The Venetian Empire

This book follows the maritime state Venice built across the Adriatic, Greece, Crete, Cyprus, and the routes to the Levant. Morris travels the former stations of the empire and braids present landscape with the centuries of conquest, trade, and loss, from the Fourth Crusade and the Stato da Mar to the long wars with the Ottomans and the republic's end. Ports, fortresses, and island administrations supply the chapters rather than a single hero. The work is a historical travel narrative of an overseas dominion, not a day-by-day chronicle of the doges.

Quarter-bound in blue cloth with Modigliani grey paper covers printed on both sides with a wall carving of the Lion of St Mark. Frontispiece and 24 pages of colour plates. 3-page fold-out colour map. Map endpapers printed dark grey on fawn. Blue slipcase front blocked with a silver design.