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From the Holy Mountain

A Journey in the Shadow of Byzantium

William Dalrymple

$24.99

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English
Flamingo
29 July 1998
A rich blend of history and spirituality, adventure and politics, laced with the thread of black comedy familiar to readers of William Dalrymple’s previous work.

In AD 587, two monks, John Moschos and Sophronius the Sophist, embarked on an extraordinary journey across the Byzantine world, from the shores of the Bosphorus to the sand dunes of Egypt. Their aim: to collect the wisdom of the sages and mystics of the Byzantine East before their fragile world shattered under the eruption of Islam. Almost 1500 years later, using the writings of John Moschos as his guide, William Dalrymple set off to retrace their footsteps.

Taking in a civil war in Turkey, the ruins of Beirut, the tensions of the West Bank and a fundamentalist uprising in Egypt, William Dalrymple’s account is a stirring elegy to the dying civilisation of Eastern Christianity.
By:  
Imprint:   Flamingo
Country of Publication:   United Kingdom
Dimensions:   Height: 198mm,  Width: 129mm,  Spine: 33mm
Weight:   420g
ISBN:   9780006547747
ISBN 10:   0006547745
Pages:   512
Publication Date:  
Audience:   General/trade ,  ELT Advanced
Format:   Paperback
Publisher's Status:   Active
Author Website:   http://www.williamdalrymple.uk.com

William Dalrymple was born in Scotland. His first book, In Xanadu, won the Yorkshire Post Best First Work Award and the Scottish Arts Council Spring Book Award, and was shortlisted for the John Llewelyn Rhys Prize. His second, City of Djinns, won the Thomas Cook Travel Book Award and the Sunday Times Young British Writer of the Year Award. He was recently elected the youngest Fellow of the Royal Society of Literature, and is currently writing a six-part television series on the buildings of the Raj for Channel 4.

Reviews for From the Holy Mountain: A Journey in the Shadow of Byzantium

The author describes the last rites of Christendom in a journey through its beleaguered outposts in the Middle East. He follows in the footsteps of John Moschos, a monk who in AD615 wrote about his travels in the Byzantine world at a time when the empire was being assailed from all sides. Dalrymple, too, had his fair share of run-ins with a rogues' gallery, from Turkish secret policemen to lighter moments, including a wonderful description of the 'inexhaustible lewd and lustful' Empress Theodora in Constantinople. (Kirkus UK)


  • Short-listed for Mail on Sunday / John Llewellyn Rhys Prize 1997
  • Short-listed for Mail on Sunday/John Llewellyn Rhys Prize 1998
  • Short-listed for Thomas Cook/Daily Telegraph Travel Book Award 1998
  • Shortlisted for Mail on Sunday / John Llewellyn Rhys Prize 1997.
  • Shortlisted for Mail on Sunday/John Llewellyn Rhys Prize 1998.
  • Shortlisted for Thomas Cook/Daily Telegraph Travel Book Award 1998.

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