Everyday Life and Consumer Culture in Eighteenth-Century Damascus

"In this interesting and careful study of consumption patterns in eighteenth century Ottoman Damascus, James Grehan puts to imaginative use probate inventories, local chronicles, and religious literature in order to bring detail and life to everyday practices involving food and drink as well as clothing and domestic space . . . . This study nicely complements other consumption studies in the field . . . . More importantly, it brings much needed color and complexity to our understanding of everyday life in an important eighteenth century Ottoman city."—Journal of Social History

"One must count Grehan's study among the most exciting books that have appeared in the fields of Ottoman and Middle East history in recent years. . . . Everyday Life and Consumer Culture in 18th-Century Damascus represents an excellent step in the further development of Ottoman consumption studies, and one whose topic merits additional study by the author."—H-Net

"Grehan gives his city a real presence: we enter its environment and rhythms. . . . Damascus as portrayed here is a late, enchanting flowering of the austere world of the early Arab Conquests—- and it is to be enjoyed."—ForeWord

"Grehan breaks new ground in Middle Eastern historiography. There is no work that deals in detail, and also with depth and insight, with consumer culture in the Middle East like Grehan's work. This work is a truly pioneering effort in this field."—Adbuk-Karim Rafeq, The College of William and Mary

"An extraordinarily well—researched and well—written work that promises to make a unique contribution in Middle Eastern Studies. Grehan presents a very engaging picture of how the residents of Damascus lived in the eighteenth century."—Resat Kasaba, author of The Ottoman Empire and the World Economy: The Nineteenth Century