Cover -- Half Title -- Title -- Copyright -- Contents -- Acknowledgments -- Notes on Dates, Transcription, and Format -- 1 Introduction -- PART ONE -- Chapter 1. Politics -- Chapter 2. Geography -- Chapter 3. Topography -- Chapter 4. Archaeology -- PART TWO -- Chapter 5. Construction -- Chapter 6. Hochbau -- Chapter 7. Monuments -- Chapter 8. Urbanism -- Conclusion -- Notes -- Bibliography -- Illustration Credits -- Index -- A -- B -- C -- D -- E -- F -- G -- H -- I -- J -- K -- L -- M -- N -- O -- P -- Q -- R -- S -- T -- U -- V -- W -- Y -- Z

The complex political and cultural relationship between the German state and the Ottoman Empire is explored through the lens of the Ottoman Railway network, its architecture, and material culture and its interest to the disciplines of geography, topography, art history, and archaeology.

Railway expansion was the great industrial project of the late 19th century, and the Great Powers built railways at speed and reaped great commercial benefits. The greatest imperial dream of all was to connect the might of Europe to the potential riches of the Middle East and the Ottoman Empire. In 1903 Imperial Germany, under Kaiser Wilhelm II, began to construct a railway which would connect Berlin to the Ottoman city of Baghdad, and project German power all the way to the Persian Gulf. The Ottoman Emperor, Abdul Hamid II, meanwhile, saw the railway as a means to bolster crumbling Ottoman control of Arabia. Using new Ottoman Turkish sources, Murat Ozyuksel shows how the Berlin-Baghdad railway became a symbol of both rising European power and declining Ottoman fortunes. It marks a new and important contribution to our understanding of the geopolitics of the Middle East before World War I, and will be essential reading for students of empire, Industrial History and Ottoman Studies.

Presents a comprehensive A-to-Z reference to the empire that once encompassed large parts of the modern-day Middle East, North Africa, and southeastern Europe.

Railway expansion was symbolic of modernization in the late 19th century, and Britain, Germany and France built railways at enormous speed and reaped great commercial benefits. In the Middle East, railways were no less important and the Ottoman Empire's Hejaz Railway was the first great industrial project of the 20th century. A route running from Damascus to Mecca, it was longer than the line from Berlin to Baghdad and was designed to function as the artery of the Arab world - linking Constantinople to Arabia. Built by German engineers, and instituted by Sultan Abdul Hamid II, the railway was financially crippling for the Ottoman state and the its eventual stoppage 250 miles short of Mecca (the railway ended in Medina) was symbolic of the Ottoman Empire's crumbling economic and diplomatic fortunes. This is the first book in English on the subject, and is essential reading for those interested in Industrial History, Ottoman Studies and the geopolitics of the Middle East before World War I.

How far was the end of the Ottoman Empire the result of Great Power imperialism and how far the result of structural weaknesses within the Empire itself? These studies of the foreign policy of each of the Great Powers and the Ottoman Empire examine these fundamental issues.

This volume explores the relationship between cities and railways over three centuries. Despite their nearly 200-year existence, The City and the Railway in the World shows that urban railways are still politically and historically important to the modern world. Since its inception, cities have played a significant role in the railway system; cities were among the main reasons for building such efficient but lavish and costly modes of transport for persons, goods, and information. They also influenced the technological appearance of railways as these have had to meet particular demands for transport in urban areas. In 25 essays, this volume demonstrates that the relationship between the city and the railway is one of the most publicly debated themes in the context of daily lives in growing urban settings, as well as in the second urbanisation of the global South with migration from rural to urban landscapes. The volume’s broad geographical range includes discussions of railway networks, railway stations, and urban rails in countries such as India, Japan, England, Belgium, Romania, Nigeria, the USA, and Mexico. The City and the Railway in the World will be a useful tool for scholars interested in the history of transport, travel, and urban change.

This monograph analyses the role of the province of Tripoli, Libya, in the context of German foreign politics with a focus on the period between 1884 and 1918. Suaad Alghafal examines the German military, political and economic strategy, and sheds lights on the international events that provided the setting for the German policy towards Libya, particularly the European ‘Scramble for Africa’.