reform in the U.S.S.R. is hard to under stand or appreciate

"It's long been assumed of the region where my grandmother was born...that at some point each year the dead will come home," Inara Verzemnieks writes in this exquisite story of war, exile, and reconnection. Her grandmother's stories recalled one true home: the family farm left behind in Latvia, where, during WWII, her grandmother Livija and her grandmother's sister, Ausma, were separated. They would not see each other again for more than 50 years. Raised by her grandparents in Washington State, Inara grew up among expatriates, scattering smuggled Latvian sand over the coffins of the dead, singing folk songs about a land she had never visited. When Inara discovers the scarf Livija wore when she left home, in a box of her grandmother's belongings, this tangible remnant of the past points the way back to the remote village where her family broke apart. There it is said the suspend their exile once a year for a pilgrimage through forests and fields to the homes they left behind. Coming to know Ausma and the trauma of her exile to Siberia under Stalin, Inara pieces together Livija's survival through years as a refugee. Weaving these two parts of the family story together in spellbinding, lyrical prose, she gives us a profound and cathartic account of loss, survival, resilience, and love.