Mountains as Frontier Arenas

This unique collection of articles lays down a solid foundation for the pre-modern history of Kurdistan. The brilliant duo of Genc and Dehqan provide a deeply researched and illuminating account of the entangled histories of the Kurdish Emirates, the Ottoman Empire, and Iran. Based on original research, this balanced and nuanced account is a significant contribution to the literature on the complicated history of the Kurdish ruling houses of the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries. No other scholars have comparable expertise on the complex sources related to Ottoman, Iranian, and Kurdish histories as Dehqan and Genc. This pioneering compilation of impeccable scholarship will be an instant classic. It will be essential reading and a call to further research for anyone interested in the administrative and political structures of 15th-17th century Kurdistan and its neighboring geographies. [Sabri Ates (Southern Methodist University, Dallas, Texas)]Based on a range of Ottoman and Persian documents and chronicles, this collection of papers on early modern Kurdistan by Mustafa Dehqan and Vural Genç brilliantly illustrates the multifaceted relationships of Kurdish emirs and other local actors with the neighboring Ottoman and Safavid Empires. This original study substantially contributes to the understanding of the historical evolution of the Kurdish emirates in the early modern period in addition to bringing new insights into the modes of integration of the Kurdish borderlands into the two empires. [Akihiko Yamaguchi (Sophia University, Tokyo)]