This volume is a major contribution to Jewish as well as to Ottoman, Balkan, Middle Eastern, and North African history. These twenty-eight original essays grew out of an international conference at Brandeis University – the first ever to be convened specifically on this subject. Outstanding scholars from Israel, Turkey, Europe, and the United States contributed wide-ranging essays dealing with the Jewish communities of the Ottoman Empire, from the Balkans and Anatolia to Arabia, from Mesopotamia to North Africa. Presented here is an unusually broad historical canvas that brings together many different perspectives and viewpoints.