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JOURNAL OF MEDITERRANEAN STUDIES, vol.19, no.1, pp.125-148, 2010 (AHCI)
The present paper concerns a Holy League plan in the first half of the seventeenth century by the Papacy seen from the perspective of hitherto lesser known archival sources on political history. In order to give the reader a contrasting perspective, the article also focuses on the self-perception and on the general world view of the Ottomans before and after the seventeenth century, and on what sort of measures were taken to counteract Ottoman stagnation beyond the heyday of its power. The present study not only attempts to highlight certain patterns pertinent to the relations between Islam and the West, but attempts also to document an attempt by the Papacy to unite Europe under Christendom, re-defining the 'other' when a revived rhetoric of the crusades was in vogue in that century.