The massacre that shattered the old Ottoman world

Welcome to the History Extra podcast, fascinating historical conversations from the makers of BBC History magazine. In 1860, the diverse Ottoman city of Damascus witnessed the massacre of thousands of Christians. The killings, combined with Constantinople's hard line response, shattered the city's tolerant society, and it took twenty five years for Damascus to recover its stability and prosperity. Earlier this year, historian Eugene Rogan spoke to Danny Bird to explain why these shocking events proved to be a watershed in the modern history of the Middle East. Please note that this episode was recorded prior to the recent overthrowing of the regime

of Basha al-Assad. Eugene, thanks for joining me to discuss your book, which focuses on the shocking and brutal events that unfolded in Damascus during 1860. Could we begin by setting the scene? What was happening in this part of the Middle East prior to the events of 1860? The mid-19th century was a period of transformative change for Syria.

You had massive changes in the direction of trade as industrial Europe was beginning to take advantage of steamshipping. To dump ever more amounts of the products of the wool and cotton mills of Manchester and Lyon into the markets of Beirut. And they're beginning to filter into Damascus in numbers that are really threatening the local artisanal trade and the Muslim merchants and artisans who made their money off that. This is also reorienting the trade of Damascus away from its natural hinterland. of the desert routes.

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