The Giaour is a poem by Lord Byron first published in 1813 by John Murray and printed by Thomas Davison. It was the first in the series of Byron's Oriental romances. The Giaour proved to be a great success when published, consolidating Byron's reputation critically and commercially. Background Byron was inspired to write the poem during 1810 and 1811 in the course of his 1809-1811 Grand Tour, which he undertook with his friend John Cam Hobhouse. While in Athens, he became aware of the Turkish custom of throwing a woman found guilty of adultery into the sea wrapped in a sack. "Giaour" (Turkish: Gâvur) is an offensive Turkish word for infidel or non-believer, and is similar but unrelated to the Arabic word "kafir". The story, subtitled "A Fragment of a Turkish Tale", is Byron's only fragmentary narrative poem. Byron designed the story with three narrators giving their individual points of view about the series of events. The main story tells of a member of Hassan's harem, Leila, who loves the giaour and is killed by being drowned in the sea by Hassan. In revenge, the giaour kills Hassan and then enters a monastery due to his remorse. The design of the story allows for contrast between Christian and Muslim perceptions of love, death, and the afterlife. Byron wrote the poem after he had become famous overnight following the 1812 publication of the first two cantos of Childe Harold's Pilgrimage; it reflects his disenchantment with fame. It also reflects the gloom, remorse, and lust of two illicit love affairs, one with his half-sister Augusta Leigh and the other with Lady Frances Webster. The earliest version of the poem was written between September 1812 and March 1813, and a version of 700 lines was published in June 1813. Several more editions appeared before the end of 1813, each longer than the last. The last edition contains 1,300 lines, almost twice as many as the version first published. Romantic Orientalism The Giaour proved to be very popular with several editions published in the first year. By 1815, 14 editions had been published when it was included in his first collected edition. Its runaway success led Byron to publish three more "Turkish tales" in the next couple of years: The Bride of Abydos in 1813, The Corsair in 1814, and Lara. Each of these poems proved to be very popular, with "The Corsair" selling