For the episode, Nico and Isaac have read through the introductory piece of Ottoman historian Daniel Goffman’s The Ottoman Empire and Early Modern Europe in addition to a letter composed by Austrian ambassador to the Ottoman court Ogier Ghiselin de Busbecq on his travels throughout the Ottoman realm. This is a continuation of the discussion opened by Jayda and Kerry on what it means to understand the history of the Ottoman Empire as perceived by the Ottomans.

The works referenced in the episode include Daniel Goffman's "Introduction: Ottomancentrism and the West" in The Ottoman Empire and Early Modern Europe (Cambridge UP, 2002); "The Third Letter Dated Constantinople, 1 June 1560" in The Turkish Letters of Ogier Ghiselin de Busbecq Imperial Ambassador at Constantinople, 1554-1562 (Clarendon Press, 1968, first edition 1927); and Eve R. Meyer's "The Image of the Turk in European Performing Arts" in Süleyman the Second and his Time, Halil İnalcık and Cemal Kafadar, eds. (Istanbul: ISIS Press, 1993).