Ottoman Text Seminar: Ottoman Historians and Historiography, 15th-19th Centuries

Note on primary sources: As the emphasis of the course is on issues of interpretation rather than on paleography, Ottoman texts will be read in transliteration as well as in printed Arabic script. 

Goals: By the end of this class, students should have a good overview of developments in Ottoman historiography between the 15^th and 19^th centuries and be aware of the key methodological and theoretical issues involved in working with Ottoman histories from different periods.  A close reading of select primary sources in tutorials will equip students with skills for a critical analysis of narratives, particularly regarding the key questions outlined in the course description.

Assessment:

• Attendance at both lecture and tutorial meetings is mandatory (if you are taking the class for 2 CR, only the lecture part is mandatory). Up to two excused absences will be tolerated before your final grade is affected.  Any unexcused absence will result in automatic decrease of the final grade by half a letter grade.
• Participation in the discussion: 15%
• Discussion questions: each student will be responsible for preparing a set of 5 discussion questions related to weekly readings and for leading the discussion twice during the term:  10%
• Response papers: 4 response papers, 2-3 pages in length (Times New Roman, double-spaced, font 12): 40% (10% each)
• Final Paper (for students taking only the lecture part of the course) – 8-10 pages: 35%
• Final Take-Home Text Exam (for students taking both the lecture and the tutorial): 35%

Useful Resources:

Bursalı Mehmed Tahir, Osmanlı Müellifleri (1915 Ottoman Turkish; 1972 Modern Turkish)

Franz Babinger, Geschichtsschreiber der Osmanen und ihre Werke (1927)

Historians of the Ottoman Empire (online project: http://www.ottomanhistorians.com)

Encyclopedia of Islam, Second Edition

İslâm Ansiklopedisi (İA) 

TDV Islam Ansiklopedisi (ISAM)

Franz Rosenthal, A History of Muslim Historiography (1955)

B. Lewis and P. M. Holt, eds., Historians of the Middle East (1962)

Chase F. Robinson, Islamic Historiography (2003).

N.K. Singh, N.K. Singh, A Samiuddin, Encyclopaedic Historiography of the Muslim World (2004)

Week 1 (Sept. 23):  Introduction—Historiographical Traditions in Medieval Anatolia and the Rise of Ottoman Historical Writing

Background reading for the lecture:

Melville, “The Early Persian Historiography of Anatolia.” In History and Historiography of Post-Mongol Central Asia and the Middle East: Studies in Honor of John E. Woods, ed. Pfeiffer and Quinn (Wiesbaden: Harrassowitz Verlag, 2006), 135-165.

Sholeh A. Quinn, “The Timurid Historiographical Legacy: A Comparative Study of Persianate Historical Writing,” in Society and Culture in the Early Modern Middle East: Studies on Iran in the Safavid Period, ed. Andrew J. Newman (Leiden: Brill, 2003), 19-31.

NO TUTORIAL BUT READ THE FOLLOWING:

Halil Inalcık, “The Rise of Ottoman Historiography,” in The Historians of the Middle East, 152-167.

Victor Menage, “The Beginnings of Ottoman Historiography” in ibid, 168-179.

Week 2 (Sept. 30):  15^th-Century Histories of the Ottoman Dynasty

For the lecture: 

Ahmedi, “Ahmedi’s History of the Ottoman Dynasty,” ed. and translit. Kemal Sılay, JTS 16 (1992): 129-158.

Cemal Kafadar, Between Two Worlds: the Construction of the Ottoman State (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1995), 60-117.

Tutorial:

Anonim Tevarih-i Al-i Osman – F. Giese Neşri, Ed. Nihat Azamat (İstanbul: Edebiyat Fakültesi Basımevi, 1992), 3-21.

Aşıkpaşazade, Osmanoğulları’nın Tarihi, Ed. Kemal Yavuz and M.A. Yekta Saraç (İstanbul: K. Kitaplığı, 2003), 319-342.

For further reading:

Oruç Beğ Tarihi, transcribed and edited by Necdet  Öztürk (Istanbul: Çamlıca, 2008)

Mevlana Mehmed Neşri, Cihânnümâ, transcribed and edited by Necdet Öztürk (Istanbul: Çamlıca, 2008)

Paul Wittek, The Rise of the Ottoman Empire  (1938)

Rudi P. Lindner, Nomads and Ottomans (Indiana University Press, 1983).

            ---.“Beginning Ottoman History,” in Studies in Ottoman History in Honour of Professor V. L. Menage edited by C. Heywood and C. Imber (The Isis Press, 1994), 199-208.

Colin Imber, “The Legend of Osman Gazi,” in Studies in Ottoman History and Law (İstanbul: The Isis Press, 1996), 323-329.

Heath Lowry, The Nature of Early Ottoman History (SUNY, 2003).

Dimitris J. Kastritsis, The Sons of Bayezid (Brill, 2007). 

Week 3 (Oct. 7): Mehmed II’s Era—Writing the Conqueror’s History

For the lecture:

R. Murphey and H. İnalcık, “The Life and Work of Tursun Beg,” in The History of Mehmed the Conqueror (Minneapolis and Chicago: Bibliotheca Islamica, 1978), 11-24.

Kritovoulos, History of Mehmed the Conqueror, trans. Charles T. Riggs, 3-6, 9-18, 55-64, 71-87, 93-95, 104-105, 125-126, 136-137, 139-142.

For the tutorial:

Anonim Tevarih-i Al-i Osman, 77-114.

Aşıkpaşazade, Osmanoğulları’nın Tarihi, 483-495.

Tursun Bey, Tarih-i Ebu’l-feth, ed. Mertol Tulum (İstanbul: İstanbul Fetih Cemiyeti, 1977), 65-76.

For further reading:

Yerasimos, Stephane.  La fondation de Constantinople et de Sainte-Sophie.  Paris: Institute Français d’etudes anatoliennes d’Istanbul, 1990.

Inalcik, “The Policy of Mehmed II toward the Greek Population of Istanbul and the Byzantine Buildings in the City,” Dumbarton Oaks Papers 23 (1969-70): 229-49.

Çiğdem Kafesicioğlu, Constantinopolis/Istanbul: cultural encounter, imperial vision, and the construction of the Ottoman capital (Penn State University Press, 2009).

Julian Raby, "Mehmed the Conqueror's Greek Scriptorium," Dumbarton Oaks Papers, 37 (1983): 15–62

Halil İnalcık, “How to read Aşıkpaşazade’s History,” in Studies in Ottoman History in Honour of Professor V. L. Menage edited by C. Heywood and C. Imber (The Isis Press, 1994), 139-156.

Week 4 (Oct. 14): Bayezid II and Selim I—Evaluating the Meaning of the Conquest

For the lecture:

Sara Nur Yıldız, “Historiography – The Ottoman Empire,” Encyclopaedia Iranica, vol. 12 (2004): 403-411. http://www.iranica.com/articles/historiography-xiv

Erdem Çıpa, “The Centrality of the Periphery: The Rise to Power of Selim I, 1487-1512” (Unpublished Ph.D. dissertation, Harvard University, 2007), 73-127.

For the tutorial:  

Kemalpaşazade, Tevarih-i Al-i Osman in Ahmet Uğur, The Reign of Sultan Selim I in the light of the Selim-name Literature (Berlin: Klaus Schwarz Verlag, 1985), 28-46.

Celalzade Mustafa, Selim-name, ed. Ahmet Uğur and Mustafa Çuhadar (Ankara: Kültür Bakanlığı, 1990), 21-32, 47-52.

For further reading:

İdris-i Bidlisi, Selim Şah-Name, translated and edited by Hicabi Kırlangıç (Ankara: Kültür Bakanlığı, 2001), 50-76, 87-116.

İbrahim Kaya Şahin, “In the Service of the Ottoman Empire: Celalzade Mustafa (ca. 1490-1567), Bureaucrat and Historian” (Unpublished Ph.D. diss., University of Chicago, 2007), 377-386, 453-469.

Week 5 (Oct. 21): Representing the Era of Sultan Süleyman

For the lecture:

Christine Woodhead, “Perspectives on Süleyman,” in Süleyman the Magnificent and His Age: The Ottoman Empire in the Early Modern World, ed. Metin Kunt and Christine Woodhead (London and New York: Longman, 1995), 164-190.

Ebru Turan, “Voices of Opposition in the Reign of Sultan Süleyman—The Case of Ibrahim Paşa (1523-1536),” in Studies on Istanbul and Beyond, edited by Robert Ousterhout (Joukowsky Family Foundation and ARIT, 2007), 23-36.

İbrahim Kaya Şahin, “In the Service of the Ottoman Empire: Celalzade Mustafa (ca. 1490-1567), Bureaucrat and Historian” (Unpublished Ph.D. diss., University of Chicago, 2007), 321-377.

For the tutorial:

Celalzade Mustafa, Geschichte Sultan Süleyman Kanunis von 1520 bis 1557 oder Tabakatü’l-memalik ve derecatü’l-mesalik, Facsimile with Introduction and Notes by  Petra von Kappert (Wiesbaden: Franz Steiner Verlag, 1981), 8a-10b, 115b-121a.

For further reading:

Fleischer, “Lawgiver as the Messiah,” in Soliman le magnifique et son temps, ed. Gilles Veinstein (Paris: La Documentation Française, 1992), 159-77 and other essays in this collection.

Essays in Halil Inalcık and Cemal Kafadar, eds., Süleymân The Second and his time (Istanbul: The ISIS Press, 1993).

Essays in Metin Kunt and Christine Woodhead, eds., Süleyman the Magnificent and His Age: The Ottoman Empire in the Early Modern World (London and New York: Longman, 1995).

Gülrü Necipoğlu, The Age of Sinan (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 2005) and her numerous essays in the journal Muqarnas.

Ebru Turan, "The Sultan’s Favorite: İbrahim Pasha and the Making of the Ottoman Universal Sovereignty in the Reign of Sultan Süleyman (1516-1526)” (unpublished PhD diss., University of Chicago, 2007.)

Week 6 (Oct. 28): The Institution of the Şahnameci and Illustrated Histories

For the lecture:

Christine Woodhead, “An Experiment in Official Historiography: The Post of Şehnameci in the Ottoman Empire, c. 1555-1605” Wiener Zeitschrift für die Kunde des Morgenlandes 75 (1983): 157-182.

Emine Fetvacı, “The Office of Ottoman Court Historian,” in Studies on Istanbul and Beyond, 7-22.

For the tutorial:

Talikizade’s Şehname-i Hümayun: A history of the Ottoman Campaign into Hungary, 1593-4, ed. Christine Woodhead (Berlin: Klaus Schwarz Verlag, 1983), 109-136

For further reading:

Nicolas Vatin, Ferîdûn Bey, les plaisants secrets de la campagne de Szigetvár : édition, traduction et commentaire des folios 1 à 147 du Nüzhetü-l- esrâri-l-ahbâr der sefer-i Sigetvâr (ms. H 1339 de la Bibliothque du Musée de Topkapi Sarayi), (Wien, 2010).

Esin Atıl, Süleymanname—The Illustrated History of Süleyman the Magnificent (New York, 1986)

Emine Fetvacı, “The Production of the Şehnāme-i Selīm Hān,” Muqarnas 26 (2009).

Emine Fetvacı, “Viziers to Eunuchs: Transitions in Ottoman Manuscript Patronage, 1556-1617” (Unpublished PhD thesis, Harvard University, 2005).

Serpil Bağcı, “From translated word to translated image: the illustrated Şehname-i Türki copies,” Muqarnas 17 (2000): 162-176.

Baki Tezcan, “The politics of early modern Ottoman historiography,” in The Early Modern Ottomans: Remapping the Empire, ed. Virginia Aksan and Dan Goffman (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2007),167-198.

Week 7 (Nov. 4): Mustafa Ali and the “Declinists”

For the lecture:

Cornell Fleischer, “Royal authority, dynastic cyclism and ‘Ibn Khaldunism’ in Sixteenth-Century Ottoman Letters.” Journal of Asian and African Studies 18 (1983): 198-220.

C. Fleischer, Bureaucrat and Intellectual in the Ottoman Empire: the Historian Mustafa Ali (1541-1600) ( Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1986), 235-307.

For the tutorial:

Mustafa Ali’s Künhü’l-ahbar and its preface according to the Leiden manuscript (İstanbul, 1987), ed. and trans. Jan Schmidt (İstanbul: Nederlands Historisch-Archaeologisch Instituut, 1987), 23-47.

For further reading:

Gelibolulu Mustafa Ali ve Künhü’l-ahbar’ında II. Selim, III. Murat ve III. Mehmet Devirleri, ed. Faris Çerçi (Kayseri, 2000).

Jan Schmidt, Pure Water for Thirsty Muslims: a study of Mustafa Ali’s Künhü’l-ahbar (Leiden, 1991).

Mustafa Ali, Counsel for Sultans of 1581, 2 vols., edited and translated by Andreas Tietze (Wien, 1982).

Cemal Kafadar, “The myth of the Golden Age: Ottoman Historical Consciousness in the Post-Süleymanic Era,” Suleyman the Second and His Time (Istanbul: The Isis Press 1993): 37-48.

Douglas A Howard, “Genre and Myth in the Ottoman Advice for Kinds Literature,” in The Early Modern Ottomans: Remapping the Empire, ed. Virginia Aksan and Dan Goffman (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2007), 137-166.

Week 8 (Nov. 11): Historiography of rebellion: representing the events of 1622

For the lecture:

Gabriel Piterberg, An Ottoman Tragedy: History and Historiography at Play (University of California Press, 2003), 71-132.

Review of Piterberg’s book by Gottfried Hagen: “Osman II and the Cultural History of Ottoman Historiography,” H-Net (2006) at http://www.h-net.org/reviews/showpdf.php?id=11651

Baki Tezcan, “The 1622 Military Rebellion in İstanbul: A Historiographical Journey,” in International Journal of Turkish Studies 8, 1-2 (2002), ed. Jane Hathaway, 25-43.

For the tutorial:

Fahir İz, “XVII. Yüzyılda Halk Dili İle Yazılmış Bir Tarih Kitabı: Hüseyin Tuği, Vak’a-i Sultan Osman Han,” Türk Dili Araştırmaları Yıllığı 266 (1967): 124-154.

Peçevi, Tarih-i Peçevi, vol. 2, 380-391.

For further reading:

Aryeh Shmuelevitz, “MS Pococke No. 31 as a source for the events in İstanbul in the years 1622-1624,” in Graciela de la Lama, ed., Thirtieth International Congress of Human Sciences in Asia and North Africa (Mexico City, 1976): Middle East I (Mexico City, 1982), 107-121.

Baki Tezcan, “Searching for Osman: A Reassesment of the Deposition of the Ottoman Sultan Osman II (1618-1622),” (Unpublished PhD thesis, Princeton University, 2001).

Rhoads Murphey, “Ottoman Historical Writing in the Seventeenth Century,” Essays on Ottoman Historians and Historiography  (Istanbul: Eren, 2009), 89-119

Week 9 (Nov. 18):  The “Long 18^th Century” and How Chroniclers Understood Their Worlds were Changing

For the Lecture:

Baki Tezcan, “The politics of early modern Ottoman historiography,” in The Early Modern Ottomans: Remapping the Empire, ed. Virginia Aksan and Dan Goffman (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2007),167-198.

Dana Sajdi, “A Room of His Own: The “History” of the Barber of Damascus (fl. 1762),” The MIT Electronic Journal of Middle East Studies, Vol. 3 (Fall 2003), http://web.mit.edu/cis/www/mitejmes/

For the Tutorial:

Lewis V. Thomas, A Study of Naima, 5-52, 110-122, 125-156

Further Reading:

Dimitrie Cantemir, Dimitrie Cantemir, historian of South East Europe and oriental civilizations: extracts from the History of the Ottoman Empire, edited by Alexander Dutu, Paul Cernovodeanu (1973).

Mehmed Paşa, Sarı. Zübde-i vekayi'at, edited by Abdülkadir Özcan (Ankara, 1995).

W.L. Wright.  Ottoman statecraft: The book of counsel for Vezirs and governors (1935). [Sarı Mehmed Paşa’s nasihatname]

Norman Itzkowitz.  "Men and ideas in the eighteenth century Ottoman empire," In T. Naff and R. Owen (eds.), Studies in Eighteenth Century Islamic History (Carbondale,1977).

Virginia Aksan.  An Ottoman Statesman in War and Peace: Ahmed Resmi Efendi 1700-1783 (Leiden: E.J. Brill, 1995). 

Week 10 (Nov. 25): The Violent Culmination of the 18^th Century:  Bandits, Rebels, and Gazis?

For the Lecture:

Virginia Aksan, “Ottoman Political Writing, 1768-1808,” IJMES Vol 25, No. 1 (Feb. 1993): 53-69.

Câbî Ömer Efendi.  Câbî Tarihi: Târîh-i Sultân Selîmi Sâlis ve Mahmûd-ı Sânî Tahlîl ve Tenkidli Metin, 2 Vols. [Transliteration Mehmet Ali Beyhan] (Ankara: TürkTarih Kurumu, 2003):

 “Rumeli’de eşkıyâ zulmü,” 55-58

“Rumeli’de dağlı eşkıyâsı,” 59-62

“Nizâm-i Cedîd’e karşı Tekirdağ’da isyân,” 62-63

 “Tayyar Paşa’ya dâir,” 96-97

“Vehhâbîler tarafından haccın engellenmesi,” 112-13

“Vehhâbilerce haccın engellenmesi ve vâlide kethudası Yüsuf Ağa’nın idâmı,” 153-171

For the Tutorial:

Ahmet Asım.  Asım Tarîhi, (İstanbul, 1284 [1868]), Vol. 1:

“Vefât-i Vidin Vâlîsi Pasban-zâde Osman Paşa,” p. 218.

“Tercüme-yi hâl-i mütevâfı-yı müşârün-ileyh,” pp. 218-223.

Further Reading:

Ali Yaycıoğlu.  Ch. IV “Ottoman Provinces under Regional Power-Holders: A Comparative Analysis (1792-1812),” in The Provincial Challenge: Regional Crisis, and Integration in the Late Ottoman Empire, 1792-1812 (unpublished Ph.D. dissertation, Harvard University, 2008): 192-293

Ubeydullah Kuşmânî Ebubekir Efendi.  Kabakçı Mustafa Risalesi, in Aysel Yıldız (trans.), Asiler ve Gaziler: Kabakçı Mustafa Risalesi (İstanbul: Kitab Yayınevi, 2007).

Week 11 (Dec. 2): Selim III, New Orderist Historiography, and the Sened-i Ittifak

For the Lecture:

Kemal Beydilli.  “Selim III in his own Words,” in Coşkun Yılmaz (ed.), III. Selim: İstanbul at a Turning Point Between Two Centuries (İstanbul. 2010): 27-52.

Fatih Yeşil.  “Nizâm-i Cedîd,” in Coşkun Yılmaz (ed.), III. Selim: İstanbul at a Turning Point Between Two Centuries (İstanbul. 2010): 103-122.

Aysel Yıldız.  “The Kabakçı Re bellion and the Murder of Selim III,” in Coşkun Yılmaz (ed.), III. Selim: İstanbul at a Turning Point Between Two Centuries (İstanbul. 2010): 227-240.

Ethan Menchinger.  “Peace, Reciprocity, and the Discourse of Reform in Late Eighteenth Century Ottoman Didactic Literature,” Lethbridge Undergraduate Research Journal,Vol. 2. No. 2 (2007).  On-line: http://www.lurj.org/article.php/vol2n2/ottomanlit.xml

For the Tutorial:

Câbî Ömer Efendi.  Câbî Tarihi: Târîh-i Sultân Selîmi Sâlis ve Mahmûd-ı Sânî Tahlîl ve Tenkidli Metin, 2 Vols. [Transliteration Mehmet Ali Beyhan] (Ankara: Türk Tarih Kurumu, 2003):

“Ruscuk Ayanı Mustafa Alemdâr’a vezâret tevcîhi, 115-116

“Alemdâr Mustafa Paşa’nın Silistre’ye gitmesi,” 116-118

“Sultan Selîm’in hal‘i ve Sultan Mustafa’nın iclâsı,” 138-143

“Alemdâr ile gelen taşra ayanlarının Davud Paşa’dan İstanbul’a nakilleri, 190-

191

“Alemdâr Mustafa Paşa’nın segban askeri tahriri teşebbüsü, 203-204

 “Alemdâr Mustafa Paşa vak‘âsı,” 270-295

“Alemdâr’ın cesedinin bulunması,” 307-309

 “Alemdâr’ın cesedine dâir,” 311-313

 

Şânî-zâde Mehmed ‘Atâ’ullah Efendi.  Şânî-zâde Târîhi.  Vol. 1:

Zuhûr-i fitne-i ‘azime der-Leyle-i  kadr, pp. 115-132

Zuhûr-i cesed-i ‘Alemdar Paşa ve sûret-i sükûnet-i gavgâ, pp. 148-151  

Further Reading:

Ali Yaycıoğlu.  Ch. V “Crisis, Revolution and Integration: A Narrative of the Crisis between August 1805 and November 1808,” in The Provincial Challenge: Regional Crisis, and Integration in the Late Ottoman Empire, 1792-1812 (unpublished Ph.D. dissertation, Harvard University, 2008): 294-427.

Stanford J. Shaw.  Between Old and New: The Ottoman Empire Under Selim III, 1789-1807 (Cambridge: Harvard University, 1971).

Stanford J. Shaw.  “The Origins of Ottoman Military Reform: The Nizam-i Cedid Army of Sultan Selim III,” The Journal of Modern History 37, no. 3 (1965): 291-306.

Mehmet İpşirli.  “The Ulema and Selim III,” in Coşkun Yılmaz (ed.), III. Selim: İstanbul at a Turning Point Between Two Centuries (İstanbul. 2010): 155-170.

 Akyıldız, Ahmet. "Sened-i İttifak'ın ilk tam metni," İAD 2 (1998): 209-222. 

Week 12 (Dec. 9): Framing the Tanzimat: Cevdet Paşa and Alternative Visions of Reform and Progress

For the Lecture:

Cristoph K.  Neumann, “Whom did Ahmed Cevdet Represent?” in Late Ottoman Society, edited by E. Özdalga (New York: Routledge, 2005), 117-134

----.  “Bad Times and Better Self: Definitions of Identity and Strategies for Development in Late Ottoman Historiography, 1850-1900,” in Suraiya Faroqhi and Fikret Adınır (eds.), The Ottoman Balkans: A Discussion of Historiography (Leiden: E.J. Brill, 2002): 57-78

Rhodes Murphey, “The City of Belgrade in the early years if Serbian self-rule and the dual administration with the Ottomans: Vignettes from Rashid’s history illuminating the transformation of the Balkans,” in Essays on Ottoman Historians and Histriography (Eren, 2009), 59-67

Tutorial Readings:

Ahmed Cevdet Paşa.  Tarih-i Cevdet, 12 Vols. (Der-i Saadet, 1309).  TBA

Belgradi Raşid.  Tarih-i vak‘a-yı hayretnu’ma-yı Belgrad ve Sırpistan (deri Saadet, ).  TBA

Further Reading:

Christoph K. Neumann.  Araç Tarih Amaç Tanzimat: Tarihi Cevdet’in Siyasi Anlamı (İstanbul: Tarih Vakfı Yurt Yayınları, 1999).

Mübahat Kütükoğlu (ed.).  Ahmed Cevdet Paşa Semineri. 27-28 Mayıs 1985. Bildiriler (İstanbul: İÜEF Tarih Araştırma Merkezi, 1986.

Şerif Mardin.  The Genesis of Young Ottoman Thought: A Study in the Modernization of Turkish Political Ideas (Princeton: Princeton University, 1962).

Hulûsî Yavuz.  “Ahmed Cevdet Paşa and the Ulema of his Time,” İTD, VII/3-3 (1984): 178-198