If you were there, it may have seemed that there were few benefits to be found in the Turkish siege of Vienna.
As historians will remember, the episode marked the high water mark of the Islamic offensive in Europe, with the Turks finally forced to retreat in 1683.
Among the things the attackers left behind, so the story goes, were some sacks of coffee. These were discovered by a group of defenders who, presuming they were camel feed, were preparing to burn them when one of their number, better travelled and more entrepreneurial than the rest, realised what they were.
