When Portuguese explorers first arrived in India, the maritime passage initiated an exchange of goods as well as ideas. European ambassadors, missionaries, soldiers, and scholars who followed produced a body of knowledge that shaped European thought about India. Sanjay Subrahmanyam tracks these changing ideas over the entire early modern period.

First published in 2007. The great interest of this volume is that it predates the establishment of the state of Israel. It is devoted to what was then called Palestine, and to 'Transjordan', the lands east of the river Jordan that now comprise the Kingdom of Jordan. The geographical rather than political approach to the region presented in this handbook is instructive.

Reprint of the original, first published in 1874.