Adriatic

Adriatic spans over two thousand years of history and the whole of the eastern Mediterranean region around the Adriatic Sea and part of the neighbouring Ionian Sea. Ever since the Romans, these lands and their peoples have experienced the coming and going of great empires, including occupation by the British in recent centuries, and the demise of the Austro-Hungarian Empire after the First World War, which had its origins in this combustible region. The book untangles a rich and complex history into the twentieth century, before the former Yugoslavia once again fractured. The fascinating and highly accessible account emphasises the interplay between different parts of the Adriatic: on the plus side, the alliances that countries formed, often through trade or royal marriage, and on the negative side, the rivalries that divided states and ended in war, invasion or the overthrow of government. The narrative is filled with personal stories of individuals from many different periods that illuminate the real issues of their day, and explores the political, cultural and economic developments, together with the major conflicts from earliest Roman times, through the Crusades, right up to the battles of the Second World War.

Caroline Boggis-Rolfe is a writer and lecturer. After receiving a B.A. in Italian from London University, she followed her husband to Berlin in 1969 where he worked for the British Commanders’-in-Chief Mission to the Soviet Forces. Their proximity and access to Iron Curtain countries piqued Caroline’s interest in the Baltic region, and she was able to regularly visit Dresden, Leipzig, and Potsdam in the 1970s. This led to her first work of history, The Baltic Story. Her interest in northern Europe was renewed thanks to her thesis on Voltaire, who knew both Frederick II of Prussia and Catherine II of Russia. Over the past ten years, Caroline has been a regular visitor to the Baltic as a guest lecturer. Caroline's new book draws on her Italian degree and experience of living on the Adriatic coast, where she began to research the long history of the nations of the region. She holds a Master and Doctor of French from UCL.

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