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During the long eighteenth century, Europe´s travelers, scholars, and intellectuals looked to Asia in a spirit of puzzlement, irony, and openness. In this panoramic and colorful book, Jürgen Osterhammel tells the story of the European Enlightenment´s nuanced encounter with the great civilizations of the East, from the Ottoman Empire and India to China and Japan. Osterhammel shows how major figures such as Leibniz, Voltaire, Edward Gibbon, and Hegel took a keen interest in Asian culture and history, and introduces lesser-known scientific travelers, colonial administrators, Jesuit missionaries, and adventurers who returned home from Asia bearing manuscripts in many exotic languages, huge collections of ethnographic data, and stories that sometimes defied belief.

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"Erudite, original, and lively. Osterhammel defends the Enlightenment from the charge of Eurocentrism and portrays in sparkling detail its humane legacy of self-criticism and communication with other cultures."--Harry Liebersohn, author of The Travelers´ World: Europe to the Pacific

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Jürgen Osterhammel is professor of modern and contemporary history at the University of Konstanz. He is a recipient of the Gottfried Wilhelm Leibniz Prize, Germany´s most prestigious academic award. His books include The Transformation of the World: A Global History of the Nineteenth Century and, with Jan C. Jansen, Decolonization: A Short History (both Princeton). He lives in Freiburg, Germany.

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