This collection of papers by İlber Ortaylı mainly deals with the political, economic, social and cultural transformations which the Ottoman Empire has undergone in its last centuries.

These areas of transformation, namely millet conception in the Ottoman Empire, modernization, tendencies in historiography, structural and judicial changes in familial relationships, provincial and urban structure in the Ottoman Empire and the relationship between Russia and the Ottoman Empire, determined the titles for the chapters of the book. Ortaylı, meticulously examining the archives and sources about the late Ottoman history, gives a comprehensive and multifaceted picture of the Empire.