On 17 October 1724, Ahmed III, Sultan of the Ottoman Empire, granted an audience to the French Ambassador Vicomte d’Andrezel whom he received in the Topkap? Palace in Constantinople. A French contemporary painter, Jean Baptiste van Mour (1671–1737), depicted the meeting in a beautifully carpeted and decorated red room, showing the sultan on his throne surrounded by a large group of officials which almost encircle the foreigners who appear rather small besides the Ottomans with their high hats. This sumptuous scene, reproduced on the jacket of the hardback edition of this Handbook, might not be visible to all readers of the book in public or university libraries. The original oil painting Réception de l’ Ambassadeur de France, le vicomte d’Andrezel, par le Sultan Ahmed III, le 17 octobre 1724, à Constantinople can be seen in the Musée des Beaux-Arts (Museum of Fine Arts) of Bordeaux. We chose this picture for the jacket because it illustrates one of the objectives of this Handbook, namely to explore the history of encounters between political and economic actors rooted in different legal cultures which gave rise to the emergence of what we now call ‘international law’. Vicomte d’Andrezel was by far not the first French ambassador in Constantinople. Diplomatic relations between the Sultan and the French King had been entertained since 1536, and at the time of our scene the ‘union of the lily and the crescent’ was firmly established. A historian commented that such meetings between Sultans or Grand Viziers and foreign ambassadors ‘appeared to be a collision between two worlds; they wore different costumes, spoke different languages and followed different religions. In reality, through their respective interpreters they spoke a common language of power, profit and monarchy.’ One of the central questions of this Handbook is whether they also spoke a common legal language.