City of fortune - Roger Crowley

A magisterial work of gripping history, City of Fortune tells
the story of the Venetian ascent from lagoon dwellers to the greatest
power in the Mediterranean - an epic five hundred year voyage that
encompassed crusade and trade, plague, sea battles and colonial
adventure.

In Venice, the path to empire unfolded in a series of
extraordinary contests - the sacking of Constantinople in 1204, the
fight to the finish with Genoa and a desperate defence against the
Turks. Under the lion banner of St Mark, she created an empire of ports
and naval bases which funnelled the goods of the world through its
wharfs. In the process the city became the richest place on earth - a
brilliant mosaic fashioned from what it bought, traded, borrowed and
stole.

Based on first hand accounts of trade and warfare, seafaring and piracy and the places where Venetians sailed and died,
City of Fortune
is narrative history at its finest. Beginning on Ascension Day in the
year 1000 and ending with an explosion off the coast of Greece - and the
calamitous news that the Portuguese had pioneered a sea route to India -
it will fascinate anyone who loves Venice and the Mediterranean world.