List Books » Defenders of the Faith: Christianity and Islam Battle for the Soul of Europe, 1520-1536
Authors: James Reston Jr.
ISBN-13: 9780143117599, ISBN-10: 0143117599
Format: Paperback
Publisher: Penguin Group (USA)
Date Published: July 2010
Edition: (Non-applicable)
James Reston, Jr., is the author of fourteen books, including Warriors of God, Dogs of God, Galileo: A Life, and The Conviction of Richard Nixon. His 1983 documentary, Father Cares: The Last of Jonestown, won the Prix Italia and the Dupont-Columbia Award. He lives in Chevy Chase, Maryland.
A bestselling historian recounts the epic clash that ended the Renaissance and pushed Islam to the gates of Vienna
In Warriors of God and Dogs of God, James Reston, Jr., brought two epochal events in the struggle between Islam and Christendom to readers eager to understand the roots of the present-day conflict. With his unwavering eye for detail, Reston now weaves a captivating narrative that examines a pivotal period in that centuries- long war, which found Europe at its most vulnerable and Islam on the attack. This saga of colliding worlds is propelled by two astonishing young sovereigns-the Holy Roman Emperor Charles V and the Turkish sultan Suleyman the Magnificent-and is supported by a wide range of larger-than-life characters, who lend this meticulously researched history a novel's worth of suspense and brio.
Foreword xix
Act 1 The Die is Cast
1 An Emperor Arrives in Europe 3
2 The Sword of Osman 9
3 Son of Satan 18
4 A Field of Fool's Gold 29
5 Let It Be Done! 39
6 The Sultan of Love and War 43
Act 2 Horsetails and Worms
7 A Diet of Worms 53
8 The Shadow of God Spreads Northward 69
9 Henry's Harangue 76
10 The Blood Sport of Kings and Popes 81
Act 3 Ancestral Aspirations
11 Holy Smoke 91
12 The Nest of Christian Vipers 97
13 In the Truest Sense 106
14 In the Extremity of His Affliction 117
Act 4 The Capture of a King
15 The Great Plan 123
16 The Last Battle in the Age of Chivalry 132
17 My Honor and My Life 141
18 I Am King Once Again! 152
Act 5 More Was Lost at Mohács
19 The Golden-Grilled Window 165
20 The Highway of Holy Struggle 173
21 Squabbling at Spires 178
22 The Game Pack of Jihad 186
23 The Sow and Her Piglet 195
Act 6 The Sack of Rome
24 Alas, Poor Italy 203
25 Setting the Stage 212
26 Pay! Pay! 221
27 Rabble at Porta San Spirito 229
Act 7 The End of the Renaissance
28 Single Combat 243
29 Showdown at Blackfriars 249
30 More Than Table Talk 258
31 His Mouth Rains Pearls 269
Act 8 The Gates of Vienna
32 The Banks of the Rhine River 279
33 Coronation in Fat City 290
34 The Creed of Protest 299
35 Ceremony of Amnesia 308
Act 9 Last Gasp in Europe
36 Two Wives 317
37 Futile Diplomacy 323
38 Stuck at Güns 328
39 The Pomposity of Ibrahim Pasha 340
Act 10 The Natural Enemy
40 Two Iraqs 353
41 Charles and the Barbary Sea Dogs 359
42 Tunis: The Last Crusade 364
43 Baghdad, Abode of Peace 372
44 The Abrupt End of a Great Friendship 378
Epilogue 382
Acknowledgments 390
Selected Bibliography 393
Index 398