When the German doctor and botanist Leonhard Rauwolff visited the Syrian city of Aleppo during an eccentrically Teutonic herb-hunting mission across the Middle East, he was instantly impressed by the thriving trade he encountered. It was ‘admirably great’, he wrote, ‘for great caravans of pack-horses and asses, but more camels arrive there daily from all foreign countries’.
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Available from the Spectator Bookshop, £14.99. Tel: 08430 600033.Justin Marozzi has written on Tamerlane and Herodotus. His Baghdad: City of Peace, City of Blood won last year’s Ondaatje prize.
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