East To West — Season 1, Episode 7: The Ottomans And The West
Documentary • 57 min • 1 season, 7 episodes • ★ 6.0/10
Episode synopsis
The film looks at the wider Ottoman world, taking in superb merchants’ houses in Birgi (Anatolia) and Damascus. At the edge of empire, on the Persian border near Mt Ararat, we discover how the Ottoman’s controlled the extremities of Empire at Ishak Pasha’s magnificent palace. The programme then explores the growing European fascination with ‘The Orient’ throughout the 19th century, both as a place of culture and also as a trading partner and market for mass produced western goods. We end by tracing the decline of the Ottoman Empire in the dying days of the19th century, a time when the Sultans still managed to achieve great feats, including the building of the great Hejaz Railway across the Arabian desert.
About East To West
This six-part series tells the story of the birth and flourishing of civilisation in the Middle East and its huge influence on the West. From the foundation of science, monotheism, commerce, justice, civil rights and artistic expression - look Eastward. The series contends that history that starts from an ancient Greek perspective distorts the true path of civilisation. For crucial phases in world history, the political, economic and cultural centre was the Middle East.