Ottoman Odyssey: Travels through a Lost Empire

Travel Guide

Ottoman Empire

Ottoman Empire

This book and its coverage is too vast for one BookTrail to do it justice. However there are many parts of is which can be visited and should be. If even to visit Istanbul and see the centre of the Empire reveal its secrets.

Diaspora means ‘scattered seeds’ and it is striking that two of the major diasporas of the Ottoman Empire – the Armenians and the Jews – claim the pomegranate as their national symbol. The pomegranate represents fertility, abundance and prosperity; when applied to a disapora, it suggests an ability to renew in adversity, fr from home.

Karakoy – The ruined rock village which was the inspiration fot the Louis de Bernieres novel Birds Without Wings.

Greece

The history of Thessaloniki does not ‘slap you in the face’  apparently as much as it does in Istanbul and elsewhere. The Haga Sophie church here played its part even though it’s not as ornamental as its namesake in Istanbul.

Georgia

The author goes here first as the relationship between Turkey and Armenia are bad and it was impossible at the time to fly between the two places.

Armenia

Armenia was the first country to get stage Christianity – (true in AD 301, sixty years before Georgia). It’s orthodoxChurch is superior to both the Russian and Georgian Othodox Church. Armenian Dolma is better then Georgian and of course there is only ‘Armenian Coffee’ not Turkish Coffee”.

Cyprus

The breakup of the island is explained in one chapter.

The Balkan States

Bosnia Herzegovina – a study in wannabe imperialism

Sarajevo – founded by the Ottomans in 1461

Serbia

The visible Ottoman legacy of Belgrade today is patchy, confined mainly to ruins rather than urban architecture. The Belgrade fortress is part of this story.

Jerusalem

The palimpsest-like streets of Jerusalem’s old town hint at the Ottoman coexistence of Muslim and Jews