Product Details
Palgrave Concise Historical Atlas of Central Asia

Palgrave Concise Historical Atlas of Central Asia
By Rafis Abazov

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Product Description

From the Silk Road to the Great Game, Central Asia has long been a region of great strategic, political, and economic importance. Currently the home of large oil reserves, Islamic terrorists, and new democracies, Central Asia is of growing visibility to Americans. In this atlas, Rafis Abazov provides 50 two-color maps, each accompanied by a facing page of explanatory text, that graphically illuminate the region's history tracing back to the 8th-7th centuries B.C. From the spread of Islam to the invasion of the Mongols, the area has been at the crossroads of some of the world's most important developments, all succinctly explained in this book. Students will regard it as a useful reference, and general readers will value it for its clarity and wealth of information.

Product Details

  • Amazon Sales Rank: #29646 in Books
  • Published on: 2008-02-05
  • Released on: 2008-02-05
  • Original language: English
  • Number of items: 1
  • Binding: Paperback
  • 144 pages

Features

Editorial Reviews

Review

"Every diplomat, scholar or traveler who knows the historical geography of Central Asia, will be miles ahead in understanding the region than those who do. The Palgrave Concisee Historical Atlas of Central Asia is an excellent read that provides a wealth of knowledge for western vistors, helping them to learn about the complexity of Central Asian history, geopolitics and recent political developments."--Grigoriy Evseev, President, Central Asian Geographic Society, Kazakhstan.

About the Author

Rafis Abazov is an adjunct professor at the Harriman Institute, Columbia University. He worked as a Central Asian regional analyst for Moscow-based news agencies and newspapers and contributed annual analytical reports on Central Asia to various international analytical research centers, including the Freedom House and Transition-on-Line. He has published three books, including Historical Dictionary of Kyrgyzstan and Historical Dictionary of Turkmenistan and contributed a number of articles to edited volumes, including about 50 articles to various encyclopedias.

Customer Reviews

best of the central asian atlases for the money5
This is a nice atlas with useful information, even though it is not full color. Simply put, there are no competing atlases about Central Asia costing less than $150, so this is your only option if you're interested in the area.

A mediocre attempt but useful since there isnt much choice3
I bought this book because a brilliant atlas on Central Asia by Yuri Bregel was not available. Besides it was 10 times more expensive.

This book is a lame attempt by Rafis to illustrate the history of central asian landscape. The choice of colors is so pathetic even a high school art student can do better.

The little factoids (I haven't checked for veracity) on the left hand side is useful and informative alongside the maps on the right side.

The publishers did not do a good job and should have hired a competent illustrator who could use all the colors at his disposal to come up with some brilliant and more descriptive maps from the ancient scythian era to the modern times.

The ancient scythian and early hunnic and turkic eras have not been given their fair share of coverage and the atlas is biased towards later turkic, czarist, soviet and modern era. Perhaps due to authors' personal bias in favor of his own heritage etc.

But since there is no other atlas apart from this one and the one by Bregel on Central Asia and the 6 stans, it wasnt a total waste of money. I have therefore assigned it 3 stars.

Palgrave Concise Historical Atlas of Central Asia5
The publication is very useful for every one who studies Central Asian history andCulture and Customs of the Central Asian Republics (Culture and Customs of Asia) internaitonal relations.