David Abulafia was Emeritus Professor Mediterranean history at the University of Cambridge, a Fellow of Gonville and Caius College and a former Chairman of the Cambridge History Faculty. His books include Frederick II, The Discovery of Mankind and The Great Sea: A Human History of the Mediterranean, which has been translated into a dozen languages. His most recent work was The Boundless Sea, A Human History of the Oceans. He was a member of the Academia Europaea and a Fellow of the British Academy.
