The Thirteenth Tribe: The Khazar Empire And Its Heritage
Condition: SECONDHAND
This is a secondhand book. The jacket image is a photograph of the exact copy we have in stock. This image shows the condition of this book. Further condition remarks are below.
Condition remarks:
Book: Good
Jacket: N/A
Pages: Good
Long before the great powers of medieval Europe rose to prominence, a formidable empire flourished in the vast steppes between the Black Sea and the Caspian — the Khazar Khaganate — and Arthur Koestler's The Thirteenth Tribe presents a bold and meticulously researched argument that this now-forgotten empire holds the key to understanding the true origins of Ashkenazi Jewry. Koestler chronicles the remarkable rise of the Khazars, a semi-nomadic Turkic people who, in a stunning act of political and spiritual sovereignty, converted en masse to Judaism in the eighth century, creating a Jewish kingdom that dominated Eastern Europe for centuries before its dramatic collapse. The book details the historical, anthropological, and linguistic evidence that suggests the majority of Eastern European Jews are descended not from the ancient Israelites of the Middle East, but from these Caucasian converts — a thesis as electrifying as it is controversial. Koestler, celebrated for his political novel Darkness at Noon, brings the same incisive, fearless intellect to this work of historical non-fiction, arguing his case with the narrative drive of a storyteller and the rigour of a scholar. The Thirteenth Tribe sits at the crossroads of history, genetics, and politics, challenging centuries of received wisdom about Jewish identity and diaspora. First published in 1976, the work continues to provoke fierce debate among historians and theologians alike — leaving the reader to wrestle with one of history's most tantalising and unresolved questions.
Author: Arthur Koestler
Format: Hardback
Published: 1976, Hutchinson of London
Genre: History
Condition remarks:
Book: Good
Jacket: N/A
Pages: Good
Long before the great powers of medieval Europe rose to prominence, a formidable empire flourished in the vast steppes between the Black Sea and the Caspian — the Khazar Khaganate — and Arthur Koestler's The Thirteenth Tribe presents a bold and meticulously researched argument that this now-forgotten empire holds the key to understanding the true origins of Ashkenazi Jewry. Koestler chronicles the remarkable rise of the Khazars, a semi-nomadic Turkic people who, in a stunning act of political and spiritual sovereignty, converted en masse to Judaism in the eighth century, creating a Jewish kingdom that dominated Eastern Europe for centuries before its dramatic collapse. The book details the historical, anthropological, and linguistic evidence that suggests the majority of Eastern European Jews are descended not from the ancient Israelites of the Middle East, but from these Caucasian converts — a thesis as electrifying as it is controversial. Koestler, celebrated for his political novel Darkness at Noon, brings the same incisive, fearless intellect to this work of historical non-fiction, arguing his case with the narrative drive of a storyteller and the rigour of a scholar. The Thirteenth Tribe sits at the crossroads of history, genetics, and politics, challenging centuries of received wisdom about Jewish identity and diaspora. First published in 1976, the work continues to provoke fierce debate among historians and theologians alike — leaving the reader to wrestle with one of history's most tantalising and unresolved questions.