Contents -- Introduction -- Empire of the Quraish -- The Umayyad Empire -- The Abbasid Empire -- Abbasid Decline and Imperial Disintegration -- The Rise of the Seljukids -- The Period of the First Crusades -- The Era of the Zengids -- Saladin and the Ayyubid Empire -- The Early Thirteenth Century -- The Mongol Onslaught -- Between Mamluks and Mongols -- The Rise of the Ottomans -- The Era of Murad and Bayezid -- Tamerlane -- End of the Byzantine Empire -- Mehmed the Conqueror -- The Rise of the Safavids -- Ottoman Expansionism under Selim -- The Era of Suleiman the Magnificent -- The End of Islamic Ascendancy -- Bibliography -- Index.