This beautifully designed volume forms a dialogue across fifteen articles exploring the development of archeological knowledge in and of the Ottoman territories from 1753 to 1914. The articles consider the works of western and Ottoman archaeologists, the manner in which they worked with and against Ottoman administrators, and the ideological uses of their research by both the Ottomans and those in the west. We learn how archaeology was developed as a science in the Empire in service of imperial concerns with territory and identity, as well as the findings, use, and exploitation of valuable cultural artifacts by western scholars. As the editors, Bahrani, Çelik, and Eldem explain, the volume “disrupts the conventional story line of the discipline, displays intricate webs of interactions between the east and the west (and within the layers of national and subnational interests in the east), and inserts the Ottomans as major players in the game” (28).

In Hamilakis's fascinating piece, we learn about the history of objects not only from an objectifying scientific gaze which reconstructs the historical context of things but the meaning and use of things as interpreted by the people who lived with and engaged with ancient physical remnants. Tolias describes the politics of early collectors, the manner in which ancient sites were looted after military conquest, and the early history of archaeological excavations. Malley discusses Austen Henry Layard's undercover work as a secret agent for the British Empire and excavations of Nineveh and thereby connects the history of archeology with the imperial occupation of modern day Iraq. Bahrani discusses the scramble for the Assyrian past among competing powers, all of whom had an interest in using that past ideologically for their own ends: Britain, Germany, France, and the Ottomans. Basch juxtaposes an interesting account of the nineteenth-century French perspectives on archaeology as an emerging science which divorced artifacts from their contexts by placing them in museums with travel writers in Greece and Anatolia who described ruins in situ. Ousterhout gives a lively account of the history of Byzantine archeology in Constantinople from the earliest classical investigations to the twentieth century. Laurens writes about Ernest Renan, a gifted French Philologist, his expedition to Phoenicia in 1860, and the effects of his efforts at scientific archeology. Jockey argues that Venus de Milo's fame is due to Western European political wrangling at the time of its discovery and thereafter, rather than any inherent quality of the sculpture. Makdisi discusses the ideological iterations and political uses of the archeological site of Baalbek among British, French, and German traveler and scholarly identifications, Ottoman Tanzimat imperial interests, and local Arab nationalist expressions through the nineteenth century. Eldem provides an overview of the Ottoman relationship to archaeology and western interest and involvement in antiquities in its territory in three stages, culminating with the passage of a law in 1869 articulating the state involvement in the excavation, study, and housing of artifacts. Szemethy focuses on the Austro-Hungarian Empire's relationship with the Porte and their efforts at developing archeological excavations and collections to rival those of Germany, France, and England. Philip discusses Herzfeld's and Sarre's excavations of Samarra beginning in 1910 and the eventual distribution of these findings following the end of WWI, resulting in a limited collection in the Republic. Pancaroğlu discusses Sarre's work on Anatolian antiquities and his attention to the Seljuks, as well as his ethnographic observations and photographs in the region between Smyrna and Aksaray in 1895. Shaw argues that the Imperial Museum founded in 1846 developed “in resistance to the territorial imperialism implicit in European archaeological collection in Ottoman territories” (425). Thus, as an act of resistance to western imperialism, the Ottoman archaeology museum became a place where modern identities were forged via artifacts excavated from the imperial territories. Çelik discusses late Ottoman depictions of the past in four ways: the construction of the Imperial Museum, Abdülhamid II's photographic albums, official yearbooks for the provinces (salnames), and the development of Ottoman popular illustrated history books.

Each of the articles is a lens through which we view individual scholars, administrators, forms of scholarship, political struggles over claims to the past, and the ownership of artifacts excavated from the imperial territories. The volume is enriched by “interludes” presented in brief historical documents and artistic and scholarly artifacts, giving the reader a glimpse into the diversity of evidence the writers explored in depth. One might argue that the book is less comprehensive than fragmentary in the profusion of differing viewpoints about the history of the archaeology of the Ottoman Empire, and that there is some repetition across the pieces. However, I would argue that the book's strength lies in its insistence on the incommensurability of political, popular, and scholarly perspectives and endeavors competing for control over the civilizational artifacts and interpretations of the Empire's territories.