English accounts of captivity in North Africa and the Middle East: 1577-1625

Between 1577 and 1625, ten Englishmen wrote or dictated accounts about thei r captivity among the Muslims. After examining similar accounts of captivit y by continental writers, Fernand Braudel argued that European governments encouraged the publication of such accounts for an ideological purpose: to alienate readers from Islam and Muslims. A close reading of the English acc ounts, however, shows that there was a more personal and selfish goal for t he publication of these accounts than the polemical and the ideological.