history
When the World Feted America
The U.S. bicentennial in 1976 was an international affair, celebrated in diverse ways by countries around the world, in a turning point for American soft power and a rejection of the blunt propaganda of the early Cold War.
The Prison of Empire
In 1915, a 20-year-old named Vartuhi Kalantar was unjustly jailed in Istanbul for promoting Armenian independence. Her prison memoir, the first by a woman in the Middle East and a fascinating window into the dying days of the Ottoman Empire, has now been translated into English.
What a Pocketful of Metal Reveals About Afghanistan’s Forgotten Empires
Nearly 200 years ago, an East India Company agent in Central Asia started collecting ancient coins. Now kept in the British Museum, they reveal a time when Afghanistan was wealthy, cosmopolitan and culturally confident.
The Arabs of Hyderabad
From royal guards to entrepreneurs and wrestlers, Hyderabad’s Yemeni-origin community has navigated the collapse of princely rule, the violence of 1948 and life in independent India, preserving its identity and reinventing itself in a changing city.
The Living Fragments of Al-Andalus
A growing movement in Spain’s Andalusia argues that everyday gestures and half-remembered prayers are the unwritten remnants of Muslim Iberia, and an answer to the far right’s narratives about national identity.
How the Strait of Hormuz Became the World’s Most Contested Waterway
From the Portuguese conquest of 1507 to the end of British policing in 1971, various powers have tried to control the narrow channel between the Persian Gulf and the Indian Ocean.
The ‘Third Gulf War’ And Its Aftermath
Iran stoked conflict abroad for 40 years to avoid ever fighting at home. But the end of American restraint set off a cascade that led to the ‘Third Gulf War’ and the likely hollowing out of the regime.