A review by wdudley89
Empires of the Sea: The Final Battle for the Mediterranean, 1521-1580 by Roger Crowley

4.0

I chose this book hoping to learn more about the century that followed the Ottoman conquest of Constantinople and was not disappointed. The first part of the book was especially engrossing, setting the stage for the conflict between the Ottoman desire for continued westward expansion and the efforts of the Spanish kings, the Popes, and the Venetian merchants to defend their established territory. All of this played out in the Mediterranean, in a series of never ending skirmishes along the coasts and a number of decisive battles: the Ottomans first taking the island of Rhodes, then failing to take Malta, and finally suffering a massive defeat at sea that exhausted the resources of both empires. The result was an uneasy peace and a reorientation of aspirations, with the Ottomans turning to the Persians in the east and the Hungarians to the north, and the Spaniards engaging Protestant Europe and the New World. My interest waned in the middle of the book, when the descriptions of particular battles became excessively detailed. But the book picked up again at the end and left me wanting to read more: about the Crusades that preceded this period, about the Catholic-Protestant wars that followed it, about the origins of the Ottoman Empire, and about the Muslim settlement of Northern Africa.