A history of the military confrontations between Islam and Christendom from the death of the Prophet Mohammed in AD 632 to the dissolution of the 1300-year-old Muslim caliphate in 1924.
From the taking of Jerusalem in AD 638 by Caliph Umar, to the collapse of the Ottoman Empire in 1918, Christian Popes, Emperors and Kings, and Muslim Caliphs and Sultans were locked in a 1300-year battle for political, military, ideological, economic and religious supremacy. In The House of War, Simon Mayall focuses on some of the most significant clashes of arms in human history: the taking and re-taking of Jerusalem; the fall of Constantinople; the sieges of Rhodes and Malta; The battle of Mohacs; The last assault on Vienna, and the ‘high-water mark’ of Ottoman advance into Europe; and the battle of Megiddo, the re-taking of Jerusalem, the collapse of the Ottoman Empire, the dissolution of the Sultanate and the Caliphate, and the formation of modern Europe, and the modern Middle East.

The House of War offers a wide, sweeping historical narrative, encompassing the broad historical and religious context of this period, while focusing on some of the key, pivotal sieges and battles, and on the protagonists, political and military, who determined their conclusions and their consequences.