The last crusaders: the hundred-year battle for the centre of the world

Birth of New Powers. The crusader prince of Portugal: Henry the Navigator, 1415-60 ; The Navigator's nephew: King Alfonso the African, 1455-81, and King John II, 1481-95 ; The Great Eagle: Mehmet the Conqueror of Constantinople, 1450-80 ; Reconquista : the Crusade of Ferdinand of Aragon and Isabella of Castile against Muslim Granada, 1480-1510 ; Barbarossa: the emergence of the Muslim corsairs, 1480-1510 ; The just and the grim: the transformation of the Ottoman Empire under Sultans Bayezid II and Selim I, 1480-1520

Struggle. Conquest of commerce: King Manuel, Hammer of Morocco, Lord of Guinea and of the Conquest of the Navigation and Commerce of Ethiopia, Arabia, Persia, and India, 1499-1515 ; Sharifs, sheikhs, Sufis, sultans, and smugglers: the Moroccan struggle against the Portuguese Crusade, 1515-50 ; The rivals: the division of Christendom between Charles V and Francis I ; The Ottoman Golden Age: Suleyman the Magnificent and the Five victories: Belgrade, Rhodes, Mohacs, Tabriz, and Baghdad, 1520-36 ; Corsair kingdoms: the Barbarossa brothers, Uruj and Khizr, and Condottiere Andrea Doria, 1512-34 ; Emperors and sultans: conquests, crusades, and family killings.

Destruction. Skull Islands: the Battle of Djerba and the Siege of Malta, 1560-70 ; A beard for an arm: the conquest of Cyprus and the Holy League's victory at Lepanto, 1570-4 ; The last Crusade: the Battle of the Three Kings

Key characters

Comparative timelines

Family trees for the rules of Morocco, Spain, Portugal, and the Ottoman Empire.