Transforming empire : the Genoese from the Mediterranean to the Atlantic, 1282-1492
Abstract/Contents
- Abstract
- Between the crusades and Columbus, the Genoese maritime empire centered in the eastern Mediterranean and the Black Sea transformed into a financial empire based on the Iberian peninsula. From the thirteenth century, Mongol, Mamluk, Turcoman, and Latin formations took advantage of Byzantine weakness; and against this backdrop the Genoese established a network of fortified ports and islands. With their maritime dominance, the Genoese rendered themselves essential to rulers from Plantagenet England to Mongol Baghdad, as mercenaries, envoys, navigators, bankers, and merchants. Yet the fifteenth-century rise of the Ottoman and Spanish empires eroded Genoese naval superiority. Traditionally, Venice is seen to have triumphed over Genoa in the geopolitical competition -- after all, the Venetian empire endured far longer than did that of the Genoese. Yet it was a pyrrhic victory, and the Genoese defeat a salutary trauma. Losing their eastern possessions to a rising Ottoman power and enduring foreign domination at home, the Genoese adapted and innovated, becoming dominant on the Iberian peninsula and in the Atlantic world in banking, the sugar industry, and the slave trade. Based on research conducted in two dozen archives and manuscript libraries around the globe, this dissertation weaves together Ottoman Turkish and Latin sources and brings together fragmented historiographies in an integrated narrative and analytical arc from the Mediterranean to the Atlantic. It was no accident that Columbus was Genoese. As pirates and slave traders, navigators and bankers, they brought extensive resources and long experience to their infiltration of the Iberian empires. Whether we demonize Columbus or lionize him, the Genoese trajectory brings us into an era we recognize readily as our own. Yet this study also forces a radical reassessment of a constellation of broad themes which we usually examine only in isolation: the legacy of the crusades and the interaction between Islam and Latin Christianity; the roots and consequences of Atlantic slavery; and the relationship of violence and colonial exploitation to the more subtle and hidden sovereignty of financial power.
Description
| Type of resource | text |
|---|---|
| Form | electronic resource; remote; computer; online resource |
| Extent | 1 online resource. |
| Place | California |
| Place | [Stanford, California] |
| Publisher | [Stanford University] |
| Copyright date | 2021; ©2021 |
| Publication date | 2021; 2021 |
| Issuance | monographic |
| Language | English |
Creators/Contributors
| Author | Rohan, Padraic |
|---|---|
| Degree supervisor | Findlen, Paula |
| Thesis advisor | Findlen, Paula |
| Thesis advisor | Como, David R, 1970- |
| Thesis advisor | Dorin, Rowan |
| Thesis advisor | Yaycioglu, Ali |
| Degree committee member | Como, David R, 1970- |
| Degree committee member | Dorin, Rowan |
| Degree committee member | Yaycioglu, Ali |
| Associated with | Stanford University, Department of History |
Subjects
| Genre | Theses |
|---|---|
| Genre | Text |
Bibliographic information
| Statement of responsibility | Padraic Rohan. |
|---|---|
| Note | Submitted to the Department of History. |
| Thesis | Thesis Ph.D. Stanford University 2021. |
| Location | https://purl.stanford.edu/zm182kq6548 |
Access conditions
- Copyright
- © 2021 by Padraic Rohan
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