Mehmed the Conqueror and His Time Paperback – October 19, 1992

A force with which to reckon

I liked the way the author told the story of Mehmed. Mehmed was not a great person, but at least he was tolerant of other religions. What amazed me is,as a muslim, he did try to learn the Christian faith. But, then again, this is how people know their enemy. They try to learn all they can. They learn what fears they have and what they value most. He was a greedy conqueror, killed millions, and was a sick man who liked young boys. I would have liked to have more information on his whereabouts during his life, but it was an informative book that did not stray from many facts. I would recommend reading this book.

I don't know if the Translation is to blame, but the author (second time a German author) completely brushes off Skanderbeg's accomplishments against Mehmed. Over and over he says that any source relating to Skanderbeg cannot be trusted or believed, et cetera. It's disheartening.

Scholarly and very prefessional. A rare insight into the life of Mehmed Celebi. Well-balanced and soberly written. Only point of critique is that for some reason the author persists in using the modern Turkish names for cities which were Byzantine at the time of the events described. This does become a little annoying when using this book with primary sources. Apart from that - splendid!

Not the most interesting read but was very useful for the report I was doing.

F.Babinger is a well-known historian but quite biased on this subject...Try Steven Runciman's The Fall of Constantinople, Nicolae Iorga's Ottoman History and Halil inalcik's works on Ottoman history...