The second book I chose to read was A Short History of the Near East by Philip Hitti. I also chose one of his books for the first review and seeing as I was able to understand it and the information seemed to stick with me somewhat I decided to read another one of his books. Also, I know that he has written many books about the Middle East so I assumed he most be a well known and accepted author in this field.
Along with his first book, this one also seemed to drag on in some places. And once again it was in the beginning I found myself being most interested in the matter. .
A Short History of the Near East is basically what the title says. It was a basic overview of the important events and facts that went on in the East. The section of the East that Hitti concentrated on includes Turkey, Iraq, Iran, Syria, Lebanon, Israel, Jordan, Arabia, and Egypt. These are all places that we too had studied in class so having some background on them helped me a lot in reading this book.
The first three chapters were mainly about the beginning of time and how basically everything could be related back to this area. For instance, writing, writing began in the Near East and writing was a foundation of our history. Writing down events and dates is and was very key, therefore the East could be given credit in this aspect. Along with writing it was the Phoenicians, ancient Lebanese, that had perfected the alphabetic system of writing. Also pottery, and other material objects can from the Near East and many of which are displayed in museum around the world. The second chapter really interested me with the physical and climatic aspects of the East. I had also thought that the East was all desert, I have the image of what Aladdin in my head as to what the East should look like. And I was wrong, as I found out also in my first book review about Lebanon. Mountain ranges exist from Turkey through Lebanon to Arabia on one coast.
