From the taking of Jerusalem in the 7th century AD 638 by Caliph Umar, to the collapse of the Ottoman Empire following the end of World War I, Christian popes, emperors and kings, and Muslim caliphs and sultans were locked in a 1300-year battle for political, military, ideological, economic and religious supremacy.
 
Simon Mayall focuses on some of the most significant clashes of arms in human history: the taking and re-taking of Jerusalem; the fall of Constantinople; the sieges of Rhodes and Malta; the battle of Mohacs; the last assault on Vienna, and the ‘high-water mark’ of Ottoman advance into Europe; and the battle of Megiddo, and, finally, the re-taking of Jerusalem, the collapse of the Ottoman Empire, the dissolution of the Sultanate and the Caliphate, and the formation of modern Europe, and the modern Middle East.
 
The House of War offers a wide, sweeping historical narrative, encompassing the broad historical and religious context of this period, while focussing on some of the key, pivotal sieges and battles, and on the protagonists, political and military, who determined their conclusions and their consequences.