The Silk Roads

Outline

The Silk Roads (2015) retells world history by placing the trade routes connecting Asia, the Middle East, and Europe at its centre. Peter Frankopan explains how these routes carried not only silk and valuable goods, but also religions, scientific knowledge, political ideas, diseases, and armies. Moving from ancient empires to the modern struggle for energy and influence, the book challenges the traditional Europe-centred view of history and shows how the lands along the Silk Roads have shaped global civilisation.

• World history looks different when the trade routes linking Asia, the Middle East, and Europe sit at the centre of the story.
• The Silk Roads carried far more than silk and valuable goods, including religions, scientific knowledge, political ideas, diseases, and armies.
• The book challenges the traditional Europe-centred view of history and puts the lands along these routes in the foreground.
• Frankopan follows the story from ancient empires to the modern struggle for energy and influence.
• The regions along the Silk Roads helped shape global civilisation, and their legacy still affects today's changing world.

Peter Frankopan is a British historian, author, and professor of global history at the University of Oxford. He specialises in the history of the Mediterranean, the Middle East, Central Asia, and the connections between different civilisations. His work is known for presenting world history from a broader perspective that emphasises the importance of regions and peoples often overlooked in traditional Western accounts.