many others) Gil Anidjar, Nicola Di Cosmo, Simo Parpola, Haggai Ram,
and Elchanan Reiner. Elchanan, who always knows where to find the most
elusive sources, helped me to obtain copies of several rare documents
used in this book and helped with the translation of few crucial passages in
Yiddish. My colleagues at NYU’s history department, Kostis Smyrlis and Yanni
Kotsonis, helped to clarify the meaning of specific words in Greek. Edward
Sullivan, dean of humanities at NYU, took hours of his busy time to help me
find ways into sixteenth-century Spanish history. Above all, I am profoundly
indebted to Amnon Raz-Krakotzkin for the thoughtful care, unparalleled
generosity, and unflagging support with which he engaged with this book,
which in many ways is written in dialogue with his thought. I cannot thank
Amnon enough for all that I learned and gained from him. For me, Amnon
truly embodies what Confucius means when he says that a scholar should
be both “earnest and keen amongst friends.”
A faculty fellowship at the Remarque Institute at NYU helped me start
writing in the spring of 2006. I thank its director, Professor Tony Judt, for
his support and friendship. The staff of the Remarque Institute, particularly
Jennifer Ren, was very helpful with many technical aspects of this book’s
production. Jair Kessler, assistant director of the institute, gave immense and
relentless support at critical stages. I am deeply grateful to her.
I am also grateful to Dr. Marcel and Deborah (Dvorah) van den Broecke of
Cartographica Neerlandica(www.orteliusmaps.com) for their kindness and
for allowing me to use Abraham Ortelius’s maps. They also provided good
quality scans of them. I also thank Rolf Stein (www.classicalgraphics.de), who
provided a scan of Sebastian Mu ̈nster’s woodblock of Asia and permitted me to
use it here. Adam Hirschberg, rights and permissions associate at Cambridge
University Press, was prompt in allowing me to reproduce a map of the Assyri-
an and Babylonian empires. My friend Yigal Nizri helped with preparing the
images and was always happy to help me to get books I could not reach.
Christopher Wheeler at Oxford University Press (UK) supported this book
from the start and was kind enough to put me in touch with my editor at the
press in New York, Cynthia Read, who was supportive—and most important
of all—very patient and understanding throughout. I am deeply grateful
for Read’s support at critical moments. Justin Tackett, editorial assistant
at the press, with whom I corresponded endlessly, has been a paragon of
good-humored efficiency. I also thank the readers whom Oxford recruited
to comment on my book: they provided important correctives and, no less
important, encouragement.
I could not have written this book without it having at least some impact
on my family. Special thanks go to my sister-in-law, Meital Ben-Dor. My
viii ACKNOWLEDGMENTS