6.2

 

7.1.1.     “The Three Great Authors of Modernity”:³⁷⁶ Đbrahim Şinasi, Münif Paşa, Ahmet Cevdet Paşa:

If there is a scale demonstrating the ideas of the Ottoman intellectuals regarding how much should be imported from European civilization and how much should be preserved, Đbrahim Şinasi should be placed somewhere closer to the margin arguing for the total adoption of the European civilization. Indeed, it was Şinasi, “the first modern writer and enlightener,”³⁷⁷ who popularized the concept of civilization. He was one of the best representatives of the dualism central to the Ottoman social system during and after Tanzimat period. His writings efficiently demonstrated the opposition between various categories, between the old and new, the alla turca and alla franca, the Ottoman Empire and Europe, and the East and the West. According to Tanpınar this reality of dualism

 

 

³⁷⁶ This expression belongs to Tanpınar, XIX. Asır Türk Edebiyatı Tarihi, 153.

 

³⁷⁷ Berkes, Development of Secularism in Turkey, 197.

was “the most significant fatality”³⁷⁸ of Tanzimat period and it produced the first ideology of this period, namely “civilizationism” (medeniyetçilik):

The first ideology of Tanzimat period is civilizationism […] Reşid Paşa, Âli Paşa, Cevdet Paşa, Münif Paşa, Sultan Abdülaziz, all try to define it in their writings and edicts. […] And, finally, Şinasi transforms this concept, which had slowly been leaking in our lives, into a religion for his and future generations by labelling Mustafa Reşid Paşa as the “prophet of civilization.”³⁷⁹

 

Thus, Şinasi’s perception of civilization was so central to his writings that he even sacralised it to attract the attention of his readers to this phenomenon. Being an ardent admirer of Mustafa Reşid Paşa, his first accounts on civilization could be found in his earlier poems dedicated to Mustafa Reşid Paşa. In one of these poems, Şinasi was courageous enough to label him as the “prophet of civilization” (medeniyet resûlü).³⁸⁰ In another one, he identified him as fahr-i cihân-ı medeniyet (another expression meaning the “prophet of civilization”).³⁸¹ In other words, he perceived Mustafa Reşid Paşa as the man, who brought civilization to the Ottoman realm, and sacralised this concept by utilizing a religious terminology.

Another significant characteristic of Şinasi’s perception of civilization was his clear association of civilization with Europe; such clarity was hardly visible in the writings of his predecessors. According to Şinasi, civilization could only be transferred from Europe, since this continent was the source of civilization. In one of his poems, he characterized the Edict of Tanzimat as a European beauty (Avrupalı büt), which gave splendour and dignity (revnâk-ü şân) to the Ottoman realm, and made it a land even envied by the Europeans

 

³⁷⁸ Tanpınar, XIX. Asır Türk Edebiyatı Tarihi, 132.

 

³⁷⁹ Italics added. Tanpınar, XIX. Asır Türk Edebiyatı Tarihi, 147.

 

³⁸⁰ Đbrahim Şinasi, Müntehâbât-ı Eş’ar, (Đstanbul: Tasvir-i Efkâr Matbaası, 1279 [1862]), transliterated and edited by Kemal Bek, (Đstanbul: Bordo-Siyah Yayınları, 2004), 56. This footnote and other footnotes below are given from the edition of Bek. The poem including this expression was written in 1857.

 

³⁸¹ The expression fahr-i cihân was utilized for the Prophet Mohammed himself. Şinasi,

Müntehâbât-ı Eş’ar, 58. The poem including this expression was written in 1858.

themselves.³⁸² In other words, he argued that only through incorporation of European-type regulations, the Ottoman Empire could prosper and reverse its decline.

Şinasi’s symbolic utilization of the concept of civilization would later be popularized and deepened in his articles, which appeared in the newspapers published by himself such as Tercümân-ı Ahvâl (starting from 1860 onwards) and Tasvîr-i Efkâr (starting from 1862 onwards). In these articles, he used the expression of hâl-i medeniyet (the condition of civilization) instead of usûl-i medeniyet (the technique of civilization) preferred by his predecessors; this transformation was important, since it means that Şinasi began to touch upon the essence of this concept, not its practical side. In other words, civilization was no more the technique, but the aim, the ideal to be achieved.

Şinasi also dwelled upon two other significant debates regarding the concept of civilization. The first one was the distinction between the civilized and uncivilized, which had already been discussed in the Islamic world through a Khaldunian perspective. The second debate was whether it was possible for the non-Europeans to be civilized. Şinasi clearly distinguished between “the civilized and non-civilized nations” (milel-i mütemeddine ve milel-i gayr-i mütemeddine), and put forward the basic characteristics of the civilized nations as being more prosperous, more peaceful, being interested in politics more and having a peculiar public opinion influencing, if not contributing to, policy- making. This distinction, however, was not an unsurpassable one, since Şinasi’s perception of civilization was based on reason.³⁸³ While most of the European intellectuals of the time perceived reason as a European phenomenon unfamiliar in the non-European world, Şinasi argued that civilization based on reason could not be monopolized by the Europeans, and any community centralizing reason in

 

³⁸² Şinasi, Müntehâbât-ı Eş’ar, 48. The poem including this expression was written in 1849.

 

³⁸³ In one of his articles published in Tasvir-i Efkâr in 1863, entitled “On the Beggars” (Seele Hakkındadır), Şinasi mentioned that the civilization of the European states was based on reason (medeniyetinin temeli hikmet üzerine kurulu olan memleketler). See Abdullah Kaygı, Türk Düşüncesinde Çağdaşlaşma, (Ankara: Gündoğan Yayınları, 1992), 57.

their attitudes and behaviours could be labelled as civilized.³⁸⁴ What is more, Şinasi did not want to abandon all the Eastern characteristics of the Empire. Rather what he tried was to evoke the rationalism that had once been a characteristic of the Islamic philosophy. His famous aphorism, cited almost in all reviews of his writings, “to marry the mature reason of Asia with the virgin ideas of Europe” (Asya’nın akl-ı pirânesiyle Avrupa’nın bikr-i fikrini izdivâc ettirmek), clearly demonstrates his effort to reach a synthesis instead of total adoption of the European civilization.³⁸⁵

If Şinasi was closer to the pro-European margin of the aforementioned scale on the degree of adoption from the European civilization, Münif Paşa (1828-1910) should be placed somewhere in the middle; since his writings demonstrate that he was almost in between the total adoptionists and total rejectionists. Hence, he was one of the excellent examples of the dualism between the old and new, Europe and the Ottoman Empire, and the West and East.³⁸⁶

The significance of Münif Paşa particularly resides in his most conspicuous contribution to the Ottoman literature, namely the journal of

³⁸⁴ This demonstrates that Şinasi was very much influenced from the earlier universality of the concept of civilization prevalent in Europe until the popularity of the idea of European superiority. According to Aydın, most of the early Tanzimat intellectuals, such as Şinasi, believed that “[…] civilization was the common heritage of humanity, not an exclusively European ideal;” however, it was stil perceived as originated from Europe. See Aydın, Politics of Anti-Westernism, 20.

 

³⁸⁵ Đbrahim Şinasi, “Đstanbul Sokaklarının Tenvir ve Tathiri” (The Enlightening and Cleaning of the Streets of Đstanbul), Tasvir-i Efkâr, No. 192, 28 Zilkade 1280 [29 April 1864], quoted in Đbrahim Şinasi, Makaleler, compiled, transliterated and edited by Fevziye Abdullah Tansel, (Ankara: Dün Bugün Yayınları, 1960), 105.

 

³⁸⁶ On the one hand, Münif Paşa closely followed the philosophical developments in the West; he translated major Western philosophical texts written by Fénelon (1651-1715), Fontenelle (1657- 1757), and Voltaire (1694-1778) and compiled them as Muhâverât-ı Hikemiye (The Philosophical Dialogues). See Münif Paşa, Muhâverât-ı Hikemiye, (Dersaadet: Ceridehane Matbaası, 1276 [1859]). On the other hand, he translated al-Harîrî’s (1054-1122) Makâmât (The Assemblies), which was one of the most significant social critiques of medieval Arab society. This translation was not published as a book. For a brief account of this translation, see Budak, Münif Paşa, 375-383. On the one hand, he translated Victor Hugo’s masterpiece Les Miserables in Turkish as Mağdurîn Hikayesi (The Story of Miserables); on the other hand, he wrote one of the last examples of a classical Ottoman poetic genre (destan), depicting each Ottoman Sultan, namely the Dâstân-ı Âl-i Osman.

Mecmuâ-i Fünûn (The Collection of Sciences), which introduced Western science and culture to the Ottoman public opinion.³⁸⁷ This journal did not only contribute to the Ottoman intellectual development, but also to the understanding of civilization particularly through the articles of Münif Paşa on this issue. Within this context, his first article published in this journal and entitled “Mukâyese-i Đlm-ü Cehl” (The Comparison between Knowledge and Ignorance) was extremely important, since it highlights major ideas of Münif Paşa on the concept of civilization and the debates that had already been initiated by Şinasi.

To start with, similar to Şinasi, Münif Paşa perceived civilization as an ideal state of being to be reached and the ultimate phase of the humanity; he considered civilization as “a reflection of the progress in science and industry” (ulûm ve sanayîde terakkînin bir tezâhürü).³⁸⁸ His emphasis on science and industry as the two pillars of civilization reflects that he focused on the material aspects of civilization instead of the moral ones. He then compared the nomadic and civilized societies by associating the former with ignorance and the latter with science and industry. He argued that the nomadic tribes of Africa and America could only sustain their basic needs and they had nothing else, while the civilized nations had prosperous countries and wealthy people. Hence civilization was displayed as the source of prosperity and wealth. What Münif Paşa added to the distinction between civilized and uncivilized nations was the idea of domination of the former over the latter.³⁸⁹ Therefore, according to Münif

³⁸⁷ The journal was begun to be published in 1862 and it was the first Turkish periodical ever published in the Ottoman Empire. Indeed there are two other journals or journal-like publications before Mecmua-i Fünûn. The first one is the Vekayi-i Tıbbiye (first published in 1850), which was bilingual (published in Turkish and French) and more like a newspaper than a journal. The other one is Mecmua-i Havadis, published by Vartan Paşa in 1852 in Turkish written in Armenian script. Kayahan Özgül, XIX. Asrın Benzersiz Bir Politekniği: Münif Paşa, (Ankara: Elips Kitap, 2005), 49-50. Tanpınar mentions that Mecmua-i Fünûn was a school and it played the role of the great Encyclopaedia in France in the eighteenth century. For a brief but very significant account of Münif Paşa and Mecmua-i Fünûn see, Tanpınar, XIX. Asır Türk Edebiyatı Tarihi, 170-173.

 

³⁸⁸ Budak, Münif Paşa, 549. For a brief accout of Münif Paşa’s perception of the concept of progress see, Đsmail Doğan, Tanzimatın Đki Ucu: Münif Paşa ve Ali Suavi, Sosyo-Pedagojik Bir Karşılaştırma, (Đstanbul: Đz Yayıncılık, 1991), 115-116.

 

³⁸⁹ Münif, “Mukayese-i Đlm-ü Cehl,” Mecmua-i Fünûn, No. 1, Muharrem 1279 [June 1862], 21, quoted by Budak, Münif Paşa, 550.

Paşa civilization was something inevitable; it could and should not be avoided. That is why, he clearly condemned those, who preferred nomadism to civilization, and labelled this preference as a “vicious idea” (fikr-i fâsid).³⁹⁰ In all, he established the oppositional categories between civilized and uncivilized based on the medium of science and industry; the ones associated with this medium were perceived as civilized, while the ones lacking it were labelled as uncivilized. This oppositional categorization was quite similar to the civilized/uncivilized distinction made in Europe, particularly in the writings of Guizot on civilization and of Social Evolutionists on the supremacy of the civilized peoples over the uncivilized ones.

Although Münif Paşa gave examples from European countries in order to depict the concept of civilization, he perceived this concept not as a European phenomenon, but as a universal achievement. Indeed, such a perception was quite widespread in the Ottoman intellectuals of the time, since they reacted to the Western texts monopolizing civilization as a European product. They were eager to demonstrate that civilization could not be confined within a single geographical entity (Europe) or a single religion (Christianity); its principles could and should be applied by whole humanity.³⁹¹ What is more, Münif Paşa perceived civilization as a quality envisaged by Islam, in other words, for him, a true Muslim was a civilized man.³⁹² That is why, he defended civilization against the critique of Islamists by writing that “[s]ome misconducts and misdemeanours witnessed among the civilized men is not an outcome of civilization, but presumably emerged out of its non-excellence.”³⁹³

All in all, like Şinasi, Münif Paşa perceived civilization as an ideal for the well-being of the Ottoman citizens and for the endurance of the Empire, and he

³⁹⁰ Münif, “Mukayese-i Đlm-ü Cehl,” 22, quoted by Budak, Münif Paşa, 552.

 

³⁹¹ Therefore, it was not surprising that neither in the articles of Münif Paşa, nor in the other articles published in Mecmua-i Fünûn, the expressions like “Western civilization,” “European civilization,” or “Islamic civilization” were utilized. Budak, Münif Paşa, 271.

 

³⁹² Budak, Münif Paşa, 551.

 

³⁹³ Münif, “Mukayese-i Đlm-ü Cehl,” 26, quoted by Budak, Münif Paşa, 555.

focused on the universality and universal applicability of this concept similar to its earlier usages in Europe.³⁹⁴ He also added the argument of the supremacy of civilized nations over the uncivilized ones to the debates regarding civilization. This argument would later be developed more, particularly by those who argued for the inevitability of civilization.

Ahmet Cevdet Paşa (1822-1895) was one of the most conservative intellectuals of the Tanzimat period and this was because of his education and career.³⁹⁵ He was very suspicious about the European civilization and this makes him very distant to the pro-European margin of the scale displaying the degree of adoption from the West. To start with, Ahmet Cevdet Paşa perceived the concept of civilization quite in line with Ibn Khaldun.³⁹⁶ Hence, his understanding of civilization as an advanced condition compared to savagery (vahşiyet) and nomadism (bedeviyet), and his perception of its inevitability were derived from Ibn Khaldun. In other words, unlike Şinasi and Münif Paşa, whose sources were mainly Western, Ahmet Cevdet Paşa relied more on Eastern sources to establish

 

 

³⁹⁴ Özgül, Münif Paşa, 162.

 

³⁹⁵ Considering the intellectual life in the mid-nineteenth century, Ahmet Cevdet Paşa (1822- 1895) was probably one of the most interesting figures. His traditional madrasa education, his earlier career in the ranks of the ulama, and his latter transfer to bureaucracy produced one of the most colourful intellectuals of the nineteenth century Ottoman Empire. For this peculiar education of Ahmed Cevdet Paşa see Richard L. Chambers, “The Education of a Nineteenth Century Ottoman Âlim, Ahmed Cevdet Paşa,” International Journal of Middle East Studies, Vol. 4, No. 4 (Oct. 1973): 440-464. His colossal History (Tarih-i Cevdet) and its latter companions Tezakir and Maruzat provide the reader with a vivid account of the problems of Ottoman modernization as well as the evolution of the Ottoman intellectual debates. The Ottoman civil code called Mecelle-i Ahkam-ı Adliye (The Book of Civil Provisions) was prepared under his guidance and was practically in enforcement until late 1920s in Turkey. His writings on logic (such as Miyar-ı Sedad), linguistics (such as Kavaid-i Osmaniye), and theological history (such as Kısas-ı Enbiya ve Tevarih-i Hulefa) were as important as his other works. All these works gives significant insights regarding his more conservative understanding of civilization, which both resembled to and distinguished from the perceptions of his contemporaries, namely Şinasi and Münif Paşa.

 

³⁹⁶ Indeed, he was one of the translators of Ibn Khaldun’s Muqaddimah in Turkish. This translation was started by Pîrîzade Sâib Molla in the beginning of the eighteenth century and could only be completed by Cevdet Paşa in 1860. Ercümend Kuran, Türkiye’nin Batılılaşması ve Milli Meseleler, edited by Mümtaz’er Türköne, (Ankara: Türkiye Diyanet Vakfı Yayınları, 1994), 142-143.

his own understanding of civilization.³⁹⁷ What is more, according to Ümit Meriç, Ahmet Cevdet Paşa was not content with the argument of a single civilization; he rather perceived the Islamic civilization as one of the greatest civilizations of world history, which was backward at his times, but had the potential to be an alternative to the Western civilization.³⁹⁸

By giving examples from his inspections in the Province of Bosna, Ahmet Cevdet Paşa justified the domination of the civilized over the non- civilized similar to Münif Paşa. Accordingly, he argued that in some parts of the province, where the condition of savagery and nomadism (hâl-i vahşet ve bedâvet) prevailed, some kind of military/colonial administration (koloni militer usulü) should be established. He wrote:

Although the inhabitants of the regions, where colonie militaire practice would be applied, were quite savage, since their former conditions and customs were similar to this practice, its application would be possible with a dominating style which would not brutalize them.³⁹⁹

 

In other words, the practice of establishing military/colonial administration by a civilized authority over uncivilized communities was perfectly acceptable in order to provide the loyalty of these people to that particular authority.⁴⁰⁰

Besides these perceptions, it can be argued that Ahmet Cevdet Paşa was perhaps the first official historian of the Ottoman Empire explaining the decline of the Ottoman Empire with its backwardness compared to the development of

³⁹⁷ Ahmet Cevdet Paşa, Tarih-i Cevdet, 6 Volumes, (Dersaadet: Matbaa-i Amire, 1271 [1855]) Vol. 1, 17. Also see Harun Anay, “Ahmet Cevdet Paşa’nın Modernizme Bakışı,” in Ahmet Cevdet Paşa Sempozyumu, 9-11 June 1995, (Ankara, Türkiye Diyanet Vakfı, 1995), 67-77, 70; Zeki Đzgöer, Ahmet Cevdet Paşa, (Đstanbul: Şule Yayınları, 1999), 58.

 

³⁹⁸ Ümit Meriç, Cevdet Paşa’nın Cemiyet ve Devlet Görüşü, (Đstanbul: Ötüken Neşriyat, 1979), 31.

 

³⁹⁹ Italics added. Ahmet Cevdet Paşa, Tezakir, Vol. 3, 34-35.

 

⁴⁰⁰ Such a perception is also visible in his reports written during his inspection in the provinces of Empire in south-eastern Anatolia, where he associated nomadism with un-civility. However, Ahmet Cevdet Paşa appraised some of the nomadic tribes, which demonstrated allegiance to the Empire, while he criticized the “savagery” of other nomadic tribes resisting against the Ottoman rule. Disloyalty and disturbance of order, therefore, emerged as a criterion for un-civility in his writings. For the details of these inspections, see Ahmet Cevdet Paşa, Tezakir, Vol. 3, 107-240.

Western world. Hence he tacitly accepted the supremacy of West; but this supremacy was only confined to the material fields, namely science, technology and administrative mechanisms. In his History (Tarih-i Cevdet) he wrote that the European developments in administrative (umûr-u mülkiye), financial (umûr-u mâliye) and military (umûr-u askeriye) fields produced the current welfare of the continent and the adoption of European regulations in these fields could contribute to the revitalization of the Ottoman Empire, provided that these regulations were in conformity with the Islamic law and the customs of the Empire.⁴⁰¹ In other words, in principle, Ahmet Cevdet Paşa was not against importation of some elements of the European civilization; however, they have to be in conformity with the basic principles of the Ottoman-Islamic tradition. This means that he was against imitation (taklîd) and superficial application of European practices rather than its essence.⁴⁰² He was also against the rapid implementation of European practices in the Ottoman Empire; he argued that a more gradual adoption of such practices would ease social tensions. The reason for this cautiousness was his firm belief in the peculiarity of the Ottoman/Islamic culture and the contradiction between the European and Islamic civilizations: “We have some peculiar characteristics; therefore, what is beneficial for other states will be detrimental for us. What is an urgent treatment for them is a fatal poison for us. This is the most important issue is to discern and comprehend.”⁴⁰³

In sum, Ahmed Cevdet Paşa made a clear distinction between the material and moral elements of civilization. After stating that one of the most significant reasons of Ottoman decline was the lack of technological development, he wrote that the European science and technology should immediately be transferred to the Ottoman Empire. However, he argued that the implementation of moral elements of European civilization such as the legal system or values would disturb the Ottoman society. Because the moral elements

⁴⁰¹ Ahmet Cevdet Paşa, Tarih-i Cevdet, Vol. 3, 51-52, quoted by Kuran, Türkiye’nin Batılılaşması ve Milli Meseleler, 144.

 

⁴⁰² Ahmet Cevdet Paşa, Tezakir, Vol. 4, 220.

 

⁴⁰³ Ahmet Cevdet Paşa, Tezakir, Vol. 4, 221.

of civilization were the product of peculiar characteristics of a particular society; therefore, they were applicable only for that society. In sum, for him, the adoption of material elements of European civilization was a requisite for the revival of the Empire, and it would not disturb the peculiar characteristics of the Ottoman society; whereas, the adoption of moral elements would create significant problems.⁴⁰⁴

All in all, the word medeniyet had soon been consolidated, and only three decades after its coinage, it became the central theme of the Ottoman intellectual debates regarding the modernization of the Empire. Particularly, the writings of 1820 generation, namely Şinasi, Münif Paşa and Ahmet Cevdet Paşa, were quite influential in the popularization of the concept and for the establishment of the basic trends, which would later evolve into political movements towards the end of the Empire. The dualism between the old and new, the European and Islamic civilizations, and the East and West became quite clear because of the notion of selectivity applied to the elements of European civilization. This contributed to a blend of the material elements of the European civilization associated with reason, which was not a European but a universal phenomenon, and the moral elements of the Ottoman/Islamic civilization, which should be preserved in order to prevent imitation, a mortal malice for the Ottoman society. In sum, the dyadic presentation of these two different entities and the attempts for their harmonization was the most significant originality of the Ottoman perception of civilization in this period.

 

7.2.2       Deepening the Civilization Debate: Namık Kemal, Ali Suavi, Ahmed Midhat Efendi, and Şemseddin Sami (1870-1890)

The major debates regarding civilization, such as singularity/plurality of this concept, its inevitability and the degree of adoption of European civilization were consolidated more with the writings of a younger generation of intellectuals, who were born around 1840s, and whose legacies continued until

⁴⁰⁴ Christoph Neumann, Araç Tarih Amaç Tanzimat: Tarih-i Cevdet’in Siyasi Anlamı, translated by Meltem Arun, (Đstanbul: Tarih Vakfı Yurt Yayınları, 2000), 145- 146.

the end of the nineteenth century and beyond. Therefore this sub-section deals with the deepening of these debates and their evolution into the ideological division which would dominate the last two decades of the Empire.

Before examining the intellectuals of 1840 generation in detail, one significant point should be emphasized in order to underline the peculiarity of the period in consideration. Accordingly, the period between 1876 and 1878 was a significant turning point for these intellectuals both for their own mental transformation and for their perception of civilization. Until 1876, the focus of their writings was to criticize the bureaucratic autocracy of the ruling elite and to pursue parliamentary regime to prevent the disintegration of the Empire. Therefore, in this period, the concept of civilization was quite interrelated with the concepts of liberty, parliamentary regime, or anti-authoritarianism.⁴⁰⁵ Meanwhile, the significance attached to the material aspects of civilization instead of moral ones continued and even deepened. Moreover, until 1876, the Young Ottomans’ perception of Europe was extremely positive not only because what they defended had indeed been sprouted in Europe, but also because they found a secure place to disseminate their thoughts in some European states when they had to flee to Europe in the mid-1860s.

This situation took a sharp curve with the Ottoman-Russian War of 1877- 78; European states did not support the Ottoman Empire against the Russians unlike the Crimean War, and the European public opinion began to turn against the Ottoman Empire. Having read the European publications condemning Ottoman maltreatment towards some subjects of the Empire (especially the Bulgarians),⁴⁰⁶ Ottoman intellectuals began to defend their state against these

⁴⁰⁵ Berkes, Development of Secularism in Turkey, 215.

 

⁴⁰⁶ No politician could be more successful than William Ewart Gladstone (1809-1898) and no pamphlet could be more influential than his Bulgarian Horrors and the Question of the East, published in 1876, in turning the European public opinion against the Ottoman Empire. Criticizing the support of Benjamin Disraeli’s (1804-1881) government to the Ottoman Empire, he accused the Turks of being “the anti-human specimen of the humanity,” after the Ottoman suppression of the Bulgarian rebellion. See Aydın, The Politics of Anti-Westernism, 40. For a detailed analysis of Gladstone and British perception of Islam during 1870s and 1880s, see Kemal Karpat, The Politicization of Islam: Reconstructing Identity, State, Faith, and Community in the Late Ottoman State, (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2001), 140-145.

accusations. The defence of Islam⁴⁰⁷ as a religion compatible with contemporary civilization in general, and with science in particular, therefore, turned out to be a major theme in the writings of the prominent figures of the second half of the nineteenth century including Namık Kemal (1840-1888), Ali Suavi (1838-1878), Ahmed Midhat (1844-1912), and Şemseddin Sami (1850-1904).⁴⁰⁸

The articles of Namık Kemal, published in his newspapers, particularly in Đbret, were quite important regarding his argumentation of the concept of civilization, and these articles included one of the most developed analyses on the positioning of the Ottoman Empire vis-à-vis the European civilization. To start with, Namık Kemal argued that the word civilization was one of the concepts created after the Ottoman interaction with Europe.⁴⁰⁹ However, in defining civilization, he not only referred to the European perceptions, but also to the Khaldunian notion of umran by writing that civilization meant the social/settled life of human beings and thus “a natural requisite of human life” (hayat-ı beşer için levâzım-ı tabiiyeden).⁴¹⁰ Therefore, Namık Kemal argued for the inevitability of civilization, and criticized those who had been trying to stand against it:

The excellence of civilization and the degree of skills of Europe began to be recognized here. The impossibility of standing against the victorious influence of this total power by this country individually was understood in a short period of time.⁴¹¹

 

⁴⁰⁷ According to Kemal Karpat, the period between 1875 and 1880 was so significant that it was in this period that Islamism turned out to be a modern ideology. See Karpat, The Politicization of Islam, 119.

 

⁴⁰⁸ What is more, by the 1880s the image of the West was altered dramatically due to advancement of European imperialism; the European scramble to Africa as well as the British occupation of Egypt and French occupation of Tunisia alarmed the Ottoman intellectuals. While they still believed in the virtues of European civilization in this period; they were more cautious when they were mentioning about Europe as a polity. See Aydın, The Politics of Anti- Westernism, 39.

 

⁴⁰⁹ Namık Kemal, “Medeniyet,” Đbret, No. 94, 16 Zilkade 1289 [15 January 1873], in Namık Kemal, Osmanlı Modernleşmesinin Meseleleri, Bütün Makaleleri 1, 358.

 

⁴¹⁰ Namık Kemal, “Medeniyet,” 358.

 

⁴¹¹ “Avrupa’nın kemâlât-ı medeniye ve derecât-ı marifeti buralarda bilinmeye başladı. Öyle bir kuvve-i külliyenin galebe-i nüfuzuna münferiden şu mülkün karşı durabilmesinde olan

Again, similar to Münif Paşa, Namık Kemal argued that civilization was a source of domination; civilized nations would inevitably dominate the non- civilized once. What is novel in Namık Kemal’s writings was his association of civilization with liberty and his argumentation that uncivilized communities could not preserve their liberty against the civilized ones.⁴¹²

Namık Kemal also defended civilization against those who were criticizing it as the source of “social and moral evils” (fuhşiyat). He wrote that “social and moral evils emerge not out of its [civilization’s] essential deficiencies but imperfectness of its application.” (fuhşiyat [medeniyetin] avârız-ı zâtiyesinden değil, nekâis-i icraatındadır.)⁴¹³ He further argued that even if one accepted the European civilization as the source of evildoing, this should not prevent the Ottomans to benefit from its material achievements; since the Ottomans need not to imitate European civilization as a whole:

Now, if we desire to favour civilization we will derive such beneficial realities from wherever we find. We are not compelled to imitate the dance and wedding practices of Europeans just as we are not compelled to derive the habit of eating snails from the Chinese.⁴¹⁴

 

In other words, similar to his predecessors, Namık Kemal did not favour total adoption of the European civilization; rather he preferred selectivity. He prioritized the adoption of the material aspects of the civilization such as steam engine, gas lamps, medicine, and science as well as some legal regulations and

 

 

 

 

imkansızlık pek az zaman içinde anlaşıldı.” Namık Kemal, “Đttihad-ı Đslam,” Đbret, No. 11, 21 Rebiyülahir 1289 [28 Haziran 1872], in Namık Kemal, Osmanlı Modernleşmesinin Meseleleri, Bütün Makaleleri 1, 84.

 

⁴¹² For a brief account of Namık Kemal’s understanding of liberty see Tanpınar, XIX. Asır Türk Edebiyatı Tarihi, 383-385.

 

⁴¹³ Namık Kemal, “Medeniyet,” 360.

 

⁴¹⁴ “Şimdi biz tervic-i medeniyeti arzu edersek bu kabîlden olan hakâyık-ı nâfiayı nerede bulursak iktibas ederiz. Temeddün için Çinlilerden sülük kebabı ekl etmeyi almaya muhtaç olmadığımız gibi Avrupalıların dansına, usul-ü münakehatına takli etmeye de hiç mecbur değiliz.” Namık Kemal, “Medeniyet,” 361.

institutions such as factories and companies which would be beneficial for the development and progress of the society.⁴¹⁵ He once wrote:

For a nation in order to join into the race of civilization, which has advanced rapidly, it is necessary to learn how the technique and equipments that other nations possessed has emerged, […] to adopt harmless ones, and to make them harmonious with the national structure by changing some parts of them after adoption.⁴¹⁶

 

Namık Kemal not only defended adoption of European achievements against the conservative ulama; but also defended his religion, which had been accused of being an obstacle to scientific development, against the Europeans. One of his acclaimed texts entitled Renan Müdafaanâmesi (Defence against Renan) reflected such a reactive stance. In this short book, he criticized Ernest Renan (1823-1892), who perceived Islam as an impediment before scientific development and claimed that the relative development of Islamic philosophy and science was a product of either irreligious rulers of the Islamic states or the Greek/Sassanid philosophers.⁴¹⁷ Namık Kemal responds that Islam, as a religion, had always encouraged its followers to acquire knowledge wherever it was; it would be extremely inaccurate to label Muslim caliphs as irreligious rulers; and borrowings from other cultures did not demonstrate the deficiency of borrowing culture but its richness.⁴¹⁸ His diversion from a more pro-European stance to a more Ottomanist/Islamist one became clearer after his disappointment due to negative European public opinion against the Ottoman Empire.

⁴¹⁵ Namık Kemal, “Đbret,” Đbret, No. 3, 11 Rebiyülahir 1289 [18 June 1872], in Namık Kemal, Osmanlı Modernleşmesinin Meseleleri, Bütün Makaleleri 1, 46-48. According to Berkes whenever Namık Kemal used the term civilization, he referred only to industry, technology, economy, the press and education. Berkes, The Development of Secularism in Turkey, 216.

 

⁴¹⁶ Namık Kemal, Osmanlı Tarihi, (Đstanbul: Mahmut Bey Matbaası, 1326 [1909]), transliterated and edited by Mücahit Demirel, (Đstanbul: Bilge Kültür Sanat, 2005), 25-26.

 

⁴¹⁷ Renan’s book entitled L’Islam et la Science (Islam and Science) (Paris: M. Levy, 1883), written after his conference delivered with the same title in the University of Sorbonne in 1883 with one of the most prominent Islamic scholars of that period, Jamaladdin al-Afghani (1839- 1897) created a significant resentment in the Ottoman Empire, which was concretized by Renan Müdafaanamesi.

 

⁴¹⁸ Namık Kemal, Renan Müdafaanâmesi, (Đstanbul: Mahmut Bey Matbaası, 1326 [1908]), transliterated and edited by Abdurrahman Küçük, (Ankara: Kültür ve Turizm Bakanlığı Yayınları, 1988), 97-109.

Besides Namık Kemal, Ali Suavi emerged as one of the most eccentric intellectuals of the late Tanzimat era with his complex personality.⁴¹⁹ Unlike Namık Kemal, who generally refrained from a polemical stance and rather preferred to write smoothly to prevent any misunderstandings, Ali Suavi was quite sharp in his newspaper articles. Being against imitation like most of his contemporaries, he wrote that the Ottomans lost their peculiar characteristics, customs and traditions after they began to imitate the Europe; he perceived imitation as an illness (maraz).⁴²⁰ He even mentioned that what Ottomans perceived as civilization was nothing but debauchery: “The bitch called debauchery entered Đstanbul under the dress of civilization.”⁴²¹ In other words, he bitterly criticized the Ottomans of being super-westernized at the expanse of losing their own characteristics. Indeed, this criticism was not a new one; however, it had not been stated as sharp as in these expressions before.

The Islamist tune in the writings of Ali Suavi soon experienced an unfamiliar transformation into a Turkist one. Therefore, one of his significant contributions to the discussion of civilization was his incorporation of the concept of race to the idea of civilization. Accordingly, in one of his articles, he wrote that “[i]n Europe there is the issue of race. In other words, there is the belief that one should consider the race of a community in order to evaluate its talents and skills.”⁴²² After that he focused not on the Ottoman but on the

⁴¹⁹ He can not be labelled under a category easily; although he had no madrasa education, he adopted the ulama dress and gave speeches in the mosques. Then he joined the Young Ottomans and defended liberty against the authoritarian regime of Tanzimat bureaucracy. This struggle ended up with his flight to Europe where he married an English woman, Marie Steward Lugh and republished the newspaper Muhbir in London and the newspaper Ulûm in 1869. His life had a dramatic end; he was killed while he was trying to re-enthrone Murad V in 1878. Doğan, Tanzimatın Đki Ucu, 214-222.

 

⁴²⁰ Ali Suavi, “Taklid,” Le Mukhbir, 18 January 1868, quoted in Doğan, Tanzimatın Đki Ucu, 292.

 

⁴²¹ “[…] sefahat dedikleri kahpe, Đstanbul’a medeniyet kisvesiyle girmiştir.” Ali Suavi, “Kemal’in Zevali, Süs Neticesi Hacet Miktarını Tecavüzün Neticesi,” Muvakkaten Ulûm, 1287 [1870], quoted in Doğan, Tanzimatın Đki Ucu, 293.

 

⁴²² Ali Suavi, “Türk,” Ulûm, No. 1, 22 Rebiyülahir 1286 [1 August 1869]. For a detailed analysis of the article see Tanpınar, XIX. Asır Türk Edebiyatı Tarihi, 226-228. Indeed, it is quite interesting that Mahmud Celaleddin’s (1826-1875, a Polish-émigré named Konstanty Borzecky, converted to Islam and became a general in the Ottoman army later on) Les Turcs Anciens et Modernes (The Ancient and Modern Turks) was published in the same year in a French

Turkish history, and argued that this history could not be brushed away just as the story of a chain of invasions. Rather, according to him, Turks were the representatives of an old glorious civilization. He particularly referred to Jean Sylvain Bailly’s (1736-1793) Lettres sur l' Atlantide de Platon (Letters on Plato’s Atlantis) published in 1779, who argued that the cradle of civilization was Central Asia.423 Moreover, Suavi insisted that it was the Turkish people that introduced animal-herding, establishing dams over rivers, mining, history and rhetoric to the world.⁴²⁴

All these interesting, if not weird, explanations demonstrate that, with Ali Suavi, the ideas of race and the Central Asia as the cradle of civilization somehow entered into the Ottoman literary circles. Of course, these ideas were quite naïve, they did not emerge out of a detailed historical analysis; however still, they should be evaluated as quite original and thought-provoking. In an age where the Lamarckian Social Evolutionism and Social Darwinism was rising in Europe, such explanations by an Ottoman intellectual, who had lived for some time in the centres of these debates, namely Paris and London, was not totally bizarre. Of course, this does not necessarily mean that Ali Suavi had covered all the literature on racism; however, at least he was aware of the concept of race and tried to implement it in his analysis of history and civilization. He was one of the earliest authors writing on the Turkish race and their achievements; that is

publishing house in Đstanbul. In this book, Mustafa Celaleddin attacked the idea of racial inferiority of the Turks and tried to prove that the Turkish and European peoples had descended from the same origin. He also set parallels between European languages and Turkish language. His studies produced different implications; on the one hand, there were those criticizing his book as filled with speculative expressions, while others perceived him as one of the earliest representatives of Turkish nationalist discourse even influencing the thoughts of Atatürk. For an account of Mustafa Celaleddin and his book see Đlker Aytürk, “Turkish Linguists against the West: The Origins of Linguistic Nationalism in Atatürk’s Turkey,” Middle Eastern Studies, Vol. 40, No. 6 (Nov., 2004): 1-25, 8-10.

 

⁴²³ He wrote: “Mister Bailly, who had achieved the qualification of a knowledgeable scholar among the English scholars, mentioned in his writings about Plato that it was the Turkish people, who had brought science, industry, civilization and illumination to the world.” (Đngiliz uleması beyninde allame vasfını kazanmış Mister Bailly, Eflatun üzerine talikatında der ki: Dünyaya ulum ve sanayi ve medeniyet ve tezehhüb veren kavim Türklerdir.) Quoted by Tanpınar, XIX. Asır Türk Edebiyatı Tarihi, 227.

 

⁴²⁴ Tanpınar, XIX. Asır Türk Edebiyatı Tarihi, 227.

why Tanpınar argues that he influenced the pre-1908 philological and historical studies on the Turkish people by a group of intellectuals.⁴²⁵

If Namık Kemal and Ali Suavi processed the concept of civilization in their newspaper articles, Ahmed Midhat did this in his literary works, particularly in his novels.⁴²⁶ Similar to the intellectuals of his age, he admired European achievements and argued for their adoption in the Ottoman Empire, while he was against “being Frankish” (alafrangalaşmak), in other words, the simple and superficial imitation of the Westerners.⁴²⁷

Ahmed Midhat Efendi was not much interested in daily politics unlike Ali Suavi and Namık Kemal. This disinterest distanced him from the two major political movements of his earlier and latter life; in other words, he could not get along with both the Young Ottomans in 1870s and Young Turks from 1890s onwards.⁴²⁸ According to Tanpınar, Ahmed Midhat opposed the methods of Young Ottomans in bringing revolutionary change to the fragile Empire; therefore, he preferred to provide the grounds of Ottoman modernization through

 

⁴²⁵ These intellectuals included Ahmet Vefik Paşa (1823-1891), Necib Asım Bey (1861-1935), and Bursalı Mehmed Tahir Bey (1861-1925). Tanpınar, XIX. Asır Türk Edebiyatı Tarihi, 227.

 

⁴²⁶ Born as the son of a poor shopkeeper, Ahmed Midhat, lived a difficult childhood. After completing his education, he was appointed as secretary to the Governorship of Danube province, which was established under extraordinary conditions by one of the most significant statesmen of the Tanzimat era, namely Midhat Paşa (1822-1884). There, he attracted the attention of Midhat Paşa, who would later give his name ‘Midhat’ to his young secretary. During his service in the Danube province, Ahmed Midhat began to learn French and followed European literature. Later, when Midhat Paşa was appointed as the Governor of Baghdad Province, he brought Ahmed Midhat Efendi among his staff. There, Ahmed Midhat was able to learn Eastern literature as well. In sum, his career provided him to evaluate these two literatures, which contributed much to his perception of the East and West’ For a short biography of Ahmed Midhat, see Orhan Okay, Batı Medeniyeti Karşısında Ahmed Midhat Efendi, (Ankara: Atatürk Üniversitesi Yayınları, 1975), 3-7.

 

⁴²⁷ Carter Vaughn Findley, “An Ottoman Occidentalist in Europe: Ahmed Midhat Meets Madame Gülnar, 1889,” The American Historical Review, Vol. 103, No. 1 (Feb., 1998): 15-49, 23. According to Aydın, Ahmed Midhat was the person, “[…] who brilliantly formulated the Muslim modernist attempt to separate the universality of modernity from the Western experience,” and who “[…] not only confirmed the liberal modernism of the earlier generation and harmonized Islamic identity with the pro-modernist attitudes but also responded to the dominant European discourse on the inferiority of Muslims. See Aydın, The Politics of Anti-Westernism, 41.

 

⁴²⁸ Findley, “An Ottoman Occidentalist in Europe,” 19.

educating the people. This was the starting point for his attempts to write and publish continuously for almost half a century.⁴²⁹

Ahmed Midhat’s dislike of revolutionary change and his preference of a more cautious modernization resulted in his distinction between the material and moral aspects of civilization, which he preferred to label as the distinction between “technique” and “idea.” Orhan Okay argues that this distinction was quite popular in the Hamidian era. On the one hand, the Ottoman intellectuals were aware that the Ottoman Empire fell extremely backwards compared to Europe in technical sense; therefore the material elements of civilization had to be adopted immediately and without questioning. On the other hand, the Western ideas, such as liberty, republicanism, representative democracy, laicism, were perceived as the “poisons” of the Western civilization, which should be avoided to prevent the total disintegration of the Empire.⁴³⁰ Ahmed Midhat was not as solid as other pre-Hamidian intellectuals on regime question; however, he argued that the discussion on regime question and liberty should wait for the achievement of material development in the Ottoman Empire.⁴³¹

Ahmed Midhat argued that it was impossible to deny the scientific development of Europe as he declared himself as “the student or disciple of Europeans in the way of progress.”⁴³² However, like Ahmet Cevdet Paşa, he criticized the Ottomans for adopting the moral elements of civilization more easily and more rapidly than its material elements. The main theme of his novels is, therefore, the adoption of the wrong side of the European civilization; there are generally two protagonists, one representing the super-westernized, ignorant, and morally corrupted Ottomans and the other representing the Ottomans who preserved their religious and cultural values while educated themselves through

⁴²⁹ Tanpınar, XIX. Asır Türk Edebiyatı Tarihi, 403.

 

⁴³⁰ Okay, Batı Medeniyeti Karşısında Ahmed Midhat Efendi, 10.

 

⁴³¹ Okay, Batı Medeniyeti Karşısında Ahmed Midhat Efendi, 10.

 

⁴³² “Biz kendimizi bu şehrâh-ı terakkîde Avrupalıların peyrevi ve âdetâ şakirdi addeyle[riz].” Ahmed Midhat, Ben Neyim: Hikmet-i Maddiyeye Müdafaa, (Đstanbul: Kırkambar Matbaası, 1308 [1892]), cited in Okay, Batı Medeniyeti Karşısında Ahmed Midhat Efendi, 13.

learning about European material achievements. The oppositional representation of these characters, the self-defeat of the former and the achievements of the latter at the end of the book establishes a typical Ahmed Midhat novel.⁴³³

Another significant novelty of Ahmed Midhat was his Social Darwinist stance. According to Atila Doğan, he was the first significant representative of this movement in the Ottoman Empire.⁴³⁴ Some of the articles in the journal Dağarcık published by himself demonstrate that he was very much influenced by Lamarckian social evolutionism. For example, in one of his articles, he associated human progress with the concept of rivalry and argued that the recent progress of humanity was an outcome of the sense of rivalry which forced the human beings to seek always the better.⁴³⁵ In another article, social Darwinist concepts were more visible; he mentioned that in the history of humanity the idea to destroy (fikr-i tahrip) always preceded the idea to construct (fikr-i tâmir), and he argued that the humanity had always reached a better condition after each destruction.⁴³⁶

Şemseddin Sami (1850-1904), a major author and linguist of Albanian origin, was very significant for the perception of the concept of civilization; since his four articles published in Hafta journal between 1881 and 1884 summed up all the major discussions of the nineteenth century regarding this

⁴³³ The most significant comparison of such kind was presented in Felatun Bey ile Rakım Efendi in which Felatun Bey represented the super-westernized Ottomans and the Rakım Efendi represented morally conservative but materially progressive Ottomans. In the initial parts of the book Felatun Bey was a rich, morally corrupted man engaging in inconvenient relationships with women, while Rakım Efendi was relatively poor, but still a man of dignity. At the end of the book, Felatun Bey was bankrupted and fell into a miserable condition, while Rakım Efendi achieved almost what he wanted. In sum, Ahmed Midhat tried to demonstrate that the former group was destined to decay while the latter group would succeed despite whatever difficulty they would experience on the way. Other novels of Ahmed Midhat on the same theme included Ahmet Metin ve Şirzad, Paris’te Bir Türk, and Jön Türk.

 

⁴³⁴ Atila Doğan, Osmanlı Aydınları ve Sosyal Darwinizm, (Đstanbul: Đstanbul Bilgi Üniversitesi Yayınları, 2006), 152.

 

⁴³⁵ Ahmed Midhat Efendi, “Đnsan,” Dağarcık, No. 2, 1288, 40-49, cited in Doğan, Osmanlı Aydınları ve Sosyal Darwinizm, 158.

 

⁴³⁶ Ahmed Midhat Efendi, “Fikr-i Tahrip ve Fikr-i Tamir,” Dağarcık, No. 9, 1289, 260-263, cited in Doğan, Osmanlı Aydınları ve Sosyal Darwinizm, 162-163.

concept.⁴³⁷ To start with, he was one of the first authors, who systematically argued that the concept of civilization was a product of the intellectual developments of the eighteenth century, emerged as a result of the works of Voltaire, Rousseau and the Encyclopaedists such as Dalambert and Diderot. He also mentioned that the way to the works of these figures were opened by “the scientific innovations and philosophical ideas and perceptions” (keşfiyât-ı fenniye ve efkâr-ı mütalaat-ı hikemiye) of Descartes, Newton, Herschel, Kant, and Bacon.⁴³⁸ This account of the historical roots of civilization was quite original and demonstrated the awareness of the author on the Enlightenment literature. He further argued for the inevitability of civilization as his predecessors; what is novel in his approach was the indestructibility of civilization. He mentioned that the spread of civilization reached such a level that, nothing could prevent its further development and nothing can destroy it. He wrote that the civilization can not be destroyed even with the destruction of entire Europe, let alone Paris and London.⁴³⁹

Moreover, Şemseddin Sami clearly distinguished between the Islamic and the European civilization. He argued that the Islamic civilization had contributed to the scientific and intellectual development of humanity in the past; however, today, current civilization had spread to the world from Europe. In other words, he associated the Islamic civilization with the past and the European civilization with the present. He underlined that the material elements, particularly steamships, railway and telegraph, were the guardians of civilization and under their protection, nothing could harm the progress of civilization.⁴⁴⁰

Şemseddin Sami also criticized the bigotry of some Ottomans regarding the European civilization. He wrote that since the idea of civilization seemed to

⁴³⁷ For the full texts of these four articles see Zeynep Süslü and Đsmail Kara, “Şemseddin Sami’nin ‘Medeniyet’e Dair Dört Makalesi,” Kutadgubilig, No. 4 (Oct. 2003): 259-281, 274.

 

⁴³⁸ Süslü and Kara, “Şemseddin Sami’nin ‘Medeniyet’e Dair Dört Makalesi,” 274.

 

⁴³⁹ Süslü and Kara, “Şemseddin Sami’nin ‘Medeniyet’e Dair Dört Makalesi,” 276.

 

⁴⁴⁰ Süslü and Kara, “Şemseddin Sami’nin ‘Medeniyet’e Dair Dört Makalesi,” 275.

be monopolized by the Christian community, ignorant people thought that it was a product of Christianity and that the Muslims should resist it. He contested this view by arguing that indeed it was not Islam preventing the progress of the Islamic community; rather the problem was the reaction in the name of Islam against the incorporation of civilization to the Islamic community.⁴⁴¹

From this point, Şemseddin Sami advanced to a critique of some of his predecessors, particularly the conservatives such as Ahmet Cevdet Paşa, who had argued that the Islamic civilization had once enlightened the world and the emergence of European civilization owed much to the works of the Muslim scientists and philosophers. He partially accepted these arguments; however, he found some of them as extremely exaggerated. Although, these arguments served easing the reaction of the ignorant masses against civilization, they produced some kind of an ungrounded pride that deterred them from adopting European achievements, since they underlined that civilization had once been achieved by the Muslims and thus could not be monopolized by the Christian Europeans. Şemseddin Sami argued that the Ottomans should give as much significance to the works of European scientists and philosophers as the works of the former Muslim scientists and philosophers. However, he added that:

[…] we can neither use telegraph nor carry out steamship and railway locomotive by the chemistry of Cahiz and philosophy of Ibn Rüşd, just as we can not cure malaria with the medicine of Ibn Sina. Therefore we should leave the study of Islamic scholars’ works to the scholars of history and antiquities, and we should take science and technology from the current civilization of Europe if we want to be civilized.⁴⁴²

 

All in all, Şemseddin Sami argued that current civilization had spread to the world from Europe. Therefore, he advised the Ottomans not to resist the importations from European civilization by arguing that these importations were peculiar to Christianity. Also, the Ottomans should not remain satisfied with

⁴⁴¹ Süslü and Kara, “Şemseddin Sami’nin ‘Medeniyet’e Dair Dört Makalesi,” 272.

 

⁴⁴² “[…] Đbn Sînâ'nın tıbbıyla sıtmayı kesmeğe muktedir olmayacağımız gibi Câhız'ın kimyası ve Đbn Rüşd'ün hikmetiyle de ne demiryolu lokomotifiyle vapuru yürütebiliriz, ne telgraf kullanabiliriz. Bunun için biz, ulema-yı Đslâmın âsârıyla uğraşmağı tarih ve âsâr-ı atîka ulemasına bırakarak, temeddün etmek ister isek ulûm ve fünûnu Avrupa medeniyet-i hâzırasından almalıyız.” Süslü and Kara, “Şemseddin Sami’nin ‘Medeniyet’e Dair Dört Makalesi,” 279.

glorifying the Islamic civilization of the Middle Ages; instead, they should work hard for adopting the current civilization in order to reverse the decline of the Ottoman Empire.

The 1840 generation, who experienced both the bureaucratic suppression of the Azizian and the authoritarian rule of Hamidian periods, not only deepened the discussions on the concept of civilization through elaborating them more systematically, but also widened the scope of the concept through incorporating some discussions in Europe, such as Social Evolutionism and its emphasis on race. The destructiveness of 1877-78 War and the Hamidian censure decreased the degree of pro-Europeanness and the critical tune of the Ottoman intellectuals; but they also voluntarily defended their own Islamic/Ottoman characteristics against European criticisms. Moreover, the distinction between the material and moral elements of civilization, the perception of the necessity of the adoption of the material elements as well as the solid emphasis on the preservation of the moral elements continued to a great extent in this period. Another important point is that this generation’s perception of civilization had a significant difference from the prevalent Western perception of the concept at that time. As Aydın clearly states the Ottomans searched “search for a global modernity that would be in harmony with the multiple traditions of different religions and cultures, at a time when European discourse of Orient and race were trying to limit the achievements and future of modernity only to the Western race and Christian culture.”443

To sum up, Tanzimat intellectuals brought the argumentation of civilization one step further. Unlike most of the European intellectuals, who argued for the impossibility of progress in non-European societies, they courageously defended that the East could and should progress, because lack of progress meant extinction for them. In other words, they had the firm belief that the Eastern societies were not static; they had the potential to change.⁴⁴⁴ This

⁴⁴³ Aydın, The Politics of Anti-Westernism in the West, 42-43.

 

⁴⁴⁴ Berkes, Batıcılık, Ulusçuluk ve Toplumsal Devrimler, 37. However, Berkes also criticized the Tanzimat intellectuals of not passing beyond the contemporary European civilization, and of not understanding the underlying historical and social dynamics that resulted in its advance. He

critical tune developed against European critiques of the non-European world, would consolidate in the post-Hamidian period evaluated in the next section.

 

7.2.           Westernism, Islamism and Turkism, and the Third Generation of Ottoman Intellectuals (1890-1920):

The dualism descended from Tanzimat period never ceased to exist in the Ottoman Empire until its final disintegration; indeed, it was this dualism that provided the intellectual richness and colourful debates of the post-Hamidian era. Although crystallization of three political movements, namely Westernism, Islamism and Turkism, seemed to be realized after the restoration of the parliament, indeed, they were the culmination of a century long discussion, which was considerably transformed during the Hamidian period.⁴⁴⁵ That is why, this section does not examine the period from 1908, but from 1890s onwards. As Berkes states, it was in the heyday of Hamidian period, the depths of intellectual circles “[…] were boiling with the signs of a coming revolt. Between the

 

 

argued that they mentioned reason, science and hard-work (say’) as the factors producing the existing civilization; however, all the other underlying reasons were neglected. Berkes, Batıcılık, Ulusçuluk ve Toplumsal Devrimler, 61.

 

⁴⁴⁵ Indeed, one of the earliest attempts to present different currents of thought as political movements was Akçuraoğlu Yusuf Bey’s (1876-1935) famous article “Üç Tarz-ı Siyaset” (The Three Ways of Politics) published in Türk newspaper in Cairo in 1904. In this article, he mentioned three currents of thought, being Ottomanism, Islamism and Turkism. He argued that Ottomanism aimed to establish an “Ottoman nation” based on the idea of fatherland (vatan) in which the components of the Empire would have equal rights and obligations. However, he mentioned that this was an extremely difficult task for several reasons: (1) protection of the borders of the Ottoman fatherland would not suffice for the survival of the state; (2) the Turkish component would lose its authority vis-à-vis the Arabs because of the changing demographic conditions; (3) Russia and the European public opinion would resist such a project for political and religious reasons. Akçuraoğlu Yusuf Bey defined Islamism as a project uniting all the Muslims of the world under Ottoman leadership. He perceived the realization of this aim more possible; however, still, he argued that its realization might take a very long period, which could not be bothered. Finally, he determined Turkism as the third current of thought and argued for a gradual union of the Turks, starting from the Ottoman Empire and later enlarged to Caucasia and Central Asia. Although it was understood from his writings that he favoured the last option, he did not clearly mention that; rather he concluded his article with a question to be answered by the intellectuals through choosing among the Islamist and Turkist solutions. See Yusuf Akçura, Üç Tarz-ı Siyaset, transliterated and edited by Enver Ziya Karal, (Ankara: Türk Tarih Kurumu, 1976).

conflicting pressures of conservatism and the Western penetration, the lines of thinking on cultural matters began to clarify and differentiate.”⁴⁴⁶

What distinguished this period from the earlier periods was that the idea of civilization was no more analyzed in individual works; rather it turned a major theme of relatively more systematic political movements. In other words, all of these political movements had a peculiar understanding of civilization; their adherents placed the concept in the midst of their discussion on the perception of the West vis-à-vis the East, as well as on the reasons of the Ottoman decline and possible solutions to prevent and reverse it. Secondly, all these movements adopted a tougher stance under Hamidian pressure. Most of the adherents suffered considerably from the censure, exiles, or arrests. Hence anti- Hamidianism was a common point for all of them. The Westernists perceived Hamidian regime as the most significant obstacle in front of modernization and Westernization.⁴⁴⁷ Islamists were not content with the monopolization of Islamism by the Sultan; they argued that the establishment of the omnipotence of state under Hamidian regime imperilled religion.⁴⁴⁸ Turkists were reacting to the Hamidian Pan-Islamism, since they emphasized nation instead of religion. For instance Ömer Seyfeddin (1884-1920) wrote that Abdülhamid felt the greatest enmity to the Turks and the Turkish nationalism.⁴⁴⁹ The sudden mushrooming of political organizations and publications after 1908, therefore, owed much to this reaction beneath the surface. After setting these common points, the rest of this section is devoted to a comparative analysis of these three movements in terms of their perception of civilization, the West, and the reasons of Ottoman decline and the remedies to reverse it. Such a survey is particularly useful to understand how the concept of civilization was transformed in the post-Hamidian era.

⁴⁴⁶ Berkes, Development of Secularism in Turkey, 289.

 

⁴⁴⁷ Mustafa Gündüz, II. Meşrutiyet’in Klasik Paradigmaları: Đçtihad, Sebilü’r Reşad ve Türk Yurdu’nda Toplumsal Tezler, (Đstanbul: Lotus Yayınları, 2007), 479.

 

⁴⁴⁸ Berkes, Development of Secularism in Turkey, 290.

 

⁴⁴⁹ Ömer Seyfeddin, “Yeni Lisan ve Hüseyin Cahit,” Genç Kalemler, Vol. 2, No. 4, 13 Mayıs 1327 [26 May 1911], for the full text of the article see Ömer Seyfettin, Makaleler I, compiled, transliterated and edited by Hülya Argunşah, (Đstanbul: Dergah Yayınları, 2001), 130-135.

7.2.1.    The Perception of Civilization

To start with the Westernist discourse, it can be argued that the adherents of this movement firmly believed in the singularity of civilization.⁴⁵⁰ In other words, according to them, there was one single civilization, and it was the Western one. Abdullah Cevdet, an ardent defender of westernization, wrote in one of his articles as such: “We have to understand one thing – there are not two civilizations, there is only one to which to turn to, and that is Western civilization, which we must take into our hands, whether it be rosy or thorny.”⁴⁵¹

However, the Westernists did not altogether reject the existence of other civilizations, particularly the “Islamic civilization.” Rather, similar to the European intellectual mood of the time, which perceived the coexistence of multiple civilizations as a historical not contemporary phenomenon, they argued that this civilization had once existed; however, currently, it could not respond the needs of the Ottoman society. They criticized the Islamist argument that the Western civilization was established through the borrowings from the Islamic civilization, and found it nonsense. For example, Hüseyin Cahid (compared the “Arab civilization” (he meant the Islamic civilization) and the Western civilization and argued for the ultimate superiority of the latter:

Articles about the teachings of Arab science have taught me only one thing: I finally learned that we have been liberated from Arab civilization forever! If our gratitude to Arab civilization is due to those Arab sciences, we can declare our good riddance of it without hesitation [… L]et us leave those Arab books and embrace passionately the modern books which can fill our brains with the sciences and techniques of our time.⁴⁵²

 

Moreover, some of the staunch Westernists, such as Abdullah Cevdet, were against the distinction between the material and moral elements of

⁴⁵⁰ For a detailed analysis of Westernism, see M. Şükrü Hanioğlu, “Garbcılar: Their Attitudes toward Religion and Their Impact on the Official Ideology of the Turkish Republic,” Studia Islamica, Vol. 86, No. 2 (Aug., 1997): 133-158.

 

⁴⁵¹ Abdullah Cevdet, “Şime-i Muhabbet,” Đçtihad, No. 89, 16 Kanun-i Sani 1329 [29 Ocak 1914], quoted by Berkes, Development of Secularism in Turkey, 358.

 

⁴⁵² Hüseyin Cahid, “Arab’dan Đstifade Edeceğimiz Ulum,” Tarîk, No. 4630, (1898), quoted from Berkes, Development of Secularism in Turkey, 298.

civilization, which had ultimately ended with the prioritization of the former over the latter. According to them, civilization was a whole; it should be adopted not partially, but totally. Hence, in order to modernize the society, the adoption of material achievements did not suffice; a more radical moral and mental transformation was necessary.⁴⁵³ This radical version of Westernism was quite different from the earlier currents of thought as well as other post-Hamidian political movements, which were based on this distinction.

These three points, the singularity of civilization, the rejection of the “Islamic civilization” as an alternative, and the holistic perception of civilization were severely criticized by the Islamists. To start with, the Islamists rejected the singularity of European civilization; despite they acknowledged the superiority of the West vis-à-vis the Islamic world, they argued that this was only a material superiority. The West was morally corrupted; its material achievements did not suffice to perceive it as the single civilization of the contemporary world.

Thus, the Islamists accepted not only the existence of “Islamic civilization,” but also perceived it as the alternative to the Western civilization. Unlike the Westernists, they believed in the glory of the Islamic civilization which had been the source of the Western achievements.⁴⁵⁴ They utilized the concept of the “true civilization” (sahîh medeniyet) to denote the Islamic civilization; and thus emphasized that there was no other way for the Muslims

⁴⁵³ Of course, it is not possible to say that there is uniformity in the thoughts of the Westernists regarding this distinction. For example, a more moderate Westernist, Celal Nuri (Đleri, 1882- 1936) clearly distinguished between the “industrial civilization” (sınaî medeniyet) and “real civilization” (hakiki medeniyet). He argued that the main mistake of the Ottoman intellectuals and administrators was to adopt both of them; what should be done was to adopt the former and to preserve the real civilization of the Ottomans. See Celal Nuri, Đttihad-ı Đslam: Đslamin Mazisi, Hali, Đstikbali, (Đstanbul: Yeni Osmanlı Matbaası, 1331 [1913]), 26-33, also quoted by Gündüz,

II. Meşrutiyet’in Klasik Paradigmaları, 122-123. For a detailed analysis of the Celal Nuri’s concept of civilization see, Tufan Buzpınar, “Celal Nuri’s Concepts of Westernization and Religion,” Middle Eastern Studies, Vol. 43, No. 2 (Mar., 2007): 247-258.

 

⁴⁵⁴ According to Berkes, in 1886, in the Tarîk journal, a series of articles, entitled “The Islamic Civilization,” appeared, which aim to “[…] show the achievements of the Arabs […] in science, technology (fen), literature and historiography; and, second, to prove that all of these were taken over by the Europeans.” This was followed by the Akyiğitzade Musa’s book entitled Avrupa Medeniyetine Bir Nazar (A Glance to the European Civilization), published in 1897, whose opening sentence follows as: “The bases of contemporary civilization are nothing but the actions and traditions of Muhammad.” See Berkes, Development of Secularism in Turkey, 263.

but to turn to Islam in order to survive and to prosper.⁴⁵⁵ According to Musa Kazım Efendi (1858-1920), the real aim of “true civilization” was to provide the people with happiness and prosperity, and Western civilization failed to do so. Therefore, he argued only the true religion (hak din) could produce the true civilization. Similarly, Đskilipli Mehmed Atıf (1875-1926) argued that Western civilization could not be labelled as the true civilization unless it incorporated the “sacred principles and essences of Islam and the path of the prophets.” Therefore, Muslims did not necessarily need to adopt Western civilization; contrarily, it was the Westerners that need to adopt Islamic civilization to prevent and reverse their moral decadence.⁴⁵⁶

Again, unlike the Westernists, the Islamists were quite firm in the issue of the distinction between the material and moral elements of civilization. They were in favour of the adoption of material elements of civilization. For example, Mehmed Akif (Ersoy, 1873-1936) once wrote in one of his poems that:

Take the science and technology of the West, take it. Give, also, your efforts on this way its utmost speed. Because it is impossible to live without these.

Because only the science and technology has no nationality.⁴⁵⁷

 

Despite their admiration to scientific and technological achievements, the Islamists were strictly rejecting moral dimensions of the Western civilization. For example, Selahaddin Asım clearly wrote:

European behaviour is utterly contrary not only to Islam, but also to the principles of any social life […] What painful wounds, the European civil laws have opened on social life in terms of morals and ethics is obvious […] It is true that we have […] to benefit form European civilization, industry, and

 

 

⁴⁵⁵ Musa Kazım, Külliyat-ı Şeyhülislam Musa Kazım: Dini-Đçtimai Makaleler, (Đstanbul: Evkaf-ı Đslamiye Matbaası, 1336 [1920]), quoted by Đsmail Kara, Türkiye’de Đslamcılık Düşüncesi: Metinler/Kişiler, 3 Volumes, (Đstanbul: Kitabevi Yayınları, 1997), Vol. 1, 130-131.

 

⁴⁵⁶ Đskilipli Mehmed Atıf, Frenk Mukallitliği ve Şapka, (Đstanbul: Matbaa-i Kader, 1340 [1924]), quoted by Kara, Türkiye’de Đslamcılık Düşüncesi, 339.

 

⁴⁵⁷ “Alınız ilmini Garbın, alınız san’atını / Veriniz hem de mesâînize son sür’atini / Çünkü kabil değil artık yaşamak bunlarsız / Çünkü milliyyeti yok san’atın, ilmin; yalnız.” Mehmed Akif, Süleymaniye Kürsüsünde, in Mehmed Akif Ersoy, Safahat, edited by Ertuğrul Düzdağ, (Đstanbul: Đz Yayıncılık, 1991), 176.

knowledge; and yet it is absolutely imperative for us […] not to allow their customs, morals and conduct to enter into our countries.⁴⁵⁸

 

Similarly, according to Şehbenderzade Ahmed Hilmi (1865-1914), a conciliatory approach was necessary, which could both embrace the material achievements of the West and the moral principles of Islam; therefore, there was no other way from “the adoption of the way of eclecticism” (iktitaf mesleğini ihtiyardan daha eslem tarîk yoktur).⁴⁵⁹

According to the Islamists, the ultimate distinction between the Islamic and Western civilizations resulted in the impossibility of the import of moral elements of the latter to the former. For example, Said Halim Paşa (1863-1921) argued that the reason for this impossibility was that the entire social order of Islam is based on the fundamental principle of the absolute sovereignty of the shariah.⁴⁶⁰ In other words, the moral elements of Western civilization and Islam were not compatible with each other, and any attempt for reconciliation might have fatal consequences for the Islamic world.

What is significant with the Turkist perception of civilization was the distinction between the concepts of civilization (medeniyet) and culture (hars), clearly put forward by Ziya Gökalp. Indeed, this distinction was not altogether original; as mentioned before, it had its precursors from 1860s onwards regarding the distinction between the material and moral elements of civilization. It was not also peculiar to the Turkists as well, more moderate Westernists, such as Celal Nuri, made a similar distinction between the industrial civilization denoting the material elements and the real civilization denoting the moral elements. However, what is novel with the differentiation between civilization

⁴⁵⁸ Quoted by Berkes, Development of Secularism in Turkey, p. 354.

 

⁴⁵⁹ Şehbenderzade Ahmed Hilmi, Hangi Meslek-i Felsefîyi Kabul Etmeliyiz, (Đstanbul: Hikmet Matbaası, 1329 [1913]), quoted by Kara, Türkiye’de Đslamcılık Düşüncesi, pp. 23-24. For a detailed review of Ahmed Hilmi’s life, thoughts and works see Amin Bein, “A ‘Young Turk’ Islamic Intellectual: Filibeli Ahmed Hilmi and the Diverse Intellectual Legacies of the Late Ottoman Empire,” International Journal of Middle East Studies, Vol. 39, No. 4 (Nov., 2007): 607-625.

 

⁴⁶⁰ Ahmet Şeyhun, Said Halim Paşa: Ottoman Statesmen, Islamist Thinker (1865-1921), (Đstanbul: ISIS Press, 2003), 130.

and culture by Ziya Gökalp was the incorporation of a sociological tune through incorporating nationalist elements to this discussion.

According to Gökalp, there were significant differences between the concepts of culture and civilization, which should be comprehended properly in order to understand the reasons for the Ottoman Empire’s decline and to search for the prospective solutions. To start with, according to Gökalp, culture is national, while civilization is international:

Culture is composed of the integrated system of religious, moral, legal, intellectual, aesthetic, linguistic, economic and technological spheres of life of a certain nation. Civilization, on the other hand, is the sum of total of social institutions shared in common by several nations that have attained the same level of development.⁴⁶¹

 

Unlike the Islamists, who clearly distinguished the technical/scientific dimensions of civilization from the moral ones, Ziya Gökalp treated the eight spheres of life mentioned in the quotation above as an integrated system. This was similar to the Westernist perception of the singularity of civilization; however, indeed, Gökalp inserted the criteria of nationality into this analysis, and argued that when this integrated system was handled at national level, it denoted culture, and when it was handled at international level, it denoted civilization.

Secondly, according to Gökalp, while civilization was created by men’s conscious actions, and was, therefore, a rational product, the elements that constituted culture were not artificially created; they grew naturally and spontaneously. In other words, they did not emerge as an outcome of a rational process.⁴⁶² Therefore, while civilization could be transferred from nation to nation, culture could never be transmitted.⁴⁶³ He wrote:

[C]ulture is composed mainly of emotional elements, while civilization is composed of ideas; this is another difference between the two. Emotions are

 

 

⁴⁶¹ Ziya Gökalp, “Hars ve Medeniyet,” translated by Niyazi Berkes in Turkish Nationalism and Western Civilization: Selected Essays of Ziya Gökalp, (Westport: Greenwood Press, 1959), 104.

 

⁴⁶² Gökalp, “Hars ve Medeniyet,” 104.

 

⁴⁶³ Gökalp, “Hars ve Medeniyet,” 106.

not conscious and rational products of men. A nation cannot imitate the religious, moral or aesthetic feelings of another nation.⁴⁶⁴

 

In other words, in the analysis of Gökalp, it was the culture that held the members of a nation together; the civilization was the upper and looser structure, a rational product of men based on ideas, not emotions. It was this distinction that resulted in the emergence of Turkism as a synthesis of moral elements of Turkish culture, incorporating not only the national, but also the religious characteristics, and the material elements of Western civilization.

 

7.3.2      The Perception of the West:

Keeping the Westernists’ admiration of European civilization in mind, it is not surprising that the Westernists perceived the West as “the best of all possible worlds,”⁴⁶⁵ a cradle of civilization. For them, the West was characterized not only by material achievement, but also by moral advancement. As Berkes notes, for the Westernists underlined individual freedom against suppression of the individual by the state or religion, reason against the domination of custom and superstition, and the application of the scientific mind against ignorance. ⁴⁶⁶ In other words, the European civilization provides its adherents the most prosperous, the most liberal and the most humane life. The Westernists associated the West with continuous progress, as a realm of inventions, development and thus the source of a happier and an advanced life. Hence the West was idealized as the only source of enlightenment; without adopting the elements producing this magnificence, survival of the Empire would be impossible.⁴⁶⁷

The Westernist admiration of the European civilization and its presentation as the only solution was considerably shattered by the Tripolitanian

⁴⁶⁴ Gökalp, “Hars ve Medeniyet,” 108.

 

⁴⁶⁵ Berkes, Development of Secularism in Turkey, 352.

 

⁴⁶⁶ Berkes, Development of Secularism in Turkey, 352.

 

⁴⁶⁷ Tarık Zafer Tunaya, Türkiye’nin Siyasi Hayatında Batılılaşma Hareketleri, (Đstanbul: Yedigün Matbaası, 1960), 79.

War of 1911 and the Balkan Wars of 1912-13. The severe Ottoman defeats and the support of Western powers towards the adversaries of the Empire created a significant disillusionment. It not only strengthened the Islamist and Turkist movements, but also split the Westernist movement into two camps, the radical Westernists, who, such as Abdullah Cevdet, still blamed the Ottomans for their defeats and continued their pro-Western stance, and the moderate Westernists, who, such as Celal Nuri, clearly declared their disappointment in the West. In his article entitled Şime-i Husumet (The Nature of Animosity), Celal Nuri wrote:

I am incapable of explaining our plight further. The whole world is our enemy […] The whole world of infidels! Friendship for the West is the vilest of all crimes I can imagine. A nation incapable of hating the West is doomed to extinction.⁴⁶⁸

 

Unlike the Westernists, for the Islamists, the West was clearly associated with Christianity. Thus, while admitting the material achievements of the West, the Islamists tend to focus more on moral decadence and corruption of the European civilization. In one of his articles published in Sebilü’r Reşâd, an Islamist journal published during and after the second constitutional period, Ahmed Fuad wrote that Europe was totally corrupted by the illness of materialism and the Europeans tried to remedy this corruption by returning to some principles that had already been envisaged by Islam such as the prohibition of alcohol, proper taxation as a counterpart of alms (zekât), or proper laws for divorce (he criticized Catholic prohibition of divorce).⁴⁶⁹ For the Islamists, the Western materialism resulted in the abandonment of the sense of justice, hence emerged the Western imperialism.⁴⁷⁰

⁴⁶⁸ Celal Nuri, “Şime-i Husumet,” Đçtihad, 15 Kanûn-ı Sânî 1329, [28 January 1914] No. 88, quoted by Berkes, Development of Secularism in Turkey, 357. For a brief account of Celal Nuri’s earlier and latter perceptions of civilization and the West see Kaygı, Türk Düşüncesinde Çağdaşlaşma, 114-139.

 

⁴⁶⁹ Ahmed Fuad, “Garpta Şarklılaşmak Cereyanı,” Sebilü’r Reşad, Vol. 33, No. 575, 1339 [1923], for the full text of the article, see Đlyas Çelebi, “Son Dönem Osmanlı Aydınlarının Batılılaşma Serüveni,” in Ferhat Koca (ed.), Osmanlıdan Cumhuriyete Siyaset ve Değer Tartışmaları, (Đstanbul: Rağbet Yayınları, 2000), 17-122, 41-45.

 

⁴⁷⁰ Tarık Zafer Tunaya, Đslamcılık Cereyanı: Đkinci Meşrutiyetin Siyasi Hayatı Boyunca Gelişmesi ve Bugüne Bıraktığı Meseleler, (Đstanbul: Baha Matbaası, 1962), 68-71.

The Islamist suspicion of the West was exacerbated with the continuous Ottoman defeats between 1911 and 1918 by the Western states; the word civilization was associated with the justification of Western aggression and imperialism against the Islamic world. Şehbenderzade Ahmed Hilmi once wrote that the contemporary Western imperialism could not even be compared with the cruellest periods of the humanity, because while these earlier cruelties were the product of the bestial ambitions of human beings, the “civilized cruelty” (medenî vahşet) was totally devoid of any humane feeling. It was a scientific and mathematical cruelty since it was designed consciously and carefully (fennî, ilmî, hatta güzelce hesap edildiği için riyazî bir vahşettir).⁴⁷¹ This negative perception of the West resulted in the association of the concept of civilization with Western imperialism. Hence emerged the famous formulation of Mehmed Akif, which was popularly referred to the National Anthem of the Turkish Republic: “How can this fiery faith ever be killed by that single-fanged monster you call civilization?”

The Turkists followed a middle way in their perception of the West. Especially before the Balkan Wars, they were neither pro-West as the Westernists, nor anti-West as the Islamists. They accepted the arguments of both pro-Westernism and anti-Westernism partially.⁴⁷² They were Westernist to the extent that they accepted the role of reason, which resulted in the emergence of the concept of society and civic morality different both from medieval Christendom and Islamic notion of ummah. However, they were also aware that although European civilization seemed to be universal in essence, indeed its basis was not reason or universality, but the existence of distinct national identities.⁴⁷³

 

⁴⁷¹ Şeyh Mihriddin Arusî (a pseudonym for Şehbenderzade Ahmed Hilmi), Yirminci Asırda Âlem-i Đslam ve Avrupa: Müslümanlara Rehber-i Siyaset, (Đstanbul: Hikmet Matbaa-i Đslamiyesi, 1327 [1911]), quoted by Kara, Türkiye’de Đslamcılık Düşüncesi, 87.

 

⁴⁷² Berkes, Development of Secularism in Turkey, 355.

 

⁴⁷³ Berkes, Development of Secularism in Turkey, 355.

The effects of Balkan Wars on the Turkists were quite dramatic. On the one hand, it resulted in a rapprochement between the Pan-Turkists and the Turkists. With the loss of Ottoman territories in the Balkans, the Turkists turned their attention more to their brothers living in the Central Asia.⁴⁷⁴ Pan-Turkism even penetrated into the bureaucratic circles on the eve of the First World War and ended with the ambitious campaigns of Enver Paşa (1880-1922) during the War. The second outcome of the Balkan Wars was the consolidation of anti- Western stance within the Turkist movement. The West was perceived as the main adversary of the Turks and Turkish nationalism. Ömer Seyfeddin wrote in one of his articles that the external enemies of the Turks were quite clear: “All the Europeans.” He argued that unlike smaller neighbours of the Ottoman Empire, which tried to enlarge their territories, what the European states wanted was not territory but to steal the national wealth of the Turks, to enslave them and to kill the nationalist sentiments by imposing their own national education.⁴⁷⁵ In sum, similar to the Islamists, the Turkists developed a negative perception of the West, especially after the Ottoman defeats vis-à-vis the former components of the Ottoman Empire, which were corrupted by the Westerners.

 

7.3.3.    The Problem of Ottoman Decline and the Possible Solutions

From the mid-nineteenth century onwards, all the political movements had one superior aim, to prevent and reverse the decline of the Ottoman Empire. This aim was much stronger in the political movements of the post-Hamidian period, since the internal and external perils threatening the Empire grew considerably. Therefore, stating the causes of the Ottoman decline and the search for solutions became the major theme of the publications of this period.⁴⁷⁶

⁴⁷⁴ Berkes, Development of Secularism in Turkey, 358.

 

⁴⁷⁵ Ömer Seyfeddin, Vatan! Yalnız Vatan..., (Selanik: Rumeli Matbaası, 1327 [1911]), for the full text of this pamphlet, see Ömer Seyfeddin, Makaleler I, 141-159.

 

⁴⁷⁶ In the first issue of Đçtihad, Abdullah Cevdet wrote that the journal would try to answer two questions: (1) What are the reasons of the decline of the Islamic world? (2) What is the most efficient solution to prevent the Islamic world from total collapse and to give it a new life? Abdullah Cevdet, “Tahkikat-ı Đlmiye,” Đçtihad, 1 September 1904, No. 1, quoted by Gündüz, II. Meşrutiyet’in Klasik Paradigmaları, 67.

Indeed, all three post-Hamidian political movements argued that the decline was not peculiar to the Ottoman Empire; rather the entire East was in an inferior condition vis-à-vis the West. For the Westernists, the reason for this decline was not the European aggression, but the inherent deficiencies of the East contributing to the incontestable superiority of the West. In other words, the reasons of decline should be sought in the internal system of not only the Empire, but also the Islamic/Eastern world. The Westernists argue that the Muslims not only neglected contemporary developments, but also consciously resisted them. Abdullah Cevdet gave the example of Morocco in one of his articles and stated that in this country there was no single publishing house, no single newspaper in Arabic, no single library. “In sum,” he wrote, “there is nothing from the effects, the consequences and the knowledge of civilization, which has also loftily been ordered by Islam.”⁴⁷⁷ He also underlined that the existing civilization had no mercy to the uncivilized and “the laws of evolution” were cruel and merciless. According to him:

[t]he contemporary civilization is an overflowing flood, which opens its course in the European continent. It destroys any obstacle in front of it. The Muslims could protect their social life only through adapting and conforming to this current.⁴⁷⁸

 

In other words, there is one single solution to the Muslim world’s and by extension the Ottoman Empire’s decline, namely, Westernization. Even imitating the West (taklîd) did not suffice; the elements of Western civilization, particularly the moral system and values should be adopted as they were (isticnâs).⁴⁷⁹

⁴⁷⁷ “Hasılı Đslamiyetin ulvi bir şekilde emrettiği medeniyetin tesirlerinden, neticelerinden ve irfanından hiçbir şey yoktur.” Abdullah Cevdet, “Fas Hükümet-i Đslamiyesinin Đnkırazı,” Đçtihad, April 1905, No. 5, the full text of the article is included in the edition of Mustafa Gündüz, Đçtihadın Đçtihadı: Abdullah Cevdet’ten Seçme Yazılar, (Đstanbul: Lotus Yayınları, 2008), 61-65.

 

⁴⁷⁸ “Bugünün medeniyeti coşkun bir sel gibidir ki, mecrasını Avrupa kıtasında açmıştır. Önüne gelen her türlü engeli, şiddetli bir şekilde alt üst etmekte ve yıkmaktadır. Müslüman toplumlar bu coşkun medeniyet seline karşı direnmekten geri durmalıdırlar. Milli hayatlarını ancak bu cereyana tabi olmakla ve ona katılmakla temin edebilirler.” Abdullah Cevdet, “Fas Hükümet-i Đslamiyesinin Đnkırazı,” in Gündüz, Đçtihadın Đçtihadı, 61.

 

⁴⁷⁹ Abdullah Cevdet, “Şime-i Muhabbet”, Gündüz, II. Meşrutiyet’in Klasik Paradigmaları, 82.

Quite the contrary, the Islamists perceived Westernization as the major reason for the material decline and moral decadence of the Ottoman Empire. This did not necessarily mean total rejection of the Western civilization. For the Islamists, the Muslims should be aware of the reasons for the Western material development and should adopt some of these material elements in order to be equipped to struggle with Western expansionism.⁴⁸⁰ That is why, in the first issue of the ninth volume of Sebilü’r Reşâd, the aims of the journal were determined as:

[1] to understand the reasons for the progress of the Westerners, [2] to determine what should be adopted from the European civilization, [3] to search what should be done to advance in terms of ideas, arts, and trade within the framework of Islamic morality, [4] to make the Muslims awaken through informing them about the education and progress of Europe.⁴⁸¹

 

For the Islamists, there were internal and external reasons for decline; some internal reasons were similar to those argued by the Westernists, such as ignorance, laziness, and superficial imitation of the West. The external reasons, on the other hand, included the Western aggression both militarily and in terms of cultural penetration through missionary activities, as well as the internal division of the Islamic community. The Islamists were against nationalism and racism, which divided the Islamic community in terms of national or racial identities. Such divisions disturbed Muslim fraternity and weakened Islamic community vis-à-vis the Christian West. In order to resist external pressure, therefore, the only solution was to defend the “Islamic unity” (ittihâd-ı Đslam).⁴⁸²

⁴⁸⁰ Şehbenderzade Ahmed Hilmi clearly mentioned the material superiority vs. moral decadence of the Western civilization as such: “We are the most sincere admirers and appreciators of the material civilization of Europe. The industrial maturity reached by European nations today has a magnificence which results in the admiration of every thinker. However, the level of the vileness of the moral civilization is lowest unseen in history.” Şeyh Mihriddin Arusî, Yirminci Asırda Âlem-i Đslam ve Avrupa, 88.

 

⁴⁸¹ “Sebilü’r Reşad Dokuzuncu Cildine Başlıyor,” Sebilü’r Reşad, 23 Ramazan 1330 [5 September 1912], No. 209, quoted by Gündüz, II. Meşrutiyet’in Klasik Paradigmaları, 220.

 

⁴⁸² Gündüz, II. Meşrutiyet’in Klasik Paradigmaları, 227. Indeed, the idea of Islamic Unity was not a post-1908 phenomenon; it had its intellectual roots in the Basiret newspaper in late 1860s, and particularly in the writings of Namık Kemal in his Đbret newspaper. For an analysis of this idea see Karpat, The Politization of Islam, 119-123.

To reverse the decline of the Islamic world, the Muslims should adopt Western scientific developments and material achievements; however they should also preserve their religious traditions and identities, purified from superstitious beliefs. This does not necessarily mean that post-Hamidian Islamists were salafi in essence; they were rejecting not the material modernity, but the cultural/ religious penetration of the Christian/Western civilization into the Islamic civilization. They argued that the Islamic civilization was morally superior to the Western one; thus what should be done was to return to true teachings of Islam. As Ahmed Naim stated “the principles that Europe seems to present as new inventions and as samples for all societies of the world, such as liberty, justice, equality and solidarity, are among the fundamental principles of Islam.”⁴⁸³

For the Turkists, the reason for Ottoman decline vis-à-vis Europe should be searched within the internal structure of the Ottoman society as the Westernists argue. According to Ziya Gökalp, “[a] nation may be destroyed by an external power, but it [the external power] does not cause its decline.”⁴⁸⁴ Therefore, the major reason for the Ottoman decline was the fanaticism displayed for not adopting the Western civilization’s achievements. Ziya Gökalp once asked: “The West […] did not show fanaticism in imitating and borrowing the achievements of the Muslims of the time […] Why, then, did we show fanaticism when their civilization has excelled ours?”⁴⁸⁵

The neglect of Turkish identity was another source of decline for the Turkists. They argue that Turkish identity was suppressed by the Ottomans, and the Turks were forced to abandon their national character.⁴⁸⁶ After loosing their warlike nature, the Turks abandoned their pure morality and former traditions.

⁴⁸³ Ahmed Naim, “Đslamiyet’in Esasları, Mazisi ve Hali,” Sebilü’r Reşad, 30 Kanun-ı Sani 1329, [12 Şubat 1914], quoted by Gündüz, II. Meşrutiyet’in Klasik Paradigmaları, 251.

 

⁴⁸⁴ Quoted by Berkes, Development of Secularism in Turkey, 351.

 

⁴⁸⁵ Quoted by Berkes, Development of Secularism in Turkey, 351.

 

⁴⁸⁶ Doktor Fuad Sabit, “Anadolu Duygularından,” Türk Yurdu, 9 Teşrin-i Sani 1329 [22 November 1913], quoted by quoted by Gündüz, II. Meşrutiyet’in Klasik Paradigmaları, 383-384.

This resulted in the exploitation of their service by other nations. Ahmet Agayef (1869-1939) argued that “by forgetting themselves [i.e., their national identity] Turks are the only nation that worked for other nations for centuries.”⁴⁸⁷

Then what should be done for the Turkists was to wake up, to get rid of all the former ties that resulted in the suppression of their national identity on the one hand, and in the backwardness of the Turkish society vis-à-vis the West on the other. Ömer Seyfeddin mentioned what to do as such:

Wake up, in order to win, you have to know your enemies; you should know that although the battles are waged by armies, they can not win the victory in this century. The victory belongs to order and progress… The Turanic family, the Turks, occupying this Ottoman realm, this continent ranging from Schkoder to Baghdad, can only preserve their sovereignty through a strong and serious progress. The progress, on the other hand, can only be achieved through the spread of science, knowledge and literature among all of us […] Our century is a century of progress, struggle and rivalry.⁴⁸⁸

 

Besides material progress, Ziya Gökalp argued for the creation of a new identity for the Turks, which should be established by avoiding the ümmet “culture” prescribed by the Islamists as well as the European “culture” prescribed by the Westernists. Instead, this new identity should merge the Turkish culture preserving national as well as religious characteristics of the Turkish nation with the European “civilization”:

As the civilization of the West is taking place of the East everywhere, quite naturally the Ottoman civilization, which was part of the Eastern civilization, would fall and leave its place to Turkish culture with the religion of Islam on the one hand, and to Western civilization, on the other. Now, the mission of the Turkists is nothing but to uncover the Turkish culture, which has remained in the people, on the one hand, and to graft Western civilization in its entirety and with all its living forms on to the national culture, on the other.⁴⁸⁹

⁴⁸⁷ Ahmet Agayef, “Türk Medeniyet Tarihi, Mukaddime,” Türk Yurdu, 16 Mayıs 1329 [23 May 1913], quoted by Gündüz, II. Meşrutiyet’in Klasik Paradigmaları, 386.

 

⁴⁸⁸ “Uyanınız, galebe için düşmanlarımızı tanımak lazımdır ve biliniz ki, bu asırda muhârebeyi ordular yaparsa da muzafferiyeti asla kazanamaz. Muzafferiyet intizâm ve terakkînindir… Đşkodra’dan Bağdat’a kadar bu kıt’ayı, bu Osmanlı memleketini işgal eden Turanî ailesi, Türkler ancak kuvvetli ve ciddi bir terakkî ile hâkimiyetlerinin mevcûdiyetlerini muhâfaza edebilirler. Terakkî ise ilmin, fennin, edebiyatın hepimizin arasında intişârına vâbestedir […] Asrımız terakkî asrı, mücâdele ve rekâbet asrıdır.” Ömer Seyfeddin, “Yeni Lisan,” Genç Kalemler, Vol. 2, No. 1, 29 Mart 1327 [11 Nisan 1911], for the full text of this article see Ömer Seyfeddin,

Makaleler I, 102-113.

 

⁴⁸⁹ Ziya Gökalp, “Hars ve Medeniyet”, quoted by Berkes, Turkish Nationalism and Western Civilization, 289.

To sum up, from 1890s onwards, three currents of thought, Westernism, Islamism and Turkism, began to crystallize as political movements, and organize around journals to disseminate their ideas on civilization, the West, the reasons for the Ottoman decline and possible solutions to reverse it. For the Westernists, the Western superiority was both material and mental, the ideas of liberty, rationality, equality, and modernity, were perceived as equally important as the scientific and technological advance of the Western civilization. For the Islamists, the West was superior only in terms of its material achievements; however, it experienced moral decadence and corruption. Therefore, in terms of morality, the Islamic civilization was superior to the Western one. For the Turkists, Western superiority was clearly material and partially moral. Despite technological development, another reason for the Western superiority was each nation’s awareness of national identity within the framework of culture.

Secondly, except for some radical Westernists, the intellectuals of post- Hamidian era continued the former distinction between the material and moral elements of civilization, and even deepened it. Celal Nuri’s distinction between industrial civilization and real civilization was mirrored by Islamist effort to revive the Islamic morality despite their clear admiration to Western technological advance. This distinction reached its zenith with its systematization through Ziya Gökalp’s differentiation of culture from civilization; while the former was very much related to the moral aspects peculiar to a particular nation, the latter mainly emphasized the material elements, which were the products of the mankind.

Third, regarding the reasons for the Ottoman decline, all of these movements agreed that the process of Westernization was wrongly implemented in the Ottoman Empire. According to the Westernists, the Ottomans had only superficially westernized; they tried to solely adopt the material achievements. However, what should be done was to adopt Western civilization as a whole. The Islamists distinguished between technological modernization and superficial westernization, and argued that what had so far been done was adopting the Western living style, values, morality without giving precedence to material development. The outcome of this choice was the developmental inferiority

together with a moral corruption due to deviation from the Islamic morality. For the Turkists, the Ottomans failed to adopt the material achievements of the West and to recognize the real dynamic behind Western superiority, the idea of nation.

Finally, regarding the solutions of the problem of Ottoman decline, all these political movements agreed that immediate and profound adoption of the material elements of civilization was an inevitable requisite of providing the survival of the Empire. However, they differed in terms of moral motivations behind this adoption. While the Westernists argued for the unconditional adherence to the Western civilization by adopting both material and moral elements of civilization, the Islamists aimed to reach a synthesis between the Western material modernity and Islamic morality inside the Ottoman Empire, and to achieve an Islamic unity outside its borders. The Turkists, on the other hand, developed another synthesis based on three different levels: (1) they aimed for the revival of Turkish national culture; (2) they tried to preserve Islamic credentials as a significant part of this national culture; (3) at civilizational level, they aimed for modernization through adopting the material elements of Western civilization.

CHAPTER 8

 

 

OTTOMAN TRAVELLERS’ PERCEPTION OF CIVILIZATION

 

 

After examining the Ottoman intellectuals’ perception of civilization, the Ottoman travellers’ perception of this concept should be analyzed as well; because there are significant similarities and differences between the perceptions of those who had not been to the non-European world and those who had actually experienced it. These similarities and particularly the differences demonstrated that the Ottoman travellers’ perception of “the East” is closely interrelated with their perception of civilization. Therefore, in this chapter, different meanings assigned by the Ottoman travellers to the concept of civilization and different mediums attributed for labelling a community as civilized or uncivilized are elaborated.

 

8.1.             Civilization as Citification

One of the most significant differences between the usages of the concept of civilization by the Ottoman intellectuals and by the Ottoman travellers to the East was the extreme significance attached to the concept of city by the latter. The identification of civilization as citification was a peculiar characteristic of the Ottoman travellers, which was not as widely visible as in the writings of the Ottoman intellectuals, who had not travelled to the East. The reasons for attaching so much importance to city as a medium of civilization are many. First of all, etymologically, it was quite natural that the Ottoman travellers had perceived citification as the essence of civilization, since both the word civilization and its counterpart in Turkish language, medeniyet, had been derived from the root city. Indeed, neither the European usages, nor the Ottoman intellectuals’ usage of this concept emphasized the role of citification in establishing civilizations in such an essential way. In Europe, when the concept had first been coined, there was no distinction between nomadic tribes and settled communities; except for very small and negligible groups of people,

nomadism was no more a European phenomenon. Hence the concept of civilization had emerged as a quality or a condition denoting a higher stage of being. On the other hand, the Ottoman intellectuals, who had learned this concept from Europe, had incorporated it into their lexicon first as a technique to attain the welfare and prosperity of Europe, and then as an ideal to achieve in order to provide the Ottoman society with security and welfare. In other words, they attached less significance to citification as a medium of civilization and put their emphasis on the material achievements of Europe. However, the Ottoman travellers to the East frequently encountered with desolated lands such as the jungles of inner Africa and India, the deserts of Arabia and North Africa, or the steppes of Central Asia, and nomadic peoples, which provided the travellers with the opportunity to compare and contrast the urban and rural lands as well as their inhabitants. Such comparisons are frequently encountered in their travelogues. Hence they preferred to conceive the concept of medeniyet through its etymological background, namely “citification.”

The second reason for giving so much significance to city as a medium of civilization was that the Ottoman travellers were somehow familiar to the Khaldunian dyadic conceptualization of nomadism (bedeviyet) and civilization (hadariyet/umran). Indeed, it is difficult to say that all of them had read Ibn Khaldun’s Muqaddimah; however, the Ottoman intelligentsia had a familiarity with the concepts like nomadic (bedevî), city-dweller (beledî), savage (vahşî), or nomadic life-style (hâl-i bedavet).⁴⁹⁰ In more recent travelogues such as Abdülkadir Câmî’s travelogue on North Africa (published in 1908) and Mehmed Mihri’s travelogue on Sudan (published in 1909), there were clear references to Ibn Khaldun. In sum, their awareness of this former conceptualization of citification/settlement as a higher condition compared to nomadism contributed to their attachment of the concept of civilization with citification.

⁴⁹⁰ The word bedevî has two different usages. The Western form of the word, bedouin, is used to denote desert-dwelling Arab nomadic pastoralists found throughout most of the desert belt extending from the Atlantic coast of the Sahara via the Western Desert, Sinai, and Negev to the Arabian Desert. On the other hand, the Ottomans used the word to denote all the nomadic groups, just as the word bedeviyet means nomadism as a general phenomenon. Therefore; in this dissertation, bedevî is used to meet the word nomadic in general, not a particular group of nomadic people.

The third reason was the Ottoman cautiousness towards the nomadic tribes from the very beginning of the Empire. Since the Ottoman economic as well as military establishment was based on land, land registry was an extremely important official duty. After a conquest, the conquered lands were immediately registered, some of these lands were allocated to the Sultan and the high-ranking bureaucrats, some of them were given to religious foundations for revenue and the remaining parts were distributed to Timariots in order to provide the Empire with troops.⁴⁹¹ In other words, agricultural production was essential in the countryside to sustain the economic and military establishment of the Empire. However, nomadic tribes disturbed this system. On the one hand, they did not recognize the existing land regime and fed their animals wherein they migrated to; this resulted in the exhaustion of pastures. Secondly, they could not easily be recruited as soldiers, since recruitment was done in accordance with land registry. Third, they did not recognize the borders of the state as well, and resulted in some diplomatic problems between the Ottoman Empire and its neighbours. Finally, they sometimes revolted against the state, when the state tried to exert its authority over them. In other words, nomadism was associated with anarchy, while settlement was associated with peace and order. Since the aim of civilization was to bring peace, order and prosperity to the Empire’s subjects, this concept was very much associated with citification and emerged as an antonym of nomadism.

In sum, all these factors contributed to the Ottoman travellers’ perception of city as a medium of civilization. When this medium was established, it was quite natural that two oppositional accounts had emerged in the travelogues to the East. The first one was about the land, distinguishing between the urban and non-urban space, and the second one was about the inhabitants, distinguishing between the nomadic and settled peoples.

 

⁴⁹¹ For a detailed account of Timar system in the Ottoman Empire see Niceora Baldiceanu, Le Timar dans l’État Ottoman: Début XIVe Début XVIe Siécle, (Wiesbaden: Otto Harrassowitz, 1980) and Ömer Lütfî Barkan, Osmanlı Đmparatorluğunda Kuruluş Devrinin Toprak Meseleleri, (Đstanbul: Devlet Basımevi, 1937).

8.1.1.    Urban vs. Non-Urban Space

Based on their association of civilization with citification, the Ottoman travellers to the East made a clear distinction between urban and non-urban space. One of the most significant criteria for this distinction was the sense of safety. The Ottoman travellers perceived urban space as a safe area, where they felt themselves much more secure and comfortable since they likened the urban areas to where they had used to live. On the other hand, non-urban space was totally unsafe since it was unknown to the traveller. Such an understanding is quite visible, for example, in the travelogue of Ahmed Hamdi Efendi on India, Swat and Afghanistan. While he admired almost all cities, ancient and modern, of India he defined rural areas as “half-savage regions inhabited by people naked until their waists.”⁴⁹² For example, while he praised Ahmedabad as the most well- planned city of Asia with its secure and comfortable environment,⁴⁹³ the route he had passed to reach that city was defined as “the realm of savagery” (vahşet-âbâd).⁴⁹⁴ In other words, the city was reflected as an island of civilization in the midst of a savage space; although the author admired the natural beauties of the jungle, he felt himself comfortable only when he reached a city. In sum, the insurmountable border between city and jungle also demonstrated the dichotomy between the civilized and non-civilized space.

For those Ottoman travellers, who had travelled in North Africa and in the Middle East, the desert was the unsafe non-urban space. Most of the travellers wrote quite negatively about the desert, although they generally admired its natural beauties. The discomfort they experienced during their travel resulted in their negative perception of the desert vis-à-vis the cities established just next to them. For example, Mehmed Mihri visited Port Said when he was returning from Sudan and was amazed how such a modern and comfortable city

⁴⁹² Ahmet Hamdi Efendi, Seyahâtnâme: Hindistan, Svat ve Afganistan, 24.

 

⁴⁹³ Ahmet Hamdi Efendi, Seyahâtnâme: Hindistan, Svat ve Afganistan, 141.

 

⁴⁹⁴ Ahmet Hamdi Efendi, Seyahâtnâme: Hindistan, Svat ve Afganistan, 28.

could be established next to the desert. He particularly mentioned that the city was established in European style as “the achievement of Western assistance,” (garblıların eser-i himmeti) as “a sample of contemporary grandeur of the civilization of Europe” (Avrupa’nın muasır azime-i medeniyesinden bir numune) just next to the “piece of the realm of savagery” (kıt’a-yı vahşet-âbâd).⁴⁹⁵

The linkage of the sense of security with urbanization was extremely clear in the two travelogues of Cenap Şehabettin as well. In his travelogue on Egypt and Red Sea ports, he associated security with citification as such:

Think about a man who lost his way in a dark night: The situation is not frightening as long as that man is in a city or in its environs. And put that man in one of the African jungles, in the vast plains nobody has ever stepped on. The situation quickly changes; he feels threatened from all sides.⁴⁹⁶

 

Similarly, in his second travelogue on the Red Sea and Iraq, Cenap Şehabettin compared Port Sudan and the desert surrounding the city and his expressions clearly demonstrated the Ottoman travellers’ distinction between urban and non-urban space. Accordingly, he wrote:

In order not to seduce anyone, I should immediately inform that Port Sudan is not a paradise [;] it is even far from being a paradise. However, no doubt that it is a place of breath on the side of Africa […] Compare it with the rural lands of Sudan just one or two kilometres far from the new city; oh my God, what a mess, what a misery, what a misfortune to be obliged to live here. Look at Port Sudan, trembling and shining, sunny and breezy under the blueness of the burning skies, look at this filthy trash!⁴⁹⁷

⁴⁹⁵ Mehmed Mihri, Sudan Seyahâtnâmesi, 342. In writing about the geography of Yemen, Rüşdi Paşa made a similar distinction between the coastal areas of this province where major cities were established and the mountainous areas called tehame. The Ottoman troops were able control the coastal regions; hence this area was perceived as a safe area; whereas the nomadic tribes inhabiting the mountains of the province disturbed order and created an unsafe space, which was threatening the Ottoman presence there. For an analysis of Yemeni geography in terms of security see Rüşdi Paşa, Yemen Hatırası, 191-195.

 

⁴⁹⁶ “Bir adam tasavvur ediniz ki karanlık bir gecede yolunu kaybetmiş olsun: Bu adam bir şehrin içinde, yahud civarında bulundukça hadisenin hiç bir dehşeti yoktur; bir de bu adamı Afrika ormanlarından birine, pay-i beşerin henüz temas etmediği o namütenahi kıt’alardan birine koyunuz; hadise derhal tebeddül-ü kıyafet eder, güya her tarafından bir sehem-i semim-i tehlike görünür.” Cenap Şehabettin, Hac Yolunda, 21.

 

⁴⁹⁷ “Hiç kimseyi iğfal etmemiş olmak için hemen haber vereyim ki Porsudan cennet değil, hattâ cennet olmaktan pek uzaktır. Fakat hiç şüphe yok ki Afrika cihet-i kenarında bir teneffüsgâhtır. Ne hacet, yeni şehrin bir iki kilometre ötesindeki Sudan karyesiyle mukayese ediniz; aman yâ Râbbi, bu ne levs, ne sefâlet, burada yaşamaya mecbur olmak ne büyük bedbahtlık… Semânın kebûdî-yi âteş-nâki altında pür-şems ü nesim titreyen ve parlayan Porsudan nerede, nerede bu murdar süprüntülük!...” Cenap Şehabettin, Âfâk-ı Irak, 46.

Different from his writings about the linkage between citification and security, Cenap Şehabettin added a civilizational dimension to urban vs. non- urban space distinction. He compared the tidiness, cleanness, and orderliness of the city with the irregularity and uncleanness of the rural areas. His depiction of Port Sudan demonstrated how citification was equated with civilization:

When we entered Port Sudan, this new harbour of Khartoum and Omdurman, I could not believe in my eyes for I found this continent – which I have not seen for seven years – so transformed […] Instead of old Port Sudan, which had speckled the desert with its vile barracks, now there established an orderly city with its buildings made up of stone and brick, its wide streets, its docks, parks, boulevards. Oh my God, the magic of the touch of the wand of progress creates wonders on the fruitless surface of the sands!⁴⁹⁸

 

Despite these examples of the clear distinction between urban and non- urban space and the association of civilization with citification, there were some Ottoman travellers, who did not have such a negative perception of non-urban space. Most of them were familiar to the life in non-urban space; they had been to deserts, jungles or steppes before their travels that established the theme of their travelogues. They even declared their satisfaction of being in such desolated lands. For example, Ali Suad romanticized his experience in Iraqi deserts:

While I was watching the horses that were taken from the stables around for a walk, I could not prevent myself from thinking the subduing meanings of old Arabian knights [and] the tales of desert on horses, girls, weapons and wines within an unlimited love, which have not still made themselves forgotten.⁴⁹⁹

 

Indeed, it can be inferred from Ali Suad’s writings that he had stayed in the Najd region in the midst of the Arabian Peninsula for a couple of years, which made him accustomed to desert conditions. The positive and even poetic

⁴⁹⁸ “Porsudan’a, Hartum ve Omdurman’ın bu yeni limanına girdiğimiz zaman – yedi seneden beri görmediğim – bu kıtayı o kadar değişmiş buldum ki gözlerime inanamıyordum… Hakîr barakalarıyla çölü benekleyen eski Porsudan yerine şimdi kârgîr binaları, geniş sokakları, rıhtımları, parkları, bulvarları ile bir belde-i muntazama kâim olmuş. Yâ Râbbi asâ-yı terakkinin sihr-i teması kumların sath-ı akîminde bile harikalar vücuda getiriyor.” For Cenap Şehabettin, “the magic of the touch of the wand of progress” (asâ-yı terakkinin sihr-i temâsı) represented the achievements of British administration of Sudan; hence, he indirectly reflected his admiration to the European civilization, which was able to create a Western-type city from almost nothing. Cenap Şehabettin, Âfâk-ı Irak, 42.

 

⁴⁹⁹ “Yakındaki ahırlardan çıkarılıp gezdirilen müteaddid atları seyrederken eski Arab şövalyelerini, çöl menakıbını, bir aşk-ı nâmahdud içinde atlar, kızlar, silahlar, şaraplarla sahraların kendilerini hâlâ unutturmayan kahramanlarını düşünmekten kendimi alamazdım.” Ali Suad, Seyahatlerim, 36-37.

descriptions of the countryside in the travelogue of Sadık el-Müeyyed on Abyssinia also reflects that the author had used to live in difficult conditions before he travelled to this country. Indeed, despite his aristocratic background, as a soldier, Sadık el-Müeyyed had experienced desert life in the Arabian Peninsula, when he had been given the duty to administer the establishment of the telegraph line linking Mecca and Medina with Damascus, as well as in North Africa, when he had been assigned to deliver the gifts of Sultan Abdülhamid to the Sheikh of the Sanusiyya order. Therefore, he felt quite comfortable during his voyage from Djibouti to Addis Ababa; he could even write that the forests and mountains surrounding the city of Dire Dawa resembled to the mountains of Switzerland, if it were not for Abyssinians around.⁵⁰⁰

Ali Suad’s and Sadık el-Müeyyed’s positive perception of the non-urban space might be understandable because of their former experiences; however, Mehmed Emin’s admiration of the deserts of Central Asia was quite interesting since, from his travelogues, it can be inferred that this was his first travel to such a difficult terrain. Although he described the environs of Khive as a large desert in which without local guidance no traveller would find his way, he exclaimed his happiness to be in the desert.⁵⁰¹ He stated that he was not content with the crowd of the cities and towns, and he preferred such desolated regions.⁵⁰² The reason for his preference of desolation could be found in his reason of travel; indeed as previously mentioned he was advised by his doctor to engage in a travel in order to heal his depressive mood. This psychological motivation might have resulted in his favour of desert, since these vast plains might have a meditative effect on him.

All in all, one of the most significant distinguishing features of the Ottoman travellers to the East from the other Ottoman intellectuals in terms of the conceptualization of civilization was their clear association of civilization

⁵⁰⁰ Sadık el-Müeyyed, Habeş Seyahâtnâmesi, 129-130.

 

⁵⁰¹ Mehmed Emin, Đstanbul’dan Asya-yı Vusta’ya Seyahat, 33.

 

⁵⁰² Mehmed Emin, Đstanbul’dan Asya-yı Vusta’ya Seyahat, 33.

with citification by differentiating between urban and non-urban space. What is more they linked this distinction with the perception of safety; accordingly, they perceived urban space as a safe and civilized place, while the non-urban regions were generally displayed as an unsafe and uncivilized spatial entity. Even those who approached non-urban space more positively did not refrain themselves to make such a distinction; but it is this distinction that made them feel in non- urban space as comfortable as in the urban space.

 

8.1.2.    Nomadic People vs. Settled People:

It is quite natural that the distinction made between the urban and non- urban space by the Ottoman travellers was compounded with another distinction between the nomadic people, in other words, the inhabitants of the non-urban space, and the settled people, the inhabitants of the urban space. In doing that, the sense of security and the idea of civilization based on citification became the criteria to distinguish between these two groups of people. Accordingly, in general, the fear felt by the Ottoman travellers about the non-urban space was both fed by and also resulted in the negative perception of the nomadic people, while the attachment of civilization with citification contributed to the labelling of the nomadic people as uncivilized and the settled people as civilized. However, there were several exceptions to this general trend; that is to say, there were some travellers, who emphasized the virtues of nomadic life, and thus developed a positive perception of nomadism and nomadic people.

 

8.1.2.1.   Negative Perception of the Nomadic Tribes:

The most negative attributes to the nomadic people by the Ottoman travellers were very much related with their personality. Many of the adjectives used to characterize them emphasized their disturbance of the settled order. Particularly, the nomadic sense of liberty was criticized the most. According to Mehmed Hurşid, one of the most significant reasons for the boundary problems between the Ottoman Empire and Iran was the nomadic tribes, which were living on both sides of the border, and breaching it continuously and harming the others’ territory. Therefore, as a state official, he bitterly criticized the nomadic

sense of liberty as disloyalty or disturbance of order. Writing about one of these tribes, Mehmed Hurşid emphasized that the nomadic people were inclined towards “vagabond and freedom” (bîserlik ve serbestiyyet), which was a “bestial attitude” (tavr-ı hayvânî).⁵⁰³ He defined the social order of these tribes as a “disordered natural republic” (cumhûriyyet-i tabî’iyye-i gayr-i muntazama).⁵⁰⁴ The nomadic tribes preferred living autonomously as a kind of republic (bir nev’i cumhûriyyet sûretinde serbest bulunmak) and wandering in mountains to the honour of civilization (şeref-i medeniyet), thus exhausting their lives with savagery (ömürlerini vahşet ile ifnâ edegelmişlerdir).⁵⁰⁵

Cenap Şehabettin similarly criticized the nomadic perception of freedom through resembling it to the sense that the animals felt:

O deaf and oblivious bedouin, you still insist on thinking liberty as idleness. You should know that the horses of the Haymana plains are captive of their wildness; you will only be free in the day that you will feed yourself with the grain you will grind; it had been field and plough that freed our first ancestors from the captivity of nature […] No, do not deceive yourself, this land is not yours, it belongs to the honest farmer waiting somewhere in the future with agrarian desire [amâl-i zirâîye] in his heart and with pickaxe and oar in his hand! If you do not give this soil the right to life [hakk-ı hayat] and the right to be planted [hakk-ı nebât] today, it will only give the right to decay under itself tomorrow.⁵⁰⁶

 

In other words, Cenap Şehabettin associated freedom with settlement; therefore, the nomadic people were not free although they declared themselves so. They could only attain freedom when they were settled and when they began to earn their own livelihood through agriculture. Such a presentation of nomadic life was a clear example of Ottoman association of civilization with settlement.

⁵⁰³ Mehmet Hurşid, Seyahâtnâme-i Hudud, the quotations were made from the edition of Alaaddin Eser, 16.

 

⁵⁰⁴ Mehmet Hurşid, Seyahâtnâme-i Hudud, 16.

 

⁵⁰⁵ Mehmet Hurşid, Seyahâtnâme-i Hudud, 203.

 

⁵⁰⁶ “Ey sağır ve bî-haber bedevî, sen hâlâ hürriyeti başıboşluk zannetmekte devam ediyorsun. Bil ki Haymana ovasındaki beygirler kendi vahşetlerinin esiridir; sen ancak kendi öğüttüğün buğday ile karnını doyurduğun gün hür olacaksın, esaret-i tabiîyeden ilk ecdâdımızı tarla ve saban azad etti. […] Hayır, aldanma, burası senin değil, elinde kazması ve küreği, gönlünde amâl-i zirâîyesiyle mâverâ-i ferdâda bekleyen namuslu çiftçinindir. Eğer sen bugün bu toprağın hakk-ı hayatını ve hakk-ı nebâtını vermezsen yarın o toprak sana ancak altında çürümek hakkını tanıyacak.” Cenap Şehabettin, Âfâk-ı Irak, 81.

Other personal negative characteristics attached to the nomadic people included their sense of arrogance, which made them extremely belligerent and directed them towards banditry. For the Ottoman travellers, the nomadic life was very much associated with unlawfulness. For example, in categorizing different classes (sunûf) of a nomadic tribe, Mehmed Hurşid used the degree of arrogance and inclination to robbery and plunder as a medium.⁵⁰⁷ It can be inferred from his writings that the more settled the nomadic people, the less autonomy they had and the more they were favoured, since they did not openly resist the control of the central government. Hence, the fellahs were more favourable for the Ottomans compared to the nomadic people.

However, fellahs could not be perceived as civilized settled people, because although they engaged in agriculture, they could not free themselves from the domination of the nomadic people. Hence, according to Mehmed Hurşid, in terms of negative personal characteristics there was little difference between the nomadic people and fellahs. In describing another tribe he clearly underlined that the nomadic people and fellahs shared similar qualities:

This aforementioned tribe had two components; some of them are fellah, in other words people of cultivation and preservation, and the others are the descendents of property, in other words, the aristocrats, who had the responsibility to lead over different groups of people. The former component deals with agriculture, and the latter is impaired with the disease of arrogance and pride, while both components are deceitful, robber, liar and trickster.⁵⁰⁸

 

The distinction between settled and nomadic people was also clearly represented in the travelogue of Abdülkadir Câmî. He particularly favoured the settlements resisting against the assaults of nomadic people, who were disloyal to the central government. For example, regarding the town of Sukana, established in the interior parts of the Saharan desert, Abdülkadir Câmî wrote quite  positively,  although  the  town  was  not  much  different  from  other

⁵⁰⁷ Mehmed Hurşid, Seyahâtnâme-i Hudud, 42-43.

 

⁵⁰⁸ “Aşîret-i mezbûre iki kısım üzere olup bir kısmı Fellâh ya’nî ashâb-ı zer’ ve hırâset ve kısm-ı dîgeri evlad-ı hamûle ya’nî asilzade olarak fırka fırka tâ’ifeler üzerine mütekallid emr-i riyâsetdir ki kısm-ı evvel rençberlik ile meşgul ve kısm-ı sâni illet-i kibr ve nahvet ile ma’lûl olup iki kısmı da hilekâr ve halli halince hırsız ve yalancı ve mekkâr âdemlerdir.” Mehmed Hurşid, Seyahâtnâme-i Hudûd, 25.

settlements in the region. The reason for this favour was the resistance of the town against the rebellion of a nomadic chieftain and their support to the Ottoman troops sent there to suppress that rebellion. Therefore, he described Sukana as a “proud town which perceived the obedience to this emerging power [sâhib-i zuhûr] as disgrace.” Moreover, the inhabitants of the town were defined as intelligent, hardworking, and talented in trade. All these characteristics proved that they “[…] attained ancestral wealth and happiness since the ancient times and accustomed to civilization.”⁵⁰⁹ In other words, Abdülkadir Câmî was so impressed from the support of this town to the continuation of Ottoman rule and order in the region that he even labelled the inhabitants of the town as civilized. Here, the nomadic people were associated with rebellion and incivility and the settled people with loyalty and civility.⁵¹⁰

Besides his emphasis on the civility of the towns, Abdülkadir Câmî also distinguished between the members of the same tribe and appreciated the settled members of the tribe compared to the nomadic ones. Regarding the Şati tribe, he wrote that that most members of this tribe were “civilized so much to be labelled as half-civic” (nîm-beledi itibar olunacak kadar medeni); they were praised as being “wealthy and civic” (mütemevvil ve beledî). Contrarily he described the nomadic members of the tribe as “savage and austere” (vahşî ve haşîn), continuously dealing with banditry and plunder.

The reference to the concept of civilization in distinguishing between the nomadic and settled people reached its zenith in the travelogue of Abdülkadir Câmî in his analysis on the Tuareg tribes. Accordingly, he stated that the Tuaregs were the offspring of a “nomadic, savage, pillager” (göçebe, vahşî, yağmakâr) tribe, which attacked “civilized communities” (akvâm-ı medeniye) living in

⁵⁰⁹ “ […] min’el kadîm nesebî bir refah ve saadete nail ve medeniyetle mütehali olduklarına […]” Abdülkâdir Câmî, Trablusgarp’ten Sahra-yı Kebîr’e Doğru, 82-83.

 

⁵¹⁰ Similarly, regarding the inhabitants of Fezzan, Abdülkâdir Câmî wrote that, compared to the bedouin tribes surrounding the city, they were “…quite hardworking, courageous, self-sacrificing and particularly honest” (Fizanlılar gayet çalışkan, cesur, kanaatkar ve hususen namuskar ademlerdir). In entire Maghreb, they were renowned for their probity. Abdülkâdir Câmî admired their patience and pursuance in making agriculture on this “ingrate soil” (nankör arz) as well. Abdülkâdir Câmî, Trablusgarp’ten Sahra-yı Kebîr’e Doğru, 116.

coastal regions during the Phoenician and Roman eras. He quoted from Ibn Khaldun that they refrained to come close to civilized regions and preferred to live individually; they were wild but courageous never submitting to an external authority. He added that these narrations of Ibn Khaldun were still valid; in other words, according to him these communities never progressed.⁵¹¹ Indeed, the last page of his travelogue focuses on their unchanging nature. He quoted from the Sicilian historian Diodorus who wrote about the ancient Libyans as such:

They live like animals, they sleep in the wild, they eat quite savagely, and being homeless and unclad, they clothed themselves with goat skin. Having no aim other than approaching their enemies rapidly in pursuing [their enemies] and in retreating, they go fighting with three spears in their hands and a skin bag full of stones. In general, in treating the foreigners they obey neither their words nor any kind of law.⁵¹²

 

After making this quotation, Abdülkadir Câmî concluded his travelogue with this sentence: “Here are the thirty-century old ancestors and their contemporary successors who completely resemble each other!”⁵¹³ Indeed, this exclamation demonstrated another negative characteristic of the nomadic people, namely their resistance to change and progress.

The belligerency of the nomadic tribes, which was the source of their inclination towards banditry and plunder, was one of the most despised characteristics attributed to these people. Almost all of the travelogues, which included passages on the nomadic life, bitterly criticized the belligerent nature of the nomads as a matter of insecurity. For example, Ali Suad did not refrain from labelling them as criminals. Regarding the deserts of Najd region, he wrote:

I passed sixth time this unpleasant and disordered as well as wild and naked sea of sand, this terrible desert, which is the scene of many murders and plunders

⁵¹¹ Abdülkâdir Câmî, Trablusgarp’ten Sahra-yı Kebîr’e Doğru, 180.

 

⁵¹² “Hayvân gibi yaşarlar, açıkta yatarlar, pek vahşîyane şeylerle tagaddi ederler ve meskensiz, elbisesiz, yalnız keçi derisiyle setrederler. Gerek takibde olsun gerekse ric’atde düşmanlarını sür’at-i seyr ile tefevvuk etmekten başka bir gâye takip etmeyerek ellerinde üç aded harbe ve taş parçaları doldurulmuş deri bir torba olduğu halde muhârebeye giderler. Umûmiyetle ecnebilere karşı olan muâmelelerinde ne ahde ve ne de bir kânuna riâyet ederler.” Abdülkâdir Câmî, Trablusgarp’ten Sahra-yı Kebîr’e Doğru, 220.

 

⁵¹³ “Đşte tamamiyle yekdiğerine benzeyen otuz asır evvelki ecdâdla bugünkü ahfâd!”Abdülkâdir Câmî, Trablusgarp’ten Sahra-yı Kebîr’e Doğru, 220.

[…] Until this day, on this road, how many victims have been robbed, how much money and property have been absorbed by the throats of the bedouins as long as the snake’s craw.⁵¹⁴

 

All in all, nomadism was a condition disliked by some of the Ottoman travellers to the East. Generally, the reason for this dislike was not much related to the inferiority of the nomadic people vis-à-vis the settled ones. Rather, the reason was the bedouin unrest, their inclination to banditry and their continuous disturbance of settled order. The fact that most of these travellers were state officials, thus representing the attitude of the state towards nomadism, explains the reason for such a negative perception of nomadism.

 

8.1.2.2.   Positive Perception of the Nomadic Tribes:

Despite these negative qualifications, the Ottoman travellers appraised some aspects of nomadic life and some characteristics of nomadic people. Generally, in the travelogues, the positive characteristics were mainly personal and depended on the degree of loyalty of the nomadic tribes to the central government. In other words, the more they were obedient to the central government, the more they were perceived positively. However, there are other nomadic characteristics appreciated by the Ottoman travellers. One of them was their talent to adapt to the extremely difficult natural conditions. For example, Mehmed Hurşid labelled some tribes as hardworking since they had continuously been striving for being vigilant about and cognizant of the developments around themselves since they were living in volatile border regions.⁵¹⁵ Similarly, Mehmed Emin admired the Turcoman tribes’ capacity of quick adaptation to their environment. He argued that these tribes did not hesitate to adopt the customs, language and even dresses and external looking of the inhabitants of the regions that they had temporarily settled.⁵¹⁶ The adaptation to

⁵¹⁴ “Bu vahşî ve çıplak olduğu kadar çirkin ve arızalı kum denizini, bu birçok katl-ü nehb fecaiinin sahnesi olan fena çölü bugün altıncı defa olarak geçiyordum […] Bu yolda o güne kadar kaç kurban soyulmuş; ne kadar emvâl-i nukûd, bedevîlerin yılan kursağı kadar uzun boğazlarına geçmiş idi.” Ali Suad, Seyahatlerim, 7.

 

⁵¹⁵ Mehmed Hurşid, Seyahâtnâme-i Hudûd, 26.

 

⁵¹⁶ Mehmed Emin, Đstanbul’dan Asya-yı Vusta’ya Seyahat, 37

natural environment was so significant for the Ottoman travellers that they even tolerated some of the unusual practices of the nomadic tribes. For example, Abdülkadir Câmî did not condemn some customs of Tuaregs, such as drinking camel blood and eating fat from camel hunch; rather, he stated that they had to do so because they had to be obedient to the rules of the infertile environment that they are living in.⁵¹⁷

Another positive characteristic attributed to the nomadic people was their hospitality and generous treatment towards their guests. Some of the Ottoman travellers were hosted by nomadic tribes; hence they experienced and appreciated the intimacy of these people. While writing about the Tayy tribe of Şehr-i Zôr Province, Mehmed Hurşid wrote that the members of this tribe were very generous, polite and courteous. He mentioned that it was not surprising that, one of the most esteemed religious saints of the Islamic world, Hatem-i Tai (?- 686), who had been renowned for his generosity, had been a member of this tribe. All these characteristics led Mehmed Hurşid to describe the Tayy tribe as “akin to civilized people” (hâl ve mişvârları medenîlere karîbdir).⁵¹⁸ Mehmed Emin also emphasized the hospitality of the Turcomans and argued that hospitality was a characteristic of all desert-deweller (bâdiye-nişîn) tribes: “Whatever religion, sect, nation or tribe he belongs to, when a voyager entered into a Turcoman kibitka, then his life and property will be under the protection and patronage of the people of kibitka.”⁵¹⁹ According to him, it was the solitude of the deserts and the lack of government for the protection of people that required such sense of hospitality.⁵²⁰

Some of the travellers considered nomadic life a natural and healthy one, in which the problems that the city-dwellers had experienced were absent. For

⁵¹⁷ Abdülkâdir Câmî, Trablusgarp’ten Sahra-yı Kebîr’e Doğru, 194.

 

⁵¹⁸ Mehmed Hurşid, Seyahâtnâme-i Hudûd,171.

 

⁵¹⁹ “Hangi din ve mezhep ve millet ve kabileden olur ise olsun bir yolcu Türkmen kibitkasından içeriye girdi mi artık onun canı da malı da kibitka ahalisinin hıfz-ü himayesi altındadır.” Mehmed Emin, Đstanbul’dan Asya-yı Vusta’ya Seyahat, 40.

 

⁵²⁰ Mehmed Emin, Đstanbul’dan Asya-yı Vusta’ya Seyahat, 40.

example, Mehmed Hurşid expressed his desire to have such a natural life; however, he added that he should have at least the basic benefits and avails of civilization, such as cleanliness (nezâfet), social cooperation (nev’i benî âdemin yek diğere i’ânesi), security (emniyet) and education (tahsîl).⁵²¹ In other words, what Mehmed Hurşid aimed was to combine the purity of pastoral life with some of the basic elements of civilization.

In some travelogues, more romantic accounts of the desert and nomadic people are visible. Some of the Ottoman travellers depicted the nomadic people quite similar to some of the European romantics, who drew a parallel between the nomadic life and the chivalric traditions of pre-modern Europe. Such depictions were frequently encountered in the writings of Avlonyalı Ekrem Bey. Regarding the two Arab Sheiks, the Druze Sheikh al-Atrash and the sheikh of Anaze tribe, Abdülaziz Sheihan, whom he had met in a dinner in the desert, he wrote as such:

These were quite magnificent people; they were long, slim, solemn but gentile. Both of them embodied aristocracy with an old tradition, [they were members of] a centuries-old race, which was accustomed to the mission of giving orders and leading others. They did not have a title of nobility; they did not have an imperial edict which granted and protected their posts; however, they were “different” from all other invitees on the table. Perhaps, I will be accused of being inculcated, bedouin romanticism, and prejudice. But the certain thing is that whenever such people came, regardless of how modestly they had dressed, people respectfully opened a corridor by stepping aside to give way to them.⁵²²

 

Ekrem Bey romanticized his encounter with the Anaze tribe and the daughter of the Anaze Sheikh so much that his writings make the reader felt that they were quoted from an Orientalist piece. He described in length the beauty of the “desert princess” and her horse by depicting them as the “embodiment of an equestrian Renaissance painting.”⁵²³

The nomadic tribes’ preference to seize the day and not to care about the future was another characteristic that some of the Ottoman travellers admired.

⁵²¹ Mehmed Hurşid, Seyahâtnâme-i Hudûd, 205-206.

 

⁵²² Avlonyalı Ekrem Bey, Osmanlı Arnavutluk’undan Anılar (1885-1912), 118.

 

⁵²³ Avlonyalı Ekrem Bey, Osmanlı Arnavutluk’undan Anılar (1885-1912), 131.

Indeed, the Ottoman traveller, who was aware of the the Empire’ decline and its ultimate destination, was extremely anxious about the future; therefore, they envied the nomadic tribes for their disinterest in the future. For example, while mentioning a local tribe in the Sahara desert, Abdülkadir Câmî stated that they were “free of anxiety about their future” (endişe-i ferdadan azade); hence, despite their poverty, they lived happily and in joy.⁵²⁴

All in all, the Ottoman travellers were not altogether negative about the nomadic people; they also appreciated some of the characteristics of the nomads, particularly their hospitality, their efforts to adapt to the difficult natural conditions, the natural life that they had been living in, and their indifference regarding the future.

 

8.2.           Other Mediums of Civilization

Although the Ottoman travellers’ perception of civilization was mainly based on citification, there were other mediums of civilization that they had used to distinguish between the civilized and uncivilized. Some of these mediums were related to the material achievements of the European civilization such as steamship, railway, train, telegraph, or factory, while some non-material elements, such as religion and the situation of women in social life, were also referred to evaluate the degree of civilization.

To start with the material elements, it can be argued that the Ottoman travellers were quite impressed from European technological achievements, especially in the field of communication and transportation. They depicted any vehicle easing and speeding up their travel as an element of civilization. The reason for their emphasis on these material elements was the stark contrast between the geography they had wandered and the vehicle they had encountered.

Train and steamship were the most cited material elements of civilization in the writings of the Ottoman travellers. For instance, Âli Bey appraised the steamship as a “product of civilization” (âsâr-ı medeniyet). Voyaging on a primitive small boat made up of wood and inflated leather over the Tigris River,

⁵²⁴ Abdülkâdir Câmî, Trablusgarp’ten Sahra-yı Kebîr’e Doğru, 134.

and continuously complaining about his discomfortable travel, Âli Bey encountered with a small British boat near Tikrit patrolling in the region, and declared his satisfaction for seeing this product of civilization in such a desolated place.⁵²⁵ Steamship appeared once more in his travelogue as a medium of civilization. During his voyage from Basra to India, in Muscat, Âli Bey was invited for a dinner in a British military steamship, Turquoise, whose crew patrolled the shores for protecting Indian merchants from the attacks of the nomadic tribes. He appreciated the enlightenment of the vessel, the delicious dinner he had and the play performed by the crew:

The organization and enlightenment of the hall, the refinement and taste of the foods [and] the harmony of the music made us forget that we are on the Sea of Oman in front of the rocks of Muscat. Actually, it is a great joy to encounter with such products of civilization in such places. Particularly, it is not imaginable to have a supé, while watching a play, listening to a concert and tasting rare foods and drinks in an uncivilized country like Muscat; most probably, there has been no such occasion before.⁵²⁶

 

This quotation demonstrates that what made this occasion so significant was the contrast between the wild and hostile environment and the place where the dinner had been held. In other words, the steamship became the scene of “civilized” practices such as a joyful play and a perfect dinner.

Train was the counterpart of the steamship on land. It facilitated travel to a great extent; especially in desert, it provided comfort and velocity to the travellers. Therefore, the Ottoman travellers perceived train as a medium of civilization. For example, Mehmed Mihri, who performed the first phase of his travel from Cairo to Sudan on train, resembled it to a wild animal in a civilized

⁵²⁵ Direktör Ali Bey, Seyahat Jurnali, 52.

 

⁵²⁶ Italics added. “Salonun tertibatı ve tenviratı et’ımmenin nezaket ve nefasetiyle mûsikînin halâveti Bahr-i Umman’da Maskat kıyılarının önünde bulunduğumuzu bize unutturdu. Böyle yerlede bu misillû âsâr-ı medenîyyete tesadüf etmek doğrusu hoşa gidiyor. Hususiyle Maskat gibi gayr-ı medenî bir memlekette tiyatro ve konser görerek en nadir ve nazik makulat ve meşrubat ile (supe) etmek hatır ve hayale gelir şeylerden olmadığı misillû emsâli de sebk etmemiş olsa gerektir.” Direktör Ali Bey, Seyahat Jurnali, 104. Ali Suad was another traveller who perceived the steamship as a civilized vehicle. In his voyage on a British vessel, he artistically wrote that “[t]he vessel sails like an extraordinarily big as well as mythical goose with its civilized majesty within the immortal secrets of the night.” (Vapur gecenin layemut serairi içinde azamet-i medenîyyesi ile fevka’l tabii ve büyük olduğu kadar esatirî bir kaz gibi yüzerek gidiyordu.) Ali Suad, Seyahatlerim, 78

form (bir nazire-i makyuse-i medeniye). Similarly in comparing the Italian rule in Abyssinia and the Ottoman rule in Yemen, Rüşdi Bey perceived railway construction in Abyssinia as a “product of civilization” (âsâr-ı medeniyet) and criticized the Ottoman Empire for not establishing railway in Yemen to facilitate the transport not only of the troops when necessary, but also of the goods and services from the port cities to the interior parts and vice-versa.⁵²⁷

Ahmed Kemal mentioned some of the European technological achievements in his travelogue. He labelled them as the products of humanity and criticized the religious bigotry of the Muslim elite of Turkistan towards these material elements of civilization. To give an example, in the town of Bay, Ahmed Kemal met the former mufti of Gochar, telling him some people rumoured that whoever adopted the new educational system introduced by Ahmed Kemal quitted praying to the God. Ahmed Kemal tried to persuade the mufti that these rumours were false. In doing this persuation, he referred to the material elements of European civilization:

The new schools are the houses of knowledge, religion, good manners and talent opened for educating youngsters who would be able to find the way for the salvation of the country from bloody claws […] As you see, today the Christians fly on our heads like birds with airplanes and zeppelins; they blew like a thunder with wireless telegrams and other electrical devices. We do not even know to walk on the ground. Although we are human beings like them, why are we so deprived of humanity… The Europeans had tired apart the layers of weather through wired and wireless telegrams and transformed the world into a unified body. The man in the East understands the ideas and works of the man in the West in a moment. We could not understand the words of the men next to us. Franks [the Europeans] disturb the veins of soil in order to search metals and to add inexhaustible treasures to the world of richness; yes they turn the soil upside down. We do not still know how to benefit from the surface of the soil […] With such ignorance, with such inertia, would the religion and nation survive?⁵²⁸

⁵²⁷ Rüşdi Paşa, Yemen Hatırası, 70.

 

⁵²⁸ “Cedit mektepleri […] vatanın kanlı pençelerden esbâb-ı halâs yolunu arayıp bulmaya aklı yeter gençler hazırlamak için açılmış birer darü’l irfan ve birer daru’d-din-i edeb ve hünerdir. Görüyorsunuz ji bugün nasara başımızın üzerinde kuş gibi – ayeroplan ve siplenler – ile uçuyor, şimşek gibi – telsiz telgraf ve sair alât-ı elektiriyye ile – çakıyor. Biz hâlâ yerde doğru yürümesini bilmiyoruz. Biz de bunlar gibi insan olduğumuz halde niçin bu insanlıktan mahrumuz… Avrupalılar telli ve telsiz telgraflar ile hava tabakalarını yardılar ve cihanı bir uzv-u gayri münfek hale getirdiler. Şarktaki adam garptaki adamın amel ve efkârını, ân-ı vâhitte anlıyor. Biz hâlâ yanımızdaki adamların sözlerini anlamaktan aciz bulunuyoruz. Yine Frenkler, maden aramak ve cihan-ı servete lâ-yüfnâ hazineler ilave etmek için, yerin damarlarını bozdular, evet yerin altını üstüne getirdiler. Biz hâlâ yerin üstünden bile istifade etmek yollarını bilmiyoruz.

These lines were written in 1916 and one can infer that the train and steamship were replaced by more modern revolutionary transportation vehicles, such as airplane and zeppelin. What is more, telegraph was referred as another significant technological achievement, which compressed distance.

Besides technological vehicles, there were some other material elements of civilization which were related with the daily life of the people that the Ottoman travellers encountered. For example, Abdülkadir Câmî perceived the civilizing effect of the date trees for the Saharan nomadic tribes. He once wrote that these trees were the “jewels of the desert” and they had a “[…] significant civilizational mission in the social life of Fezzan.”⁵²⁹ He utilized the word civilizational in both senses. On the one hand, date trees resulted in the settlement of nomadic tribes since the raising of dates required a settled life; on the other hand, the settled life civilized several nomadic manners of the tribes.

Eating and drinking habits were also encountered as a medium of civilization. For example, during his voyage to Abyssinia, Sadık el-Müeyyed hired a local cook, who ate meat and fat uncooked. He wrote that although the cook had acquainted with “the products of progress and civilization” (asar-ı terakki ve medeniyet) such as soft-boiled egg, grilled cutlet, pasta and other dishes of Western cuisine when he had accompanied several Western travellers in their expeditions to the interior parts of Africa, he did not abandon his habit to eat raw meat.⁵³⁰ In another occasion, he wrote that the Abyssinians generally drink teci (a local drink of Abyssinia) with horns not with bottles and glasses. However, after bottles, jugs, glasses and chalices “filled with European civilization” began to enter the country, the Abyssinian elite began to drink with

 

 

 

[…] Bu cehaletle, bu ataletle din ve millet payidar olur mu?” Habibzade Ahmed Kemal, Çin- Türkistan Hatıraları, 114.

 

⁵²⁹ “[…] Fizan’ın hayat-ı içtimaiyyesinde mühim bir vazife-i medeniye ifa eder.” Sadık el- Müeyyed, Habeş Seyahâtnâmesi, p. 176.

 

⁵³⁰ Sadık el-Müeyyed, Habeş Seyahâtnâmesi, p. 176.

jugs and chalices.⁵³¹ In other words, the dishes of the Western cuisine, bottles, jugs, glasses and chalices were labelled as symbols of civilization.

Besides these material elements of civilization, two particular moral elements were emphasized in order to depict a group of people civilized. One of them is religion, especially Islam. For some Ottoman travellers, Islam had a civilizing effect. For example, Mehmed Mihri argued that it was Islam, which civilized the inhabitants of Sudan. Describing the Sudanese people, he argued that the Sudanese abandoned their pre-Islamic customs and traditions due to the introduction of Islam by the Arabs in the region: “Although they preserve some of their ancient customs and practices, they save themselves from the ridiculous practices of still-infidel Central and South African black people, due to Islam.”⁵³² Different from Mehmed Mihri, for Sadık el-Müeyyed and Ebubekir Efendi, it was not Islam per se, but the concept of religion that raised the uncivilized people to the level of civilization. When Sadık el-Müeyyed met Itu tribe in East Africa, he argued that these people were half-savages because they did not accept any religion. Therefore, most of them were naked except for a small piece of cloth around their waist and they marry seven or eight women.⁵³³ He did not clearly mention about Islamizing them; rather he referred to the concept of religion as a civilizing medium. Similarly, in one of his letters sent from South Africa to the journal of Mecmua-i Fünûn, Ebubekir Efendi wrote about the Fettar tribe. He mentioned that this tribe was extremely ignorant and simple-hearted (gayet cahil ve safdil) and therefore the Europeans sent missionaries to convert them to Christianity. He then wrote as such: “The local government [the British colonial government of South Africa] gave the permission to invite this tribe to the religion of Islam since the same Europeans

⁵³¹ “Habeşler umumen teciyi şişe ve bardak yerine boynuz ile içerlerdi. Avrupa medeniyetiyle dolu şişeler, dolu sürahiler, bardaklar, kadehler girmeye başladığından kibarlar sürahi ve kadehlerle içmeye başladılar.” Sadık el-Müeyyed, Habeş Seyahâtnâmesi, p. 350.

 

⁵³² “Her ne kadar a’dât ve ahlâk-ı kadîmelerinden bazılarını hıfz etmişler ise de henüz müşrîk olan Afrika-yı Vustâ ve Cenubî zencîlerinin gülünç adetlerinden, Đslamiyet sayesinde, kendilerini kurtarmışlardır.” Mehmed Mihri, Sudan Seyahâtnâmesi, 158.

 

⁵³³ Sadık el-Müeyyed, Habeş Seyahâtnâmesi, 435-436.

were introducing the technique of civilization [in the region].”⁵³⁴ In other words, Ebubekir Efendi appreciated the Europeans that what was important for them was not the religion but bringing civilization there, either by Christianity or by Islam.

Sadık el-Müeyyed also discussed the civilizing role of a particular religious establishment in North Africa, namely the Sanusiyya movement. Accordingly, the sheiks of this movement were teaching not only the true principles of Islam to the local people, but also the proper methods of agriculture and herding. What is more, they preserved internal security of the region. According to Sadık el-Müeyyed, they were the “guides and teachers” (mürşid ve mürebbî) of the local people and they deserved to be labelled as the “desert civilizers” (çöl medeniyetçileri).⁵³⁵

Woman was another medium of civilization. For instance, Mehmed Emin compared civilized and nomadic lifestyles in terms of their attitude towards women. He argued that although complimenting the beauty of women was perceived as a respectful manner for the women in the “civilized countries”, in the “nomadic world” such a practice was only the right of the husband and anyone else who behaved so meant to assault the honour of the woman.⁵³⁶

Regarding the veiling practices, Mehmed Emin wrote that in the Islamic countries except Iran, although the women were veiled in accordance with the Islamic principles, they were not prohibited from living together with the men in social life. He found this practice as totally “right and appropriate for the progress of civilization” (savâb ve terakkiyat-ı medeniyeye muvafık). He argued that if  the  masculine and feminine  realms were  entirely separated,  then

 

 

 

⁵³⁴ Ebubekir Efendi, “Đkinci Mektub,” Mecmua-i Fünûn, Vol. 1, No. 10, Şevval 1279 [1863], quoted from the edition of Ömer Lütfî’s travelogue by Hüseyin Yorulmaz, Yüzyıl Önce Güney Afrika: Ümitburnu Seyahâtnâmesi, 86.

 

⁵³⁵ Sadık el-Müeyyed, Afrika Sahra-yı Kebiri’nde Seyahat, 71-72.

 

⁵³⁶ Seyyah Mehmed Emin, Đstanbul’dan Asya-yı Vusta’ya Seyahat, 64.

particularly the boys were raised within women, which would disturb their character.⁵³⁷ He wrote:

The son of a mother who is the daughter of lion will be a lion. The child learned the first samples of heroism from his mother. Therefore, in Asia, in the age of ten or eleven, a child could be an able horseman and a strong valiant, while in our lands a teenager of eighteen or twenty years old could not go out at night without his nanny. Why? Because he was raised in harem.⁵³⁸

 

Mehmed Emin also complained that in the Ottoman Empire, some Ottoman citizens had recently maltreated some Ottoman woman and he criticized this behaviour and perceived that such an occurrence could not happen in a civilized society (cemiyet-i medeniye). He argued that the reason of this scandal was the separation of men and women in the social sphere. According to him, there can be no civilized society behaving their women as such; even the prostitutes did not deserve such behaviour; “because” he wrote “there [in civilized countries], men and women are together members of the civilized society.”⁵³⁹ He further argued that in terms of the liberty of women, civilized world resembled the nomadic world, since women were relatively free in both lifestyles, while in Iran and in the Ottoman Empire, women was very much isolated from social life.⁵⁴⁰

All in all, in distinguishing between the civilized from the uncivilized, neither the city nor the material elements of Western civilization were perceived as the sole mediums of civilization. Rather, a wide range of technical as well as non-technical factors, including vehicles such as steamship and train, the eating and drinking habits, religion and even women, turned out to be labels for categorizing a society as civilized or uncivilized.

⁵³⁷ Seyyah Mehmed Emin, Đstanbul’dan Asya-yı Vusta’ya Seyahat, 64.

 

⁵³⁸ “Aslan kızı olan bir validenin çocuğu dahi aslan oğlu olur. Şecaâtin, bahadırlığın ilk numunesini çocuk validesinde görür. Đşte bu sebebe mebnîdir ki Asya’da on-on bir yaşında bir çocuk a’lâ süvari, gürbüz kahraman kopup bizde ise on sekiz-yirmi yaşında bir delikanlı dadısı yanında olmayınca gece dışarı çıkamaz. Niçin? Çünkü haremde büyümüştür.” Seyyah Mehmed Emin, Đstanbul’dan Asya-yı Vusta’ya Seyahat, 66-67.

 

⁵³⁹ “Çünkü oralarda kadın ve erkek hep bir cemiyet-i medenîyyenin a’zâsıdır.” Seyyah Mehmed Emin, Đstanbul’dan Asya-yı Vusta’ya Seyahat, 65.

 

⁵⁴⁰ Seyyah Mehmed Emin, Đstanbul’dan Asya-yı Vusta’ya Seyahat, 66.

8.3.           Civilization As a Learnable Talent

In the previous chapter, it was argued that the Ottoman intellectuals tried to create a synthesis of Western science/technology and Eastern morality and when they referred to the concept of civilization, they generally meant this synthesis. The Ottoman travellers followed a similar understanding. The inhabitants of the regions that they had visited were non-Europeans; therefore most of them had the notion of Eastern morality. To attain civilization, therefore, what they “should” do was to abandon nomadism and to adopt the Western science and technology. In sum, for the Ottoman travellers, civilization was a learnable, an attainable talent. In an age when the dominant criterion for the concept of civilization was the race, the Ottoman travellers argued that everyone could be civilized since civilization was a characteristic of the mankind.

If civilization was a learnable talent, the reason for the uncivilized nature of the non-Europeans was their ignorance and their reliance on superstitions through unsound interpretation of Islam as well as Western achievements. For instance, Mehmed Hurşid bitterly criticized the nomadic ignorance and their resistance to education. In his travelogue, he narrated that he had once encountered with an interesting conversation between the sheikh of Benî Lam tribe and the governor of Baghdad. Accordingly, the sheikh visited the governor with his nephew at the age of twelve and during their conversation the governor asked the child whether he knew reading and writing. His uncle answered negatively “because he is the son of a sheikh.” The governor asked what did that mean and the sheikh answered: “In our great families, reading and writing is a shame; these practices are not for us.”⁵⁴¹ Witnessing this conversation Mehmed Hurşid wrote that these people “demonstrated their bestiality while presenting their politeness.”⁵⁴²

⁵⁴¹ “[…] bizim büyük familyalarımıza okumakla yazmak ayıbdır, bize düşmez […]” Mehmed Hurşid, Seyahâtnâme-i Hudud, 65.

 

⁵⁴² “[…] kibarlıklarını arz ederken hayvanlıklarını meydâna urmuş idi.” Mehmed Hurşid,

Seyahâtnâme-i Hudud, 65.

Most of the Ottoman travellers were not as rigid as Mehmed Hurşid in their criticism towards ignorance. For example, in writing about the Swat people, Ahmed Hamdi wrote that they were extremely intelligent but unfortunately uneducated. While describing a local Swat ruler, he noted that this person would have been an adroit man, if he had been educated.⁵⁴³ In other words, the problem was not the racial inferiority of these people, but the lack of education. Therefore, education turned out to be a significant medium transforming civilization into a learnable talent. For example, in his travelogue Abdülkadir Câmî mentioned certain tribes, living in the western parts of the Libyan Desert, who were more talented for civilization (medeniyete istidâdları çoktur) because of their continuous voyages from Tripoli to Ghat and their compulsory relationship with other people.⁵⁴⁴ He wrote that if these tribes were granted an appropriate education under a proper administration they would be enlightened more rapidly than the other nomadic tribes living in the region.⁵⁴⁵

Similarly, according to Ahmed Kemal, the reason for the “backwardness” of the Central Asia was the lack of proper education. He wrote that indeed the youngsters living in Kasghar had an extraordinary intelligence (zekâvet-i fevkalade). He appreciated the talent of the young students despite the old methods of education:

[…] I could not deny that these poor Turkish boys having lively eyes and a wide scope of reasoning did never refrain to demonstrate their existence, although they have been buried under the musty roofs and venomous methods of these medreses and choked by the irresolvable tumultuous problems.⁵⁴⁶

 

 

 

⁵⁴³ Şirvanlı Ahmed Hamdi Efendi, Seyahâtnâme: Hindistan, Svat ve Afganistan, 218.

 

⁵⁴⁴ Habibzade Ahmed Kemal, Çin-Türkistan Hatıraları, 55.

 

⁵⁴⁵ Habibzade Ahmed Kemal, Çin-Türkistan Hatıraları, 55.

 

⁵⁴⁶ “Fakat hiç inkar edemem, cevval gözlere, vüs’at-ı muhakemeye sahip bulunan bu zavallı Türk gençleri bu medreselerin köhne sakfları altına ve fikirleri zehirleyici usulleri arasına gömüldükleri ve bu içinden çıkılmaz dağdağalı mesaile boğuldukları halde, yine her zaman mevcudiyetlerini göstermekten hali değildirler.” Habibzade Ahmed Kemal, Çin-Türkistan Hatıraları, 29.

In sum, he claimed that if they had been taught in schools employing the new methodology (yeni usûl mektepler), they would have been intellectually developed.

All in all, for the Ottoman travellers, civilization could be provided through education, either traditional or modern. For some of the travellers the knowledge of Islam would have a civilizing effect since this religion intentionally ordered for learning both about science and technology as well as theological teachings. Others focused more on education through new methods, implying a Western kind of education, which would also enhance the moral development of the students. Therefore, similar to the Ottoman intellectuals, they attached special significance to education as a tool for bringing civilization to the uncivilized.

 

8.4.           Civilization As a Collectivity: The Travellers’ Interest towards Former Civilizations

As mentioned before, one of the meanings of the word civilization denotes a collectivity, the distinct societies of human beings with their own identifiable characteristics. This meaning resulted in the utilization of this word in its plural form, and such utilization is evident not only in the writings of the Western authors, but also of the Ottoman intellectuals. Some of the travelogues written by Ottoman travellers to the East also included the plural form of civilization; in other words, especially in informing the reader about the history of the regions that they had been travelling, the Ottoman travellers labelled the former historical collectivities dominating the region as civilizations.

Indeed, the rudiments of archaeology as a distinct discipline reached the Islamic world very lately, only after the mid-nineteenth century. The European excavations in the Middle East and the recovery of ancient artefacts led to a greater awareness of an indigenous heritage in the regions. From then on, first in Cairo under the auspices of British and French archaeologists, and then in Đstanbul  through  the  efforts  of  Osman  Hamdi  Bey,  the  first  Ottoman

archaeologist, archaeological studies were introduced in the Islamic world.⁵⁴⁷ However, most of the Ottoman travellers read about the ancient civilizations from Western sources even before the systematization of archaeological studies in the Ottoman Empire. They were not indifferent to the achievements of former inhabitants of the Ottoman realm; rather they were extremely eager to see the traces of civilization and to compare the existing conditions of the regions with the former conditions.

For the Ottoman travellers to the Middle East and North Africa, Egypt was perceived as the centre of the most significant ancient sites and attracted their attention. They were aware of the grandeur of Egyptian civilization and thus desirous to see the Egyptian sites and monuments. For example, almost one third of the travelogue of Mehmed Mihri was devoted to the ancient Egyptian history and the description of the Egyptian sites that he had visited during his journey. He admired the pyramids and their mathematical construction; moreover, he was particularly amazed when he saw the mummified bodies of the pharaohs.⁵⁴⁸ He was so impressed by the ancient monuments that he criticized the Western tourists to the region, who had carved their names on the statutes he encountered in Upper Nile. He was so annoyed that he wrote the heads of these people, who had harmed these precious historical monuments, should be smashed by the pickaxes.⁵⁴⁹

Cenap Şehabettin similarly criticized the indifference of the local inhabitants of Egypt to the historical monuments. He wrote:

⁵⁴⁷ According to Stephen Vernoit, with the growth of nationalist sentiments, antiquities policies were introduced and museums founded in Egypt and Đstanbul. He wrote that in Egypt, “[…] an antiquities policy evolved under Auguste Mariette from 1858, primarily for the protection of pharaonic remains, but in 1881 the Committee for the Conservation of Monuments of Arab Art was founded and three years later the Museum of Arab Art opened in the mosque of al-Hakim in Cairo. In the Ottoman Empire an antiquities regulation that placed all archaeological excavations under the control of the Ministry of Education was put into effect in 1884 by Osman Hamdi, the director of the Archaeological Museum in Đstanbul. Osman Hamdi also organized his own excavations, discovering in 1887 the Sidon sarcophagi.” See Stephen Vernoit, “The Rise of Islamic Archaeology,” Muqarnas, Vol. 14 (1997): 1-10, 2.

 

⁵⁴⁸ Mehmed Mihri, Sudan Seyahâtnâmesi, 109-110.

 

⁵⁴⁹ Mehmed Mihri, Sudan Seyahâtnâmesi, 131.

If their souls had acquired the necessary refinement through a lengthy art education; they would have not seen the ornamented ruins among tombs with such indifferent eyes […] They understand nothing from these fragile architectural ambitions, from these leaves and flowers made up of stone, from these refine and emaciated lines and ornaments.⁵⁵⁰

 

For Cenap Şehabettin, the Egyptian civilization was one of the greatest civilizations of mankind and he claimed that the Egyptian civilization influenced the course of history:

The first presumptions of beliefs establishing the required beginning of the history of progress emerged out of here… First superstitions and the first affliction of suspicion and hesitation of ideas were felt here; the thoughts regarding the existence of the soul, the beauties of the soul and the immortality of the soul were born out of here. The Egyptian, which began to develop after the first tribes spreading from a migrating community coming from Asia driven towards the centre of Africa and particularly towards Sudan, established the first phase of apprehension and superstition. The first cradle of superstitions was Egypt; but it was not confined to that; it became the cradle of industry, the cradle of science, the cradle of philosophy, and finally in the nineteenth century, it became the cradle of wealth and prosperity.⁵⁵¹

 

Similarly, Halid Ziyaeddin depicted the pyramids and the Egyptian relics exhibited in the Museum of Cairo as “extremely surprising” (hayretbahş-i ukûl) and perceived the Egyptian civilization as “the producer and complementary of the current civilization” (umran-ı hâzıranın müsebbeb ve mütemmemâtı).⁵⁵²

Besides Egypt, Mesopotamian sites attracted the attention of the Ottoman travellers as well. For example, Ali Suad mentioned about an ancient site in

⁵⁵⁰ “Eğer bunların ruhları uzun bir terbiye-i san’atla rikkat-ı lazımiye kazanmış olsa idi belki merakid arasındaki enkaz-ı menkuşeyi o nazar-ı istiğna ile göremezler […] onlar bu kabil inkisar-ı hevasat-ı mamuriyeden, bu sengin evrak ve ezhardan, bu nahif ve nazenin halut ve nükuştan hiç bir şey anlamazlar.” Cenap Şehabettin, Hac Yolunda, 170.

 

⁵⁵¹ “Tarih-i terakkinin mukaddeme-i zaruriyesini teşkil eden ilk zünûn-u itikadat buradan çıkmış… Đlk ebatıl ile fikrin ilk ıztırabat-ı şekk ve tereddi burada tercüme edilmiş… Vücud-u ruh, letafet-i ruh, beka-yı ruh fikirleri burada doğmuş idi; Asya’dan geçen bir fırka-yı muhacere tarafından aşair-i müteşettete-i iptidaiye Afrika’nın merkezine ve bahusus Sudan cihetlerine doğru sürüldükten sonra neşv-ü nemaya başlayan medeniyet- mısriye ilk devr-i evham ve harafatı tesis etti, işl mehd-i ebatıl-ı kıta-yı Mısriye oldu; fakat bununla kalmadı; sırasıyla mehd- i sanayi; mehd-i fünun, mehd-i felsefe ve nihayet on dokuzuncu asr-ı miladide mehd-i servet oldu.” Cenap Şehabettin, Hac Yolunda, 229.

 

⁵⁵² Halid Ziyaeddin, Musavver Mısır Hatıratı, 3. Abdülkâdir Câmî also mentioned about the traces of former civilizations of North Africa. He particularly referred to the Phoenician, Carthaginian and Roman settlements in North Africa as “civilized” settlements and argued that they were continuously attacked by several nomadic tribes which were the forebears of the Tuaregs. Abdülkâdir Câmî, Trablusgarp’ten Sahra-yı Kebîr’e Doğru, 179.

Bahrain. He decided to visit the site, where a British archaeological team was excavating. He tried to meet the head of the team; however, he was absent there. Ali Suad expressed his regret for not being able to inform the reader about this site as he wanted.⁵⁵³ It is quite interesting that he perceived this visit not as a matter of courtesy but as an opportunity to inform his readers.

Avlonyalı Ekrem Bey was one of the most curious travellers regarding the ancient sites in Syria Province. He visited Petra and Palmyra during his travel in the region and he had to bear a long and tiring journey to reach the sites. Particularly, regarding Palmyra he emphasized the striking contrast between the former civilization and the current desolation: “The traces of the grand and magnificent culture of the past in the desert and, next to it, the miserable Arab village of Tadmur, as the symbol of the decadence in our time.”⁵⁵⁴

Not only the ancient sites, but also the Islamic past of the region was glorified in some travelogues. For example, in writing about Basra, Cenap Şehabettin labelled the city as “the first noble city established by the hand of Islam” (dest-i Đslamın ilk tesîs ettiği belde-i necîbe) and “the earliest keepsake of Islamic civilization” (Đslamın evvelîn yâdigâr-ı medeniyeti).⁵⁵⁵ However, he also emphasized that this glorious Islamic past had waned and the current situation of the city was far from its former grandeur.⁵⁵⁶

All in all, similar to the European perception of several historical collectivities as civilizations, the Ottoman travellers considered the Egyptian, Mesopotamian and Islamic sites as the mirrors reflecting the ancient great civilizations established in these regions. They admired the ancient monuments; however, their archaeological interest hardly passed beyond this admiration.

 

 

 

⁵⁵³ Ali Suad, Seyahatlerim, 16.

 

⁵⁵⁴ Avlonyalı Ekrem Bey, Osmanlı Arnavutluk’undan Anılar (1885-1912), 132.

 

⁵⁵⁵ Cenap Şehabettin, Âfâk-ı Irak, 61.

 

⁵⁵⁶ Cenap Şehabettin, Âfâk-ı Irak, 61.

To conclude, the Ottoman travellers’ perception of civilization had both similarities and differences in comparison to the perception of the Ottoman intellectuals. To start with the similarities, the Ottoman travellers accepted the technological and scientific superiority of the West and tried to introduce the material elements of civilization to the non-European world. They also emphasized the preservation of moral elements of the Islamic/Ottoman culture while adopting these material elements. Their focus on education as a source of civilization reflected this synthesis as well.

However, different both from the European understanding of civilization as well as from the Ottoman intellectuals’ perception of this concept, the Ottoman travellers put their real emphasis on the issue of the distinction between nomadism and settlement when they were mentioning about the concept of civilization. In many of the regions that they had visited ranging from the Saharan Desert, to the jungles of Africa, from the Central Asian steppes to the mountainous regions of Yemen, nomadism was the major life-style and the Ottomans perceived it negatively for centuries. Therefore, for the Ottoman travellers education and learning about the Western science and technology were of secondary importance only after the provision of settlement. In other words, without the transformation from a nomadic to a civilized life-style, such processes would not mean much. The Ottoman travellers’ solid distinction between the urban and non-urban space, the positive qualifications attached to the former and the negative ones attached to the latter demonstrated their desire to civilize these regions through first promoting the settled life and then to increase the level of knowledge of the people through proper education.

However, still, there was no unified perception on this matter; there were some Ottoman travellers who complained for the indolence of the settled people vis-à-vis the vigilance of the nomads, or who criticized the hypocrisy of some city-dwellers vis-à-vis the hospitality and honesty of some nomadic tribes. Therefore, although the focus on the concept of civilization was mainly based on the distinction between nomadism and settled life, this was not the only criterion for labelling a group of people civilized.

PART IV

 

 

OTTOMAN TRAVELLERS’ PERCEPTION OF THE “EAST”

 

 

The previous two chapters on the Ottoman intellectuals’ perception of the concept of civilization in general and the Ottoman travellers’ perception in particular demonstrate that the Ottoman understanding of civilization was different from the European one since it aims for a synthesis instead of total adoption. This difference was one of the most significant impediments in front of labelling the Ottoman perception of the “East” as an Orientalist perception. Another significant difference between the European and Ottoman outlooks towards the region called “the Orient” is that while the former accounts generally established a superior-inferior distinction and thereby a monolithic civilizational understanding of “superior West” and “inferior East;” the Ottomans, particularly the travellers, mentioned differently about different parts of this broad category of “Orient.” In other words, although most of them accepted this distinction, they placed themselves in the Eastern world and resisted the civilizational inferiority argument by attempting to modernize themselves without westernizing. This distinction was, therefore, not an insurmountable one.

Considering all these issues, the final part of this dissertation focuses on the Ottoman travellers’ perception of the “East” and questions whether a monolithic perception of a particular “East” is present in their writings. In doing that, five geographical regions, the North Africa, the Middle Eastern provinces of the Ottoman Empire, Iran, the Central Asia and the South and East Asia, are determined, and separate chapters are devoted for each of them. Each chapter has two sections. The first section deals with a brief account of either the Ottoman rule over or the Ottoman relations with that particular region. The second section focuses on the Ottoman travellers’ perception of that region through emphasizing the similarities and differences regarding their narration of these distant regions. In doing that, it both presents the common themes that the travellers touched upon and underlines the issues specific to that particular region.

CHAPTER 9

 

 

THE OTTOMAN TRAVELLERS’ PERCEPTION OF AFRICA

 

 

9.1             Ottoman Empire in the African Continent

 

 

9.1.1       The Ottoman Rule in North Africa (Sixteenth to Nineteenth Centuries)

Ottoman Empire’s southward expansion in the early sixteenth century and the conquest of Egypt after the defeat of Mamluks in the Battle of Ridaniyah in 1517 resulted in the Ottoman penetration to the continent of Africa. Egypt was transformed into an eyalet⁵⁵⁷ of the Ottoman Empire in the same year and became a stronghold in the north-eastern corner of the continent. After this initial establishment, from the 1520s onwards, the need to control Eastern Mediterranean for containing the two significant rivals of the Empire in the region, namely the Habsburg Empire and Venice, forced the Ottomans to occupy some strategic posts in Northern Africa. The first target of the Ottomans was Algiers, which became an eyalet under the governorship of a privateer, Khair-ed- din Barbarossa (1478-1546), after his voluntary acceptance of the Ottoman sovereignty and his appointment as the High Admiral of the Ottoman fleet (kaptan-ı derya) in late 1533. Unlike this peaceful expansion, the littoral parts of Tripolitania and Cyrenaica were captured from the Order of St. Jean in 1551, while the city of Tunis was occupied in 1574 from the local al-Hafsid dynasty, which had been collaborating with the Habsburg Empire, four decades after the failed Ottoman initiative to occupy the city in 1534. Therefore, by the end of the

⁵⁵⁷ Eyalet is the largest administrative division in the Ottoman Empire until the 1864 Provincial Code. It is composed of multiple sanjaks. The governors of eyalets were generally having the rank of beylerbey and were equal to the rank of vizier in the Ottoman protocol. For a detailed description of the concept of eyalet, see Mehmet Zeki Pakalın, Osmanlı Tarih Deyimleri ve Terimler Sözlüğü, 3^rd Edition, 3 Volumes, (Đstanbul: Milli Eğitim Bakanlığı Yayınları), Vol. 1, 577-578.

sixteenth century, there were four Ottoman eyalets on the North Africa, being Egypt, Algiers, Tripolitania, and Tunisia.⁵⁵⁸

By the second half of the sixteenth century, the Ottomans concerned not only about the control of the Eastern Mediterranean, but also about the increasing Portuguese presence in the Indian Ocean. The Portuguese naval incursions in the southern parts of the Red Sea and in the eastern shores of Africa alarmed the Empire; since it threatened the newly established Eyalet of Egypt as well as the sacred cities of Islam in Hejaz. Therefore, the Ottomans first supported some local Muslim leaders against the Portuguese and their major ally in the region, namely the Abyssinians.⁵⁵⁹ Then, they took more concrete measures and managed a significant campaign towards the strategic ports of north-eastern Africa, namely Massawa and Suakin, which were captured between 1555 and 1564. These newly occupied territories were reorganized as the Eyalet of Abyssinia.⁵⁶⁰

Considering the geographic, economic and social differences of these vast territories, the Ottomans established different modes of governance. First of all, these provinces were administered through the system called saliyane. Unlike most of the provinces in Anatolia and Rumelia, their territories were not divided into smaller territorial units allocated to soldiers for cultivation to produce wealth for raising an army (dirlik). Rather, a predetermined amount of annual tax was imposed on the provinces. Initially, the governors appointed by the centre and then the local governors had the responsibility to collect and send

⁵⁵⁸ For the Ottoman conquests in Africa, see Ahmet Kavas, Osmanlı-Afrika Đlişkileri, (Đstanbul: TASAM Yayınları, 2006), 34-50 and Muhammad Al-Fasi, “Algeria, Tunisia and Libya: The Ottomans and Their Heirs,” in Bethwell A. Ogot, Africa from the Sixteenth to the Eighteenth Century, (Berkeley, CA: University of California Press, 1999), 120-133.

 

⁵⁵⁹ The Portuguese-Abyssinian alliance, established in the period of Abyssinian Emperor Lebna Dengel (1508-1540), contributed to the Portuguese presence in the region. In order to repulse this threat, the Ottomans first supported Ahmed bin Đbrahim Gran (c. 1507-1543), a Somalian tribal leader who attacked Abyssinia in 1520s and occupied several territories. In response, Lebna Dengel demanded Portuguese help. Ahmed Gran was defeated by the Portuguese and Abyssinian rule was restored in the occupied territories. For a brief account of these events see J. Spencer Trimingham, Islam in Ethiopia, (London: Frank Cass, 2008), 85-86.

 

⁵⁶⁰ Kavas, Osmanlı-Afrika Đlişkileri, 46.

this tax to the central treasury.⁵⁶¹ Despite this common system of taxation there were significant differences in terms of governance and the degree of the interrelationship between eyalets and the centre. To start with, the ties of the Eyalet of Egypt with the centre was the most strong, because it was the richest administrative unit of the Empire in the sixteenth century, contributing to central treasury more than any other eyalet.⁵⁶² These strong ties continued until the beginning of the eighteenth century, after which the rivalry between the Ottoman administration, the Mamluks, who had remained in Egypt after the conquest, and the local Arab elite loosened the Ottoman presence.⁵⁶³ Unlike Egypt, the Eyalet of Abyssinia was the least centralized administrative unit because of its geographical distance and lack of institutional continuity. The rapid changes of governors and the absence of control over the local nomadic tribes contributed to its loose structure. In the seventeenth century the Ottoman influence gradually retreated from interior regions to the littoral and in the next century the administration of this eyalet was left to the local elites.⁵⁶⁴

Between these two extremes, there were the three remaining eyalets of the Empire in North Africa, which were labelled as Garb Ocakları. In these

⁵⁶¹ For a detailed account of saliyane, see Pakalın, Osmanlı Tarih Deyimleri ve Terimler Sözlüğü, Vol. 3, 111-112.

 

⁵⁶² Jane Hathaway, The Politics of Households in Ottoman Egypt: The Rise of Qazdağlıs, (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1997), 6. This significance forced the Ottomans to establish a more centralized administration not seen in any other province of the Empire in the region; particularly the Code of Egypt (Kanunname-i Mısriyye) promulgated by the Ottoman Grand Vizier Đbrahim Paşa (1493-1536) in 1525 contributed to this centralization. See P[eter] M[alcolm] Holt, “Pattern of Egyptian Political History from 1517 to 1798,” in P[eter] M[alcolm] Holt, (ed.) Political and Social Change in Modern Egypt, (London: Oxford University Press, 1968), 79-90, 81.

 

⁵⁶³ This rivalry ended in 1786, when Cezayirli Gazi Hasan Paşa (1715-1790) was sent to Egypt to restore internal stability. He ended the Mamluk interference to the administration of province and restored the strength of centrally-appointed governors; however his efforts were not effective because of the French invasion of Egypt three years later. For a brief analysis of this period of turmoil, see Holt, “Pattern of Egyptian Political History from 1517 to 1798,” 82-90. For a detailed analysis of Egyptian politics, economics and society during the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries see Hathaway, The Politics of Households in Ottoman Egypt: The Rise of Qazdağlıs; Michael Winter, Egyptian Society under Ottoman Rule 1517-1798, (London and New York: Routledge, 1992).

 

⁵⁶⁴ Kavas, Osmanlı-Afrika Đlişkileri, 47.

administrative units, there was a system called ocak, established by the janissary corps and the military troops brought from Western Anatolia for the maintenance of security and order in the region, and this military establishment turned out to be the ruling elite of these provinces. Since the governor sent by the centre had a very short tenure (three years) and the difficult duty of collecting taxes, internal affairs of these provinces were handled by the councils including the representatives of this military establishment and some local elites. Therefore, political power lied in the hands of these military elite. A second political group contesting the power of ocak was the naval troops (levend), the renegades from the Mediterranean countries who not only protected cities from naval incursions, but also contributed to the budget of the provinces as privateers.⁵⁶⁵

This political balance based on a governor sent by the centre and a governing council formed by the military and local elites tilted towards the latter with the gradual military decline of the Ottoman Empire and the sending of corrupt governors. In Algeria, the janissary commanders (ağa) were able get total control of the ocak in 1659 and until 1671 they established a military oligarchy, which was also approved by the Porte. In 1671, they were defeated by the naval troops, whose leaders, entitled dey assumed the governance. From then on, until the French invasion of Algeria, the province was ruled by the Deys, who were extremely autonomous from the centre, even having the competence to declare war and peace towards the neighbouring states, or to conclude political or economic agreements with the European states.⁵⁶⁶ In Tunisia, in 1591, the Deys revolted against the governor and forced the Porte to accept their authority over the eyalet, after with they virtually ruled for forty years. During this period, the Deys tried to collect taxes through an intermediary mechanism headed by a

⁵⁶⁵ For the system of ocak and its administration see Tal Shuval, “The Ottoman Algerian Elite and Its Ideology,” International Journal of Middle East Studies, Vol. 32, No. 3 (Aug., 2000), 323-344.

 

 

 

⁵⁶⁶ For a brief account of these power struggles and administration of Algeria in the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries see Jamil M. Abun-Nasr, A History of the Maghrib in the Islamic Period, (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1993), 159-164.

local bureaucrat called Bey, who was appointed by them and approved by the Porte. In 1631, the Bey of Tunisia, Murad Corso, defeated the Deys in this quest for power and convinced the Porte to accept his dynastic rule in Tunisia in the name of the Sultan. In 1705, this dynasty was replaced by a Turkic dynasty established by Huseyn bin Ali el-Türki (1669-1740), which ruled Tunisia until the French invasion in 1881.⁵⁶⁷ In Tripolitania, the administration of the governors appointed by the centre lasted until 1711, when a dynasty called Karamanlı, which had emerged out of the marriage of janissaries with local women, was able to end this system and forced the Porte to accept its rule. This dynasty ruled Tripolitania until 1835, when the Ottoman Empire re-established central administration.⁵⁶⁸

Besides these power contests and administrative transformations, the Ottoman Empire also contacted the Muslim states of Central Africa, especially the state of Bornu, the strongest state in Central Africa at that time.⁵⁶⁹ In this period, other smaller Muslim states also contacted the Ottoman Empire and declared their allegiance to the Caliph; in return, the Ottoman Sultan sent them

⁵⁶⁷ The first half of the eighteenth century was very much dominated by inter-dynastic struggle for power and disturbed Tunisian economy, while the second half was more stable due to the rule of Hammuda Pasha (1777-1814), who both imitated the limited modernization of the Ottoman centre and secured the borders of the province against external incursions, particularly by the Algerians. See Asma Moalla, The Regency of Tunis and the Ottoman Porte, 1777-1814: Army and Government of a North African Ottoman Eyalet at the End of the Eighteenth Century, (London and New York: Routledge Curzon, 2004), 141-142.

 

⁵⁶⁸ For the establishment of Karamanlı dynasty see K. S. McLachlan, “Tripoli and Tripolitania: Conflict and Cohesion during the Period of the Barbary Corsairs (1551-1850),” Transactions of the Institute of British Geographers, New Series, Vol. 3, No. 3, Settlement and Conflict in the Mediterranean World (1978), 285-294.

 

⁵⁶⁹ Particularly, the correspondence between the Sultan of Bornu, Mai Đdris Alloma (r. 1570- 1602), and Murad III (r. 1574-1595) was quite significant. Accordingly, Mai Đdris Alloma sent an envoy to Murad III (r. 1574-1595) in order to establish good relationships, to prevent Ottoman incursions into his realm, and finally to equip his army with Ottoman weaponry to dominate his rivals. Murad III advised Mai Đdris Alloma not to attack other Muslim states in the region; however Ottoman weapons were sold to Bornu through private traders and some Ottomans served in the army of Bornu as military experts during the sultanate of Alloma. For Ottoman- Bornu relations, see Zekeriya Kitapçı, “Osmanlıların Orta Afrika Politikası: Askeri, Ticari ve Siyasi Đlişkiler,” in Eren (ed.), Osmanlı, Vol. 1, 411-420, 414-415 and Numan Hazar, “Türklerin Afrika ile Đlişkilerinin Kısa Tarihçesi,” in Güzel [et. al.] (eds.), Türkler, Vol. 13, 118-131, 122- 124.

gifts and sometimes seals indicating that he accepted their loyalty.⁵⁷⁰ Although the relationship between the Ottoman Empire and these political entities hardly passed beyond the legitimization of the authority of their Muslim rulers through the Caliph’s approval, still, these contacts reflect that there was an Ottoman awareness about these distant territories.

 

9.1.2. Challenges to the Ottoman Rule in Africa during the Nineteenth Century and the Ottoman Responses

The year 1798 was a turning point for the Ottoman Empire because European colonialism directly and militarily penetrated into the Middle Eastern territories of the Empire by the French invasion of Egypt. Although this invasion did not last long, its effects were profound. First of all, it resulted in the Ottoman perception that the central Ottoman territories were no longer secure from European attacks; the invasion of one of the richest provinces of the Empire meant that the attacks would no more be waged at the borderlands but at the very heart of the Empire. Secondly, it transformed the socio-political structure of Egypt. From the post-invasion turmoil a mighty governor, Kavalalı Mehmed Ali Paşa, emerged who would later challenge the Ottoman sovereignty in Egypt and would be able to establish his dynastic rule over this province.

Before the Ottoman Empire’s recovery from this initial shock, the Eyalet of Algeria was invaded by the French in 1830. Initially this invasion was limited to the major cities in the Algerian littoral; however, local resistance movements forced the French to enlarge the scope of their colonial expansion from 1840s onwards. Ottoman Empire could not react to the invasion except for some diplomatic initiatives, because the central army of the Empire had already been dismissed with the abolition of Janissary corps in 1826 and the establishment of

⁵⁷⁰ Among them were the states of Vaday, Kanem, and Darfur (established in contemporary Eastern Sudan and Chad), the states of Agadez, Ayir and Kavar (established in contemporary Niger), the sultanates of Kano and Sokoto (established in contemporary Nigeria), the sultanate of Harar (established in contemporary Somalia), the sultanates of Funj and Senar (established in contemporary Sudan), and finally the sultanate of Zengibar (established in contemporary Tanzania and Mozambique). See Ahmed Kavas, “Osmanlı Devleti’nin Afrika Kıtasında Hakimiyeti ve Nüfuzu,” in Eren (ed.), Osmanlı, Vol. 1, 421-430.

new army was not effective enough to cope with this problem. What is more, existing troops were sent to repulse Kavalalı’s rebellion against the central administration. Therefore, the Empire had to acquiesce and later recognize the French invasion of Algeria in 1847.⁵⁷¹

However, several lessons were drawn from this invasion. First of all, the Ottomans perceived that a movement for centralization of the remaining North African provinces was a must, because it was evident that the French did not satisfy solely with the control of Algeria. Therefore, in 1835, Ottoman troops were sent to the Eyalet of Tripolitania to end the Karamanlı dynasty and to re- establish Ottoman central administration, which was consolidated particularly with the enactment of the Provincial Code in 1864. These measures proved to be effective; despite French and later English colonial ventures in North Africa, Tripolitania remained in the hands of the Ottomans until 1912. However, a similar initiative for Tunisia failed. Accordingly, in order to prevent the fall of Tunisia to French colonial rule the Tunisians demanded the Ottomans to establish a more central administration as in the case of Tripolitania. The Ottomans responded these demands positively and officially declared Tunisia as a part of the Ottoman Empire in 1871; however, this did not prevent the province from falling under French rule a decade later.⁵⁷²

While the Ottoman Empire was on the eve of losing its North African territories, the virtually independent governor of Egypt, Kavalalı Mehmed Ali Paşa, enlarged the territories of his eyalet by conquering Sudan in 1821. Thenceforward, the Province of Sudan was established, which was nominally governed by the Ottoman Empire and practically by Egypt. The territories of the province were once more enlarged in 1870 by Khedive Đsmail Paşa (1830-1895) towards the Great Lakes in the south and Darfur in Western Sudan, in which a

 

 

⁵⁷¹ For the reasons and implementation of the French invasion of Algeria, see John Ruedy, Modern Algeria: the Origins and Development of a Nation, 2^nd Edition, (Bloomington, IN: Indiana University Press, 2005), particularly Chapter 3, 45-79.

 

⁵⁷² Abun-Nasr, A History of the Maghrib in the Islamic Period, 187.

relatively modern administrative system was established.⁵⁷³ After this expansion another province was established, entitled the Province of Equator (Hatt-ı Üstüva Vilayeti). The governors of this province were generally foreigners appointed in consultation with the Great Powers, which were increasing their presence in the region.⁵⁷⁴ After British occupation of Egypt, a condominium was established on Sudan and Equator in 1899; however, the Egyptian control remained nominal.⁵⁷⁵

The intensification of the “scramble for Africa” after the Treaty of Berlin in 1881, which also resulted in the French invasion of Tunisia in the same year and the British invasion of Egypt a year later, forced the Ottoman Empire to take more concrete measures. One policy was to delineate the Ottoman territories in North Africa clearly. In order to prevent further French advance in the Saharan Desert, some smaller administrative units were established in the south-western borders of the Province of Tripolitania upon the request of the local people.⁵⁷⁶ A second policy was the use of diplomacy in order to prevent further colonial expansion. Ottoman diplomats tried to voice their protests in international platforms to protect the legal rights of the Empire.⁵⁷⁷ Finally, the Hamidian policy of Pan-Islamism was tried to be utilized in order to provide the allegiance

⁵⁷³ Gabriel Warburg, “Islam in the Sudan under the Funj and the Ottomans,” in David J. Wasserstein and Ami Ayalon (eds.), Mamluks and Ottomans: Studies in Honour of Michael Winter, (London and New York, Routledge, 2006), 206-225, 210.

 

⁵⁷⁴ The first governor was the English Orientalist Samuel Baker (1821-1893), and after him. Charles Gordon (later Gordon Paşa, 1833-1885) assumed the governance. In 1878 when Gordon Paşa became the governor of Sudan, a German renegade, Mehmed Emin Paşa (Edward Schnitzer, 1840-1892) became the governor of this province. See Hazar, “Türklerin Afrika ile Đlişkilerinin Kısa Tarihçesi,”127-128.

 

⁵⁷⁵ For a brief analysis of the Province of Equator see, Đdris Bostan, “Orta Afrika’da Nüfuz Mücadelesi ve Osmanlı Đmparatorluğu (1893-1895), Belleten, Vol. 54, (Aug., 1990): 665-697.

 

⁵⁷⁶ Indeed, the small towns in this region demanded the formal acceptance of Ottoman sovereignty; therefore district administrators were sent by the Porte and three districts (kaza) were established being Reşade and Tibesti (in contemporary Chad) in 1880 and 1884, and the district of Kawar (in contemporary Nigeria) in 1911. See Hazar, “Türklerin Afrika ile Đlişkilerinin Kısa Tarihçesi,”124.

 

⁵⁷⁷ For an analysis of Ottoman diplomatic initiatives regarding Algerian and Tunisian incidents, see Abdurrahman Çaycı, Büyük Sahra’da Türk-Fransız Rekabeti, 1858-1911, (Erzurum: Atatürk Üniversitesi Basımevi, 1970); Abdurrahman Çaycı, La Question Tunisienne et La Politique Ottomane, 1881-1913 (Erzurum: Atatürk Üniversitesi Yayınları, 1963).

and loyalty of local tribes to the Ottoman Empire and to the Sultan/Caliph. Abdülhamid contacted several religious orders, the most significant of which was the Sanusiyya order established in the Province of Tripolitania, for preserving the Ottoman control over the local tribes.

Besides Western colonial penetration, the second significant aspect of the nineteenth century was the modernization of the region either under colonial rule, or under the rules of the Ottoman or Egyptian governors. For example, Kavalalı and his successors urbanized and modernized Egypt to a significant degree.⁵⁷⁸ In Algeria and Tunisia, French colonial administration conducted the policy of eliminating traditional economic and political structures as well as ensuring the absolute and complete subjugation of the population.⁵⁷⁹ Finally, in the Province of Tripolitania, the Ottoman Empire’s centralization was compounded with modernization. Sanitary conditions as well as education were tried to be developed. Particularly during the Hamidian era, tens of primary schools and a few secondary schools were opened in the province.⁵⁸⁰

All in all, in the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries, the Ottoman presence in North Africa was very much shattered by the British and French penetrations, as well as by the quasi-independent administration of Egypt. The limited attempts of centralization could only serve for the maintenance of Ottoman control in Tripolitania, while other Ottoman territories were gradually lost. This age of turmoil was very much reflected in the Ottoman

⁵⁷⁸ For a detailed analysis of Egyptian modernization, see Gabriel Baer, “Social Change in Egypt: 1800-1914,” in P. M. Holt, (ed.) Political and Social Change in Modern Egypt, (London: Oxford University Press, 1968), 136-161; Ehud R. Toledano, State and Society in Mid-Nineteenth Century Egypt, (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1990).

 

⁵⁷⁹ This was done in Algeria through the Code de l’Indigénat (The Native Code), which perceived the colonized people as subjects, not as citizens and clearly separated between the local population and the new French settlers. Benjamin Stora, Algeria, 1830-2000: A Short History, translated by Jane Marie Todd, (Ithaca and London: Cornell University Press, 2001), 5-6.

 

⁵⁸⁰ For a detailed analysis of these schools, see the two articles written by Nesimi Yazıcı, “Osmanlı Son Döneminde Libya’da Türk Dilinin Öğretimi Üzerine Bazı Gözlemler,” Belleten, Vol 59, (Apr. 1995): 121-132 and “Layihalar Işığında II. Abdülhamid Döneminde Libya Üzerine Bazı Gözlemler,” in Sultan II. Abdülhamid ve Devri Semineri, 27-29 May 1992, (Đstanbul: Đstanbul Üniversitesi Edebiyat Fakültesi Basımevi, 1994), 47-84.

travelogues to the region; which is examined thoroughly in the coming section of this chapter.

 

9.2.           Ottoman Travellers’ Perception of Africa in the Nineteenth Century

Although the continent of Africa was quite remote to the Ottoman centre, especially during the second half of the nineteenth century, it was one of the most visited regions by the travellers. Particularly, the pan-Islamist and anti- imperialist policies of Abdülhamid II found a significant playground in this part of the world, where the rivalry of imperialist powers intensified after 1880s. Therefore, in the late Ottoman Empire, travellers made their way to Africa as agents for developing good relations with the local Muslim elites in order to check imperialist expansion, as soldier/bureaucrats for preventing European, especially French, imperialist desires in the Sahara, or as diplomats for maintaining friendly relations with neighbouring African states. Whatever the reason for their presence in Africa, these travellers wrote and published their travel accounts as books or in newspapers and these publications contribute to the understanding of the Ottoman perception of Africa in this volatile period.

 

9.2.1.     The Representation of the Allegiance and Loyalty of the African Muslims to the Caliph and the Ottoman Empire

Since the North African territories of the Ottoman Empire were under Western penetration during the nineteenth century, despite cultural differences between the Ottoman imperial core and North African periphery, the Ottoman travellers perceived these regions as parts of the Empire and emphasized this sense of belongingness in their travelogues. In other words, although the geography (for example, the desert) or the peoples (for example, the bedouins) were quite alien to the travellers, while demonstrating their feelings (excitement, astonishment, comfort or discomfort) emerged out of the difference between the observer and the observed, they were aware that these territories were part of their fatherland. For example, with regard to the Saharan Desert, Sadık el- Müeyyed wrote that the awareness that he was travelling in the Ottoman realm made him forget all the difficulties of travel by giving “an extraordinary

strength” to his body and “an unidentifiable sense of comfort and security” to his heart.⁵⁸¹ Similarly, Ahmed Şerif declared his feeling of peace when he passed the Ottoman-Tunisian border and entered Tripolitania, which he defined as the “holy soil of the fatherland;” he wrote that he felt as if he were at home.⁵⁸²

The perception of the remaining territories of North Africa as part of the fatherland was strengthened with the sense of pride emerged as a result of the African Muslims’ ultimate allegiance to the Caliph (in other words, the Ottoman Sultan). The travellers’ narrative of demonstration of this allegiance is not peculiar to the Hamidian era, when the discourse of Pan-Islamism reached its zenith. The travelogues written before and after this period also include similar narrations. For example, as early as 1860s, Ömer Lütfî wrote that when the Muslim community of Capetown had heard of the arrival of the Ottoman religious mission, they gathered to welcome the mission and expressed their gratitude to the Caliph for sending religious scholars. This welcoming demonstration satisfied Ömer Lütfî and his tutor, Ebubekir Efendi and made them feel in a friendly and familiar environment.⁵⁸³ What is more, during their stay, an Ottoman vessel visited Capetown and the Muslim community declared their “joy and cheerfulness” (izhar-ı şadî ve ferah) to Ömer Lütfî that they were extremely content to see a vessel of the Ottoman Empire in their city.⁵⁸⁴

The Ottoman travellers’ experience of Muslim allegiance to the Caliph took a visual form in the Friday prayers, when the imams prayed for the continuation of the reign of the Caliph/Sultan in their speeches. These prayers were the occasions where the travellers observed the sense of belonging to the same community to the highest degree. For example, Mühendis Faik attended a Friday prayer in Port Louis, Mauritius, during which the imam prayed for Sultan

 

⁵⁸¹ Sadık el-Müeyyed, Afrika Sahra-yı Kebîr’inde Seyahat, 45.

 

⁵⁸² Ahmed Şerif, Arnavudluk’da, Sûriye’de, Trablusgarb’de Tanîn, 242.

 

⁵⁸³ Ömer Lütfî, Ümitburnu Seyahâtnâmesi, 55, 57.

 

⁵⁸⁴ Ömer Lütfî, Ümitburnu Seyahâtnâmesi, 87.

Abdülaziz as the Caliph of the entire Muslim community. After hearing this pray, Mühendis Faik wrote that they

[…] voiced their allegiance [to the Sultan] and adorned their tongues with the devotions ‘long live the Sultan’ in order to thank for hearing the name of our eminent benefactor even in such places as a result of his imperial grace.⁵⁸⁵

 

Similarly, Sadık el-Müeyyed attended a mass prayer in Harar, Abyssinia, in which almost two thousand Muslim people had prayed for the Caliph. He once more accentuated the significance of Caliphate in these distant lands:

Almost in all Muslim realms such a natural situation [praying for the Caliph] exists. But after passing all these seas and deserts, it is impossible for a loyal subject not to be happy after seeing that the highness of that holy name has always been chanted with respect and glorification.⁵⁸⁶

 

As it can be seen from this excerpt, the emphasis on the Muslim allegiance to the Caliph intensified in the writings of Hamidian travelogues. In another occasion, Sadık el-Müeyyed wrote that during his voyage to the Sanussi lodge in al-Jaghbub, whenever the local Muslims heard that a representative of the Sultan had arrived, they came, declared their allegiance to the Caliph, and kissed his hands.⁵⁸⁷ Similarly, during his embassy to Addis Ababa, he continuously wrote about the mood of the Muslims in the cities that he visited. For example, he narrated the arousal of the Muslims in Djibouti and their expressions of content for the visit of the envoy of the Caliph vividly: “The Muslim community wanted not to see the envoy sent [by the Caliph] once, but to contemplate them with pleasure as much as possible.”⁵⁸⁸ Such narrations

⁵⁸⁵ “Bizler dahi sâye-i şâhânede böyle mahallerde bile nâm-ı âli-i velinimeti kûş eylememize teşekküren padişahım çok yaşa dua’ı[na] icabet intimâsıyla tezyin-i lisân musarefet eyledik.” Mühendis Faik, Seyahâtnâme-i Bahr-i Muhît, 47.

 

⁵⁸⁶ “Memâlik-i Đslamiye’nin hemen her tarafında bu hâl tabii olup fakat bunca bahr-u küfrâyı kat ve tayy ettikten sonra o nâm-ı kutsînin ulviyetini daima ta’zîm ve tebcîl ile zikr olunduğunu gören tebâ-yı sâdıkadan birinin mesrûr olmaması kabil değildir.” Sadık el-Müeyyed, Habeş Seyahâtnâmesi, 159.

 

⁵⁸⁷ “Kafile halkı hazret-i hilâfet-penâhîden olduğumu anlayınca kemâl-i ta’zîmle ellerime sarıldılar. Yolda ne kadar urbana ve urban meşâyihine rast geldimse cümlesi ta’zîmde kusur etmiyorlar idi.” Sadık el-Müeyyed, Afrika Sahra-yı Kebîri’nde Seyahat, 14.

 

⁵⁸⁸ “Ahâli-i Đslâmiye taraf-ı eşref-i hazret-i hilâfet-penâhîden îzam buyurulan heyeti yalnız bir kere görmek değil mümkün olduğu kadar temâşâ etmek istiyorlar idi.” Sadık el-Müeyyed, Habeş

demonstrate the travellers’ emphasis on the spiritual authority of the Caliphate over the entire Muslim realm.

This allegiance and loyalty of the local people was re-emphasized in the post-Hamidian era; however, this time, it was presented as a loyalty not to a religious figure, namely the Caliph, but to the Ottoman fatherland itself. Particularly, in Ahmed Şerif’s travelogue, it was expressed in the form of the Ottoman anti-imperialist quest against the Italian aggression. Regarding the Arabs of Sfax (in contemporary Tunisia), Ahmed Şerif wrote that they expressed an extraordinary excitement against the Italian attack to the Province of Tripolitania and they shared his sorrow.⁵⁸⁹ Similarly, in writing about the province, he mentioned that its real wealth was not its fertile soil or sub-soil mineral resources but its people: “In order to find a people exerting such loyalty and allegiance to the government, being peaceful in their lives, one should go to Anatolia.”⁵⁹⁰ Even, he wrote that the inhabitants of the region were more loyal to the state than the inhabitants of Anatolia considering the difficulties that they experienced because of Ottoman governments’ negligence of the province.⁵⁹¹ This comparison with the Anatolian people demonstrated how he appreciated the efforts of the local communities in defending the fatherland against colonial expansionism.

In sum, narrating the allegiance of the local Muslims first to the Caliph and then to the Ottoman fatherland served for creating a sense of common identity, meaning that the Ottomans (including the North African people) had similar concerns and feelings with regard to the contemporary problems they had

Seyahâtnâmesi, 45. Another interesting experience was the extreme respect of the local Muslim rulers to the seal (tuğra) of the Caliph. Accordingly, Sadık el-Müeyyed brought some watches as gifts to these local Muslim rulers. They opened the watches, saw the seal of the Caliph carved in it and asked what that particular sign meant. When Sadık el-Müeyyed told them that it was the seal of the Caliph, they kissed and bring the watch to their forehead meaning they paid a great respect. Sadık el-Müeyyed, Habeş Seyahâtnâmesi, 342.

 

⁵⁸⁹ Ahmed Şerif, Arnavudluk’ta, Suriye’de, Trablusgarb’de Tanîn, 241.

 

⁵⁹⁰ “Bu halk kadar hükümete sâdık ve bağlı, hayatında sâkin, adamlar bulmak için, Anadolu’ya gitmek gerekir.” Ahmed Şerif, Arnavudluk’ta, Suriye’de, Trablusgarb’de Tanîn, 259.

 

⁵⁹¹ Ahmed Şerif, Arnavudluk’ta, Suriye’de, Trablusgarb’de Tanîn, 80.

encountered. This common identity was perceived as a way to prevent the ultimate disintegration of the Empire.

 

9.2.2.     Comparing and Contrasting North Africa with Europe and Ottoman Empire

Comparing North African cities, landscapes, and peoples with the Ottoman Empire or Europe was a common practice for the Ottoman travellers. In making this comparison, the Ottoman travellers tried to display that the African cities and peoples may not be as much different from the European ones as had been thought. Moreover, comparison with Anatolia and other parts of the Empire might mean that these regions were not much different from the other parts of the Ottoman Empire as well. What is more, through such comparisons, it was also aimed to make these distant regions more familiar to the readers of these travelogues and to visualize them in their eyes.

To start with, some North African cities, modernized under the Ottoman governors or colonial administrations, were resembled to some European cities, particularly to Paris and London, the two significant models for the Ottoman travellers. For example, with regard to Alexandria, Ömer Lütfî wrote as such: “This city was quite ordered and adorned, and its streets were enlightened with gas lamps from one extreme to the other. It was a counterpart of London.”⁵⁹² Süleyman Şükrü similarly resembled al-Mansoura (in contemporary Egypt) to Paris: “The parts of al-Mansoura, which has no difference from European cities, along the Nile resembles to the banks of Seine of Paris.”⁵⁹³

⁵⁹² “Şehr-i mezkur gayet muntazam ve müzeyyen olub sokakları bütün bir baştan öbür başa gazlar ize münevver idi […] Londra’dan bir nazire idi.” Ömer Lütfî, Ümitburnu Seyahâtnâmesi, 109.

 

⁵⁹³ “Avrupa şehirlerinden asla farkı olmayan Mansure’nin Nil kenarına düşen kısmı Paris’in ‘Sen’ sahilini andırır.” Karçınzade Süleyman Şükrü, Seyahat-i Kübra, 325. Besides Alexandria and Mansure, the Egyptian cities of Helwan and Port Said were perceived as having no difference from European cities in the travelogue of Mehmed Mihri. Regarding the city of Helwan, he mentioned that there was a hot mineral water resource, which resulted in the establishment of a European-style bath in the city. Besides, there were big hotels, coffee houses, a big observatory and gardens in which both Arabic and Western music was performed. In sum, he writes that “Helwan is a European-style, small and beautiful city, whose entire roads and streets were enlightened with electricity.” (Hasılı Helvan bütün yol ve caddeleri elektrik ziyasıyla

Halil Halid described the cities of Philippeville (contemporary Skikda in Algeria) and Algiers as French cities. With regard to Philippeville, he wrote: “There is nothing reminding East in the general composition of the city; it is an ordinary French city having apartments, taverns and so forth.”⁵⁹⁴ In Algiers, he experienced the degree of the visibility of French colonial presence:

When I arrived at the city of Algiers, I thought that I was in France. Because I found everything had become French. There is nothing that reminds one that he is in Africa unless there are porters wearing fez or turban, or other servants.⁵⁹⁵

 

All these expressions show that unlike other resemblances mentioned above, Halil Halid’s depiction of these cities includes a significant criticism of French colonial administration disturbing the original character of these cities and transforming them into mere replicas. What reminds the traveller of their real nature was the presence of Eastern-costumed “porters and servants,” in other words, the colonized people serving the colonial masters. This visualization of this colonial relationship in the form of French-type cities and Eastern-looking colonized people was the new characteristic of North Africa. Another criticism towards the extreme modernization of North African cities was directed by Cenap Şehabettin. Regarding Ramla, which was established in the suburbs of Cairo, he was critical of extreme intervention to nature and extreme reliance on scientific environmental arrangements. He wrote:

There, there is entirely science and ornaments; there remains none from nature and reality. There, they cut, broke and reaped the trees to give them the same shape… They mixed the colours as they wanted… They gave a geometrical shape to the branches… The curved and bended nature; they forcibly intervened in it…⁵⁹⁶

 

tenvir olunmuş, Avrupavari güzel ve küçük bir şehirdir) Mehmed Mihri, Sudan Seyahâtnâmesi,

71. For the depiction of Port Said, see 342.

 

⁵⁹⁴ “Şehrin şekl-i umumisinde şarkı andırır bir durum yok; apartmanları, meyhaneleri ve saireyi havi adi bir Frenk beldesinden ibarettir.” Halil Halid, Cezayir Hatıratından, 6.

 

⁵⁹⁵ “Cezayir şehrine vasıl olduğum zaman kendimi Fransa’da zannettim. Çünkü her şeyi Fransızlaşmış buldum. Fesli, sarıklı hamallar veya sair hizmetkarlar da olmasa insana Afrika’da bulunduğunu andıran bir hal görülmez.” Halil Halid, Cezayir Hatıratından, 73.

 

⁵⁹⁶ “Orada bütün bir fen, bütün bir ziynet vardı; hiç tabiat ve hakikat kalmamıştı. Orada ağaçları bir hizaya getirmek içün kesmişler, kırmışlar, biçmişler… Renkleri istedikleri gibi meczetmişler…

In other words, the Ottoman travellers were content with the modernization of the North African cities; however they reacted to the extreme modes of modernization, which resulted in the loosening of identities of the urban space. To put differently, they wanted to see modern cities having preserved their own characteristics.

Comparing African cities with Đstanbul and other parts of the Ottoman Empire was another way of decreasing the unfamiliarity of the Ottomans to these distant parts of the world. For example, Mehmed Mihri resembled Khartoum to Đstanbul by the way of comparing the Nile River with the Bosphorus, both of which divides the city into two parts.⁵⁹⁷ Similarly, Abdülkadir Câmî resembled the marketplace of the city of Tripoli to the bazaars of Đstanbul and argued that it demonstrated a “disordered panorama” (gayrımütecânis bir manzara) with “a tumult peculiar to our East” (Şarkımıza mahsûs bir kargaşalık).⁵⁹⁸

Besides the comparison of cities and countryside, there were some other characteristics that directed the Ottoman travellers to resemble Africa to Europe. Military qualities and the situation of women were two such media of comparison. In comparing Abyssinian soldiers with the European ones, with regard to their courage, stability, strength and speed, Sadık el-Müeyyed found the former superior to the latter.⁵⁹⁹ He also compared European and Abyssinian women from the higher echelons of these societies and found the latter almost equal to the former. In describing a local chieftain’s wife, he wrote: “She has such a style, such courteous sentences and parables that make a person admired. The politest ladies of Europe could speak only as much as herself.”⁶⁰⁰

Dallara bir şekl-i hendesî vermişler… Tabiatı eğmişler, bükmüşler, bir vaziyet-i cebriyeye koymuşlar…” Cenap Şehabettin, Hac Yolunda, 95.

 

⁵⁹⁷ Mehmed Mihri, Sudan Seyahâtnâmesi, 136-137.

 

⁵⁹⁸ Abdülkâdir Câmî, Trablusgarp’tan Sahra-yı Kebîr’e Doğru, 11.

 

⁵⁹⁹ Sadık el-Müeyyed, Habeş Seyahâtnâmesi, 372-373.

 

⁶⁰⁰ “Öyle bir seyak ve tarz-ı ifadeleri, öyle nazik cümle ve darb-ı meselleri vardır ki insanı hayran ediyor. Avrupa’nın en terbiyeli madamları o kadar söyleyebilir.” Sadık el-Müeyyed, Habeş Seyahâtnâmesi, 390

In sum, one of the main concerns of the Ottoman travellers was to demonstrate that the North African territories were not much different from the European or other Ottoman territories. This was done not only for displaying that at least some parts of this region resembled to Europe unlike their alienation by the Europeans, but also to consolidate the Ottoman sense of familiarity to these regions by arguing that Africa shared some significant similarities with the Ottoman Empire irrespective of its physical or social differences.

 

9.2.3.     “Urban Duality” in North African Cities: A Discussion of Modernity, Colonialism and Civilization

Another significant characteristics of the travelogues on the non- European world in general and North Africa in particular, is the “urban duality,”⁶⁰¹ in other words, the coexistence of modern European-style quarters with the old Arab/Islamic quarters in the urban space. This division of the urban space underlined the civilized/non-civilized, modern/non-modern, new/old dichotomies. For example, for the city of Tripoli, Abdülkadir Câmî underlined the contrast between the modern buildings established at the coastal areas of the city and the old buildings in the old city centre. While he utilized positive adjectives to describe the former, he pejoratively wrote about the old city:

The streets of new city outside of the walls are quite wide and the buildings are in good order. However the tumult and lack of homogeneity peculiar to the East demonstrate itself here as well. One can encounter zerbe established by the branches of date trees peculiar to the black people within a vacant plot next to an adorned building […]⁶⁰²

⁶⁰¹ Indeed, the concept of “urban duality” is a recent coinage and is used to denote the social and economic, class-based differences in the urban space. In other words, it means the division of the city along quarters or regions resided by different groups having different socio-economic backgrounds. For the definition and a brief analysis of the concept of “urban duality,” see Chris Hamnett, “Social Segregation and Social Polarization,” in Ronan Paddison (ed.), Handbook of Urban Studies, (London: Sage Publications, 2001), 162-176; for its application, for example, in Latin America, see Dirk Kruijt and Kees Koonings, “Epilogue: Latin America’s Urban Duality Revisited,” in Dirk Kruijt and Kees Koonings (eds.), Fractured Cities: Social Exclusion, Urban Violence and Contested Spaces in Latin America, (London and New York: Zed Books, 2007), 138-141. In this dissertation, however, “urban duality” is used as a concept to denote the establishment of quarters in the urban space based on ethnic or religious divisions as well as the divisions created by colonial relationships between the colonizer and the colonized.

 

⁶⁰² “Hâric-i surdaki belde-i cedîdenin caddeleri oldukça geniş ve ebniyesi muntazamdır. Ancak

Şarka mahsûs kargaşalık ve adem-i tecânüs burada da hikmeti icra eder. Müzeyyen bir binanın

Similarly, Cenap Şehabettin wrote that this coexistence disturbed the very identity of Alexandria:

Examined in whatever perspective, there is no particular characteristic of this city: One can encounter a mosque, a church, a synagogue, a Coptic monastery, or the temples of four or five communities. A large building on a new avenue is followed by an old house with bowed windows in a wide street. One street is narrow, dirty and dark; the street next to it is wide, clean, and adorned with gas lamps.There, an Egyptian sells vegetables, next to him a European deals with tailing; beyond, an Indian sells rarely-found relics, an Englishman has opened a pub, next to him there is the cabin of an Arab scribe [...]⁶⁰³

 

He further described the division between modern and non-modern quarters of Cairo with reference to the Mahmudiye Canal, which completely separated these two distinct urban spaces: “This bank, adorned and prosperous; the opposite bank, the real origin of the realm of Egypt, ruinous and inferior...”⁶⁰⁴

Cenap Şehabettin also argues that this dichotomy resulted in an ambivalent situation; for example, he defined Alexandria as a city ambivalently situated between the East and the West:

This place is neither West nor East, neither totally Europe, nor totally Africa… This place is a mixed and intermediate thing [between these two]. Its disharmony is ridiculous; however these colours and shapes are worth of looking at. The eyes never get tired from this looking, because the panorama continuously changes. Wandering around one thinks that he is playing a game […]; because in every step he finds another situation, another life, another world.⁶⁰⁵

yanı başında boş bir arsada zencîlere mahsûs hurma dallarından ma’mul zerbelere […] tesadüf olunur.” Abdülkâdir Câmî, Trablusgarp’tan Sahra-yı Kebîr’e Doğru, 12.

 

⁶⁰³ “Ne nazarla teftîş edilirse edilsin, bu şehrin bir tabiat-ı husûsiyesi yoktur: Aynı sokakta bir câmî-i şerîfe, bir kiliseye, bir sinagoga, bir Kıptî mâbedine… Dört beş milletin ibâdethânesine tesâdüf olunabilir; bir büyük caddede pencereleri meşrebiyeli bir eski hâneyi bir bulvar binası takip edebilir; bir sokak dar, murdar, karanlık… yanındaki sokak geniş, temiz, havagazı fenerleriyle mücehhez. Şurada bir Mısrî sebzevat satıyor, yanında bir Avrupalı terzilik ediyor, ötede bir Hintli âsâr-ı nâdire satıyor, beride bir Đngiliz bir birahâne açmış, onun yanında bir Arap barakası[…]”Cenap Şehabettin, Hac Yolunda, 74.

 

⁶⁰⁴ “Bu sâhil bir zîb-ü servet, karşıki sâhil, kıt’a-yi Mısriyyenin mübde-i hakikîsi, harâb ve hakîr” Cenap Şehabettin, Hac Yolunda, 82.

 

⁶⁰⁵ “Burası ne garb, ne şark, ne bütün bütün Avrupa, ne bütün bütün Afrika… Burası muhtelit, mutavassıt bir şey […] Nisbetsizliği gülünç, fakat elvân ve eşkâli şayân-ı temâşâ; nazar bu temâşâlardan hiç yorulmuyor, çünkü daima manzara başkalaşmakta. Buralarda dolaşırken insan kendisini […] oynuyor zannediyor, zira her hatvede bir başka hal, bir başka hayât, bir başka cihân buluyor.” Cenap Şehabettin, Hac Yolunda, 75.

In sum, the presentation of European-style and Arab/Islamic quarters through the juxtaposition of new and old, brilliant and dull, wide and narrow, enlightened and dark, ordered and tumultuous, or clean and dirty serves for a more general comparison, namely the one between civilized and uncivilized. In other words, the European quarters were defined as samples of civilization while in the non-European quarters this quality was said to not exist at all.

The acceptance of such an account of Africa forced the Ottoman travellers to think about the reasons of this division and the underdevelopment of the Muslim space vis-à-vis the European colonial one. From the travelogues, three reasons could be discerned, related to (1) the characteristics of local people,

(2) the Ottoman neglect of the region, and (3) the negative implications of colonial administration.

To start with, Ottoman travellers argued that one of the reasons for this perceived backwardness was some characteristics of the local people. This argument paved the way for the reproduction of several accounts very close to the Orientalist discourse. To begin with, idleness was one such characteristic. From the perspective of the Ottoman travellers, local people did not demand much from life; they were content with their simple lives. Therefore, they did not work hard enough to reach the avails of civilization. For example, Cenap Şehabettin wrote about the local inhabitants of Egypt as such:

[H]ere life and death are perceived as a kind of sleep and awakening reiterating daily; all the events of life are perceived as a deceptive dream… It is not for the sons of Egypt to live behind the strong and fortified Great Wall of China […] Their nature wants to run in front of the winds of desire until getting tired and then to listen to the looseness and idleness of life in a neat and temporary tent.⁶⁰⁶

 

To put it differently, unlike the Europeans who were continuously striving for living under better conditions, the Egyptians preferred to obey the call of their desire instead of working hard for their future. What is more, in their

⁶⁰⁶ “Burada hayât ve memât her gün tekrar eden bir nev’i nevm-i yakaza gibi itibâr olunmuş; bütün şuûn-u hayâtiyeye bir rûya-yı mağfel gibi bakılıyor […M]etîn ve müstahkem bir sedd-i Çinî içinde yaşamak evlâd-ı Mısrîye’nin kârı değil; onların mizâcı bâd-ı hevesât önünde yoruluncaya kadar koşmak, sonra hafîf ve zarîf bir hayme-i muvakkate içinde keslân-ı hayâtı dinlemek istiyor.” Cenap Şehabettin, Hac Yolunda, 116-117.

lives, nothing was permanent; rather they preferred to live in temporary and loose frameworks. Besides the lack of diligence, the travellers accused the local people of being ignorant of how to benefit from the soil as well. According to Sadık el-Müeyyed, although the soil of Benghazi (in the Province of Tripolitania) was extremely fertile, the laziness of the local people and their lack of agricultural knowledge resulted in their underuse of the potential of their lands:

The agricultural productivity is one to one hundred and ten, one to one hundred and twenty in rainy season, despite the overabundance of laziness and lack of talent of the local inhabitants, who are perhaps, as mentioned before, the most awkward of all peoples of the world in terms of agriculture, and despite the lack and insufficiency of the agricultural tools and implements that they use.⁶⁰⁷

 

The indifference to life, laziness and ignorance were the intrinsic reasons attributed to the backwardness of local communities; however, according to the Ottoman travellers, the real reasons for underdevelopment were to be sought elsewhere. One of the explanations was the long Ottoman neglect of the region. Ottoman travellers, either indirectly or directly, accused the Ottoman central administration of not dealing with these regions properly. As early as the 1860s, Ebubekir Efendi criticized the Ottoman government for not being interested in the remote regions of Africa, although transportation had been quite developed in recent times. He pointed at the fact that Islam was spread in many parts of this continent and added that the desire of the African Muslim communities to establish contact with the Ottomans and their allegiance to the Caliph was very strong. Therefore, he argued, the establishment of friendly contact would be beneficial for both sides.⁶⁰⁸

The travelogues of the post-Hamidian Era also condemned the Ottoman neglect of their own territories in North Africa. The reason for this critique was not that these regions had really been neglected by the Hamidian administration;

⁶⁰⁷ “Ziraat kabiliyeti ise – evvelce de beyân olunduğu üzere – emr-i ziraatte akvâm-ı cihânın belki en beceriksizi olan sekene-i mahalliyenin fart-ı atâlet ve fikdân-ı mahâreti, kullandıkları âlât ve edevât-ı zer’iyenin noksan ve adem-i kifâyeti ile beraber yine rahmetlerin bereketli olduğu zamanlarda bire yüz on, yüz yirmi vermek derecesindedir.” Sadık el-Müeyyed, Afrika Sahra-yı Kebîri’nde Seyahat, 29-30.

 

⁶⁰⁸ Ömer Lütfî, Ümitburnu Seyahâtnâmesi, the edition of Hüseyin Yorulmaz, 90-91.

it was the anti-Hamidian stance of the travellers that directed them to criticize the former repressive regime. In other words, the argument for the neglect of Africa was not put forward to underline African backwardness; rather it was used as an opportunity to attack the Hamidian regime. For example, Abdülkadir Câmî argued that Tripolitania had gained notoriety in the eyes of the Ottomans because of the Hamidian regime’s transformation of the province to an exile post for those convicted for their political views. He lamented that “Tripoli had a meaning for those living in Đstanbul as horrible as the frightful and gloomy prison cells in the ground floors of inquisition dungeons and old castles of middle age princedoms.”⁶⁰⁹ He also drew attention to the Ottoman failure to benefit from the riches of the region. For example, a particular herb called halfe had once been one of the most significant export items of the province. However, the central government’s disregard for the proper cultivation of this source of wealth shattered the provincial economy to a great extent.⁶¹⁰ Unlike Abdülkadir Câmî, Halil Halid’s criticism did not only focus on the Hamidian policies but also referred to a general neglect. He argued that instead of wasting human and financial resources for military conquests in Europe, the Ottomans should have allocated them for North Africa, which was populated by Muslims.⁶¹¹

Ahmed Şerif tried to help his readers visualize the Ottoman neglect of Africa by comparing the two sides of the Ottoman-Tunisian border. On the Tunisian side, one was to find paved roads, telegraph and telephone lines, and other traces of civilized life frequently. The fields were properly cultivated, even

⁶⁰⁹ “Đstanbullularımız için birçok zamanlardan beri, kurûn-u vustâ prensliklerinin eski şatolarında, engizisyon mahbeslerinin zemin katlarındaki muhavvif ve muzellem zindan hücreleri kadar korkunç bir mânâ ifâde eden Trablus […]”, Abdülkâdir Câmî, Trablusgarp’ten Sahra-yı Kebîr’e Doğru, 4.

 

⁶¹⁰ “[…] hükümetin bu menbâ-i servetin muhâfazası husûsunda göstermiş olduğu lakaydî […], Abdülkâdir Câmî, Trablusgarp’ten Sahra-yı Kebîr’e Doğru, 31. What is more, according to Abdülkâdir Câmî, the government could not even prevent the destructiveness of goat herds towards the olive trees which had been implanted by the Romans. In other words, he accused the government of even not preserving the heritage inherited from the Roman period. Abdülkâdir Câmî, Trablusgarp’ten Sahra-yı Kebîr’e Doğru, 32.

 

⁶¹¹ “Keşke eski Türkler o yorulmak bilmeyen kuvve-i cihâdiyelerini Avrupa içlerine ilerlemeye hasretmeyip de anâsır-ı Đslam ile memlû Afrika-yı şimâlinin bu cihetlerine tahsîs eyleselerdi.” Halil Halid, Cezayir Hatıratından, 71.

the soil was more fertile. On the other hand, the Ottoman side of the border could not display any such indications of civilization. The reason for this destitution was the previous Ottoman governments’ disinterest in these parts of the Empire.⁶¹²

If the Ottoman Empire was one of the actors to be blamed for the backwardness of the North African territories in Ottoman travelogues, a more sinister actor was the imperialist Great Powers, particularly France. Unlike the civilizing effect of the British colonial administration, French colonial policy was regarded as the main reason for the backwardness of the region, particularly in the places that had once belonged to the Ottoman Empire.⁶¹³ The travellers especially underlined the very existence of the duality between the colonizer and the colonized. For instance, Süleyman Şükrü focused on the visual representations of the colonial administration through statues. In describing a French statue in Tunisia, he compared the representation of a French boy dressed in European style with a Tunisian boy dressed in traditional costume. He argued that the Tunisian boy was in an “insulting condition” both in terms of his appearance and because the French boy was depicted as teaching the French language to him. In other words, the French mission civilisatrice was clearly

 

⁶¹² Ahmed Şerif, Arnavudluk’ta, Suriye’de, Trablusgarb’de Tanîn, 257.

 

⁶¹³ Indeed, the initial travelogues to Africa, particularly the ones written on South Africa did not strongly criticize colonialism, particularly the British version; since their authors found British colonial administration useful for bringing civilization in this region. For example, in one of his letters Ebubekir Efendi wrote that the Muslims living in Capetown were loyal to the British, and they hated the Dutch because of their religious intolerance during their colonial rule before the British. What is more, the Muslims felt themselves as favoured by the British compared to the other nomadic or settled local communities of the region; this was another factor that resulted in Muslim loyalty to the British. Ebubekir Efendi even defended British colonial administration in Mozambique as a source of civilization. He appreciated the British for establishing many towns and cities and for having the local people raised cotton, sugar cane and other products; he perceived that the British tried to guide the local inhabitants of the region to civilization. However, despite these efforts the local people were so ignorant that they were not eager to learn civilization. See Ömer Lütfî, Ümitburnu Seyahâtnâmesi, the edition of Hüseyin Yorulmaz, 85,

96. Similarly Mühendis Faik perceived British investments to Capetown as a contribution to the civilization of this region. He wrote that after the establishment of British control, the British spent a lot of money to develop the region and currently, the Capetown “is improved and developed as the European countries” (Avrupa memleketleri gibi mâmur ve abâdan). Ömer Lütfî, Ümitburnu Seyahâtnâmesi, the edition of Hüseyin Yorulmaz, 96.

carved in stone in order to demonstrate to the Muslims that the French were in Tunisia for nothing but to “civilize” them.⁶¹⁴

Halil Halid and Süleyman Şükrü bitterly criticized French colonial policies, particularly the religious intolerance of the French towards the Muslims despite their self-acclaimed laicism.⁶¹⁵ Both of them disapproved the French prohibition of reciting of the Caliph/Sultan’s name during the speeches of Friday prayers and the implementation of this prohibition by employing French soldiers in the mosques during the prayers.⁶¹⁶ What is more, for Halil Halid, the imposition of the French lifestyle in Algeria resulted in the moral decadence of the Islamic community; he wrote that the “freedom brought by French civilization undermined Islamic morality.”⁶¹⁷

In addition to religious intolerance and imposition of a “morally decadent” lifestyle, the segregation between the French settlers and the local Muslim community was strongly criticized. Süleyman Şükrü witnessed that the French were not treating the local inhabitants as equals; they did not even perceive them as human beings: “The nations that have fallen under their rule are [perceived as] nothing, regardless of the ethnic group or religious sect they belong […] They do not perceive the ones other than their own race as human beings and they do not respect them at all.”618

Ottoman travellers also criticized the French policy of appointing Frenchmen only to critical governmental posts. Both Süleyman Şükrü and Halil Halid criticized this policy of segregation by arguing that the Muslim community

⁶¹⁴ Karçınzade Süleyman Şükrü, Seyahat-i Kübra, 206-207.

 

⁶¹⁵ “[…N]asaranın en mutaassıbı Katolik Fransızlar sözde terk ve tahkîr ettikleri dinlerinin mâhud taassubunu bir türlü bırakmadıklarından […]”Karçınzade Süleyman Şükrü, Seyahat-i Kübra, 207.

 

⁶¹⁶ Karçınzade Süleyman Şükrü, Seyahat-i Kübra, 279; Halil Halid, Cezayir Hatıratından, 36-48.

 

⁶¹⁷ “[…] Fransız medeniyetinin getirdiği serbestî ahlâk-ı Đslâmiyeyi kökünden sarsınca

[…]”,Halil Halid, Cezayir Hatıratından, 24.

 

⁶¹⁸ “Taht-ı hükümetlerine düşen akvâm hangi cins ve mezhebe tâbî olur ise olsun, indlerinde hiçtir [...] Kendi ırklarından gayrısını insandan add ve zerre kadar itibâr etmiyorlar.” Karçınzade Süleyman Şükrü, Seyahat-i Kübra, 262.

was not inferior compared to the Frenchmen; some of them were even considered superior to the officials of French origin. In criticizing the appointment of a French director to the madrasah of Algiers, Halil Halid wrote:

[…] The Frenchmen usurp all kinds of occupations from our hands and they even go further to perceive us as naturally impotent with regard to our capacity for governance […] There was no quality of these Frenchmen superior to the Muslims. On the contrary, we know some intelligent people from the Muslim community who are not inferior to the Frenchmen in terms of knowledge and performance; they are even superior to them in terms of moral strength and required humanitarian characteristics. However, they are not perceived as eligible to have a proper job in their own country.⁶¹⁹

 

Likewise, according to Süleyman Şükrü, the Frenchmen had occupied all the critical governmental posts, all the companies, all the fertile lands of Algeria and deprived the local people of any kind of opportunity. Indeed, there were some local inhabitants of Algeria who could speak French even better than the Frenchmen; however, they were only employed as translators or Arabic language clerks with extremely low wages.⁶²⁰ What is more, this discrimination was not only imposed on the Muslims but also against the local Christians.⁶²¹

All in all, the critique of colonial administration, in general, and of unequal treatment of the colonized people by the colonizers, in particular, is one of the most significant themes in the Ottoman travelogues written about North Africa. The backwardness of the North African communities was not solely considered as an outcome of their internal problems, but also of the colonial administration. Notwithstanding the appreciation for the material development of the region as a result of colonial rule, the Ottoman travellers generally criticized the mission civilizatrice for being extremely destructive for the local people.

⁶¹⁹ “[…] Frenkler her işimizi elimizden alıyorlar ve bizi idâre-i umûra salâhiyetten tab’en aciz telakîi etmeye kadar varıyorlar […] Bu Frenklerin Müslümanlara pek de bâis-i tefevvuk bir sıfatları görülemez. Kezalik müslümandan bir hayli ashâb-ı zekâ biliriz ki malûmat ve mesaî cihetiyle o Frenklerden hiç de aşağı olmadıkları ve belki metânet-i ahlâk ve lâzıme-yi havass-ı insaniyetkâranca onlara müteveffik bulundukları halde kendi memleketlerinde bir baltaya sap olmaya layık görülmemişlerdir.” Halil Halid, Cezayir Hatıratından, 49-50.

 

⁶²⁰ “Đslamlar Fransızcayı Fransızlardan daha ala tekellüm ve kitabet edebiliyorlar.” Karçınzade Süleyman Şükrü, Seyahat-i Kübra, 279.

 

⁶²¹ Karçınzade Süleyman Şükrü, Seyahat-i Kübra, 262.

9.2.4.    The Taxonomy of Local People and Their Characteristics

In addition to themes such as the representation of the local Muslims’ allegiance to the Caliph, the segregation of urban space, and the reasons for backwardness of the African people, the Ottoman travellers also paid attention to the taxonomy of the local people based on several criteria. This effort seems to be paradoxical since some of the Ottoman travellers criticized the European stereotyping and monolithic perception of the African people as well as colonial discrimination between the white colonial settlers and other races of the continent. However, still, there were significant differences between the European and Ottoman taxonomies.

First of all, the Ottoman travellers did not perceive the African people simply as black people. In the Ottoman writings about the ethnic taxonomy of the African peoples, the ethnic blending of the local people differentiating them from each other was one of the most referenced issues. In making such references, the Ottoman travellers established several racial hierarchies. For example, Sadık el-Müeyyed classified the local inhabitants of Abyssinia under several categories. Although there is no clear indication, it could be inferred that he established a loose hierarchy among these local people in which “Arabian- looking” Abyssinians were at the top. They were followed by the “Sudanese- looking” Abyssinians, the Galla people, and the Hamitic tribes, respectively. In other words, the Semitic ethnic groups were perceived as superior compared to the Hamitic ones.⁶²²

Mehmed Mihri’s categorization of the peoples of Egypt was different. First of all, he distinguished between the Arabs and fellahs. This distinction seemed to be based on their life styles and occupations first and foremost. The Arabs were living in larger cities and dealing mainly with trade and industrial production, while fellahs were living in small villages and towns and growing local crops. However, later in his writings, other criteria, such as language, religion, and even, to a lesser extent, purity of blood, were added.623 On the other

⁶²² Sadık El-Müeyyed, Habeş Seyahâtnâmesi, 330-31.

 

⁶²³ Mehmed Mihri, Sudan Seyahâtnâmesi, 37.

hand, Mehmed Mihri thought that although fellahs were different from Arabs in terms of ethnicity, they became Arabized through the change of language and religion. In other words, for him, the real criterion for taxonomy was not simply blood; religion and language were even more important than that.

Regarding the Copts of Egypt, Mehmed Mihri mentioned how they preserved their own language and used it in their churches and schools. He wrote that there was no difference between the fellahs and the Copts in terms of appearance and customs, and the Copts resembled the figures on wall paintings and statues of ancient Egypt. These people were mainly dealing with art, printing and currency exchange.⁶²⁴ As it can be inferred from these explanations, occupation once again turned out to be a criterion for classification. Mehmed Mihri’s perception of the Berberî tribe of Aswan also reflected the focus on ethnic blending as well as occupations. The Berberî tribe was described as the offspring of a mixture of the Arabian invaders of Egypt, the Sudanese and the remainders of the Ottoman army left behind after the Egyptian campaign of 1517. He wrote that this community was very much trusted by the Egyptians; hence, they were utilized in the aristocratic circles as cooks, cellar-keepers and servants.⁶²⁵

Unlike the description of Egyptian or Berberî communities, Mehmed Mihri’s taxonomy of the inhabitants of Sudan was very much influenced by the European anthropological classifications of the nineteenth century. He explicitly noted that he informed the readers through the accounts of the European anthropologists (ulema-yı tabiiyyûn). Accordingly, he classified the Sudanese tribes in terms of their physiognomy, and, more importantly, in terms of their inclination to civilization. For example, the black people of Sudan were the most inferior community in his eyes since they were ignorant of science and civilization.⁶²⁶ What is more, he argued that these indigenous black people were

⁶²⁴ Mehmed Mihri, Sudan Seyahâtnâmesi, 39.

 

⁶²⁵ Mehmed Mihri, Sudan Seyahâtnâmesi, 119.

 

⁶²⁶ Mehmed Mihri, Sudan Seyahâtnâmesi, 240.

very ugly and their physical appearances could only become more comely when they mixed with Berberî or Arab tribes.⁶²⁷ In other words, physiognomic inferiority was compounded with ignorance. However, the author did not relate these two in a casual way; the former could be eliminated through ethnic blending and the latter through education.⁶²⁸

Physiognomy was a significant criterion for the classification of local people in the writings of Abdülkadir Câmî as well. In describing inter-tribal clashes in the Saharan Desert, he portrayed the local tribes with regard to their physiognomic characteristics:

When the white but dark-skinned, hawk-nosed, black eyed Arab bedouin encounters a long and slim, bright looking and black Tibu, whose long face, however, demonstrated that he belonged to the white race in Hamedeh, a lightening flashes in the eyes of both and only the rifles of the military headquarters in the vicinity prevents them to jump down each other’s throats.⁶²⁹

 

Moreover, just as other travellers, Câmî Bey focused on ethnic blending when describing the inhabitants of Fezzan:

The inhabitants of Fezzan are most inclined to the black race. Although this The inhabitants of Fezzan are the closest to the black race. Although this resemblance seemed to be the natural result of the periods of governance of the black people from the Kanem and Borno tribes, which had occupied Fezzan one after another, it is certain that the marriage [of the inhabitants of Fezzan] with the black people brought from Sudan has a significant impact on this resemblance. Therefore, today all the inhabitants of Fezzan are so mixed that one can encounter all shades and scales of colours from all white to dark black.⁶³⁰

 

⁶²⁷ Mehmed Mihri, Sudan Seyahâtnâmesi, 318.

 

⁶²⁸ Mehmed Mihri described the Arabs quite positively; they were more “preferable and superior” (müreccah ve efdal) compared to other African tribes in terms of “civilized practices and issues and other kinds of progress” (umur ve esbab-ı medeniye ve terakkiyat-ı saire) as well as in terms of their nature, intelligence and cleverness.”Mehmed Mihri, Sudan Seyahâtnâmesi, 256.

 

⁶²⁹ “Beyaz ve fakat esmer, ekserisi minkari-ül haşem, siyah gözlü bir Arab bedevisiyle, uzun boylu, ince, siyah renkli ve fakat hutut-u vechesi ırk-ı ebyazdan olduğunu gösteren parlak nazarlı mağrur bir Tibu Hamide’de yekdiğerine tesadüf ettikleri zaman her iki tarafın da gözlerinden bir şule-i berkiye çakar ve ancak civardaki asker karakolunun tüfenkleri tarafeynin yekdiğerinin boğazlarına sarılmasına mani olur.” Trablusgarp’ten Sahra-yı Kebir’e Doğru, 130.

 

⁶³⁰ “Fizanlılarda en ziyade ırk-ı esvede temayül vardır. Bu temayül yekdiğerini müteakip Fizanı işgal etmiş olan Kanem ve Bornu akvam-ı zencisinin icra-yı hükümet ettikleri zamanların netice-i tabiisi gibi görünürse de Sudan’dan getirilen zencilerle izdivacın da bu hususta icra-yı tesir ettiği muhakkaktır. Bu suretle bugün umum Fizan sekenesi o derece karışık bir unsur teşkil

The Ottoman travellers’ emphasis on physiognomy, ethnic blending and hierarchical taxonomy of African tribes reveal that the Ottomans were not immune from the discussion of race as can be observed in the nineteenth and early twentieth century European colonial literature. Indeed, in this period, the European literature on the Orient was influenced from Social Evolutionism and Social Darwinism, which linked the concept of civilization to the concept of race. Particularly in the writings of French philosopher Arthur de Gobineau and British anthropologist Herbert Spencer, the word civilization was transformed from an inclusive concept embracing all of the humanity to one based on a fundamental separation of peoples based on their blood.⁶³¹ Therefore, most of the Orientalist literary production on Africa is replete with expressions underlining the racial inequality and taxonomy of African tribes as well as linking the lack of civilization in this part of the world to the intrinsic characteristics of the African people.⁶³² Not only European intellectuals and authors, but also the Ottoman travellers were likely influenced from the Social Evolutionist and Social Darwinist discourse through the translations of the seminal works of these theories into Turkish.⁶³³ Therefore, the Ottoman travellers’ critique of some of the characteristics of local people for their backwardness and their taxonomy of these people along physiognomic lines resemble the Orientalist anthropological discourses developed in Europe. However, even in the presentation of African people along racial lines, there are significant differences between the Ottoman

ederler ki bunlarda tam beyaz renkten koyu siyaha kadar bütün tabakat ve derecat-ı elvana tesadüf olunur.” Abdülkâdir Câmî, Trablusgarp’ten Sahra-yı Kebir’e Doğru, 116.

 

⁶³¹ Arthur de Gobineau’s Essai sur l'inégalité des races humaines and Herbert Spencer’s Principles of Biology were the two seminal works emphasizing the inequality among races, the superiority of the white race and the “survival of the fittest.” See, Reeves, Culture and International Relations 25.

⁶³² For such pieces of the European literature, see, for instance, Henry Ridder Haggard’s King Solomon’s Mines, Joseph Conrad’s The Heart of Darkness, Rudyard Kipling’s The White Man’s Burden, or Charles Baudlaire’s A une Malabaraise. For a review of the English colonial literature, see E. Boehmer (ed.), Empire Writing: An Anthology of Colonial Literature, 1870- 1918, (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1998); for an analysis of French Orientalist fiction, see

J. Yee, Exotic Subversions in the Nineteenth Century French Fiction, (London: Legenda, 2008). ⁶³³ For instance, Ludwig Büchner’s Natur und Geist, Edmond Demolins’ A quoi tient la supériorité des Anglo-Saxons?, and Gustave Le Bon’s Les Lois psychologiques de l'évolution des peuples were translated into Turkish from the late 1880s onwards. For the influence of these translations on the Ottoman intellectuals, see Doğan, Osmanlı Aydınları ve Sosyal Darwinizm.

and European accounts. To start with, for the Ottoman travellers, the reasons for the backwardness of the African people are not solely confined to their intrinsic characteristics; the Ottoman neglect of the region and European colonialism are cited as more significant reasons. In other words, the emphasis is on external reasons, instead of intrinsic ones, unlike the European Orientalist literature. Secondly, in terms of racial taxonomy, what the Ottoman travellers did is not to establish their own accounts, but to reflect upon what had been written by the European anthropologists. In other words, the Ottoman travellers’ hierarchical representation of the local people does not emerge out of their own scientific expeditions or research unlike the Europeans. Even their prioritization of the Arabic-looking people over the others showed that their criterion for civilization is also religious, not simply racial.

 

To conclude, the examination of Ottoman travellers’ perception of Africa and African people is important because this analysis reveals the Ottoman understanding of the concepts of civilization, colonialism and race. In a volatile period when most of the African territories of the empire were lost as a result of European colonial expansion and the remaining territories were under similar threat, Islam and Ottomanness were the two pillars that the Ottoman travellers extensively emphasized in their travelogues. The travellers’ efforts for underlining the allegiance of local Muslims to the Caliph/Sultan or to the fatherland demonstrate that they considered some parts of Africa within the political/religious realm in which they also belonged. Therefore, these travellers did not consider the African lands as territories for colonization or exploitation as most of the Europeans had perceived. Instead, they represented the remaining African territories of the empire as indispensible parts of the Ottoman fatherland, and considered other regions of the African continent, where the Muslims resided, under the religious authority of the Caliph.

Notwithstanding these efforts for establishing a sense of shared identity, the Ottoman travellers also differentiated themselves from the African people by sometimes treating them as objects of study. The taxonomy of African tribes based  on  several  criteria,  including ethnicity,  physiognomy,  religion,  and

occupation, and establishment of several hierarchies among themselves reflected the limits of the Ottoman travellers’ attempts for emphasizing the commonality between the Ottomans and the African people.

The perception of colonialism was another paradoxical theme in the Ottoman travelogues on Africa. On the one hand, the Ottoman travellers’ appreciated the colonial administrations’ investment on infrastructure, establishment of modern urban centres or betterment of sanitation and education facilities. On the other hand, they bitterly criticized the colonial mentality based on the superiority of Western/Christian/white colonizers over the colonized. Being aware of the colonial discourse aiming to rationalize and justify European colonial penetration by focusing on the lack of “civilization” in Africa, the Ottoman travellers attempted to develop an alternative discourse by emphasizing the essentiality of modernization and adoption of material elements of European civilization for being strong enough to contain the threat of European colonialism.

The need to adopt some elements of European civilization to prevent European infiltration into the Ottoman realm was a paradox that the Ottoman travellers reflected in their travelogues. They could not deny the necessity of modernization; benefitting from the avails of civilization required the transfer of European material development into the “underdeveloped” regions of the world, such as Africa. However, at the same time, they were aware that it was the European colonial expansion concealed in the form of the civilizing mission that resulted in the backwardness of Africa more than anything else. This dual perception of “civilization,” a better stage of human development on the one hand and a catchy word cloaking European colonial intentions over the rest of the world on the other, permeated into the Ottoman travelogues on Africa and thereby produced a paradoxical-yet-colourful account of this continent.

CHAPTER 10

 

 

THE OTTOMAN PERCEPTION OF THE MIDDLE EAST

 

 

10.1.       Ottoman Empire in the Middle East⁶³⁴

 

10.1.1.The Ottoman Rule in the Middle East until the Nineteenth Century:

The Ottoman control of the Middle East started in the early sixteenth century, with the Ottoman victory over the Mamluks in the Battles of Marjdabik (1516) and Ridaniyah (1517). After the incorporation of Mamluk territories to the Ottoman Empire,⁶³⁵ the former administrative divisions of the Mamluk Empire were very much preserved in the form of eyalet system. On these territories, initially four eyalets were formed, being the Eyalet of Aleppo, Eyalet of Damascus, Eyalet of Hejaz and Eyalet of Yemen.⁶³⁶ Although a more centralized administration was established in the Syrian territories of the Empire, the the Arabian Peninsula was linked to the centre more loosely. Because of its special status for the presence of the two sacred Muslim cities, Mecca and

⁶³⁴ For the purposes of this dissertation, the Middle East includes three principle regions, being the Fertile Crescent, contemporary Iraq and the Arabian Peninsula. Although Egypt is also perceived as an indispensible part of the Middle East, it is not included in this chapter in order to provide thematic integrity, since Egypt had been visited by Ottoman travellers not passing through the Middle East, but passing through North Africa. In other words, the travellers included the account of Egypt in their travelogues on North Africa; therefore, it is thought more appropriate to include Egypt into the previous chapter.

 

⁶³⁵ Besides Egypt, these territories included the Fertile Crescent (or Bilâd al-Sham, including contemporary Syria, Lebanon, Israel, Palestine and Jordan), Hejaz and Yemen.

 

⁶³⁶ Until the late seventeenth century, several administrative modifications were made in the composition of these eyalets for the special conditions of some regions. Particularly, it became extremely difficult to rule vast territories of the Eyalet of Damascus for the presence of too many ethnic communities living under regions difficult to reach and control; hence three new eyalets were established on its territories being Tripoli (1570) over the northern coastal strip of the Fertile Crescent, Raqqa (1586) over the south-eastern Anatolia, and finally Sidon (1660) over the southern coastal strip of the Fertile Crescent. See Philip Khoury Hitti, History of Syria, Including Lebanon and Palestine, 2 Volumes, (New Jersey: Gorgias Press, 2002), Vol. 2, 664.

Medina, and because it was conquered peacefully through the recognition of the Ottoman sovereignty by the Amir of Mecca, Hejaz was initially remained under the administration of the Amir, who was given the status of vizier in the Ottoman protocol.⁶³⁷ In Yemen, although Ottoman direct rule was established from 1517 onwards, the Ottomans could never control the entire country because of the resistance of Zaydi Imams, the hereditary rulers of this region. They were initially successful in suppressing the Zaydi resistance; however, later on, the Zaydis took control of the interior parts of the country and the Ottomans were just stuck the coastal strip until the nineteenth century.⁶³⁸ Unlike the rapid and decisive conquest of Mamluk territories, Ottoman conquest of Iraq from the local rulers allegiant to the Safavid Empire and the establishment of Ottoman eyalet system in this region took almost four decades. The conquest of Mosul in 1516 was followed by the conquest of Baghdad and the peaceful transfer of Basra in 1534.⁶³⁹

⁶³⁷ Even, as a result of the Ottoman respect to Hejaz, Ottoman flag was not hung over the bastions of these two cities. Zekeriya Kurşun, “Osmanlı Devleti Đdaresinde Hicaz (1517-1919),” in Eren (ed.), Osmanlı, Vol. 1, 316-325, 316. In the late sixteenth century, the Eyalet of Jeddah was established to control the Amirs, who sometimes abused the autonomy granted by the Empire. Therefore an administrative triptych was established in Hejaz by the Amir of Mecca as the local authority, who had legitimized his existence through his lineage descending from the Prophet, the Beylerbey of Jeddah, who represented the Sultan in the region, and the Sheikh-ul Harem of Mecca, who was particularly responsible for the administration of the holy places. Kurşun, “Osmanlı Devleti Đdaresinde Hicaz (1517-1919),” 317.

 

⁶³⁸ For the establishment and collapse of the Ottoman rule in Yemen in the sixteenth century, see

J. Richard Blackburn, “The Collapse of Ottoman Authority in Yemen, 968/1560-976/1568,” Die Welt des Islams, Vol. 19, No. 1-4 (1979): 119-176.

 

⁶³⁹ Until the late sixteenth century, Mosul was first attached to the Eyalet of Diyarbakır, then to the Eyalet of Baghdad; however, because of its strategic significance as a crossroad between the Persian Gulf and Anatolia as well as between Syria and Iran, and as a granary of the Ottoman armies engaging in campaigns towards the Safavids, the Eyalet status was given in 1587. Ahmet Gündüz, “Musul: Osmanlılar Dönemi” Türkiye Diyanet Vakfı Đslam Ansiklopedisi, Vol. 31, 363- 367, 363. For the conquest of Mosul, also see Hala Fattah and Frank Caso, A Brief History of Iraq, (New York: Facts on File, 2009), 116-117. The Eyalet of Baghdad was established in 1535 just after its conquest; it was given the fifth place in the Ottoman protocol of eyalets after Rumelia, Anatolia, Egypt and Buda. See Yılmaz Öztuna, Devletler ve Hanedanlar, 6 Volumes, (Ankara: T. C. Kültür ve Turizm Bakanlığı Yayınları, 2005), Vol. 2, 1092. For the conquest of Baghdad, also see, Fattah and Caso, A Brief History of Iraq, 117-120. Since the former ruler of Basra, Rashid ibn Mughamis, recognized the sovereignty of the Ottoman Empire after the conquest of Basra, he was first remained in power; the establishment of direct rule in Basra was only realized in 1545. Yusuf Halaçoğlu, “Basra: Osmanlılar Dönemi” Türkiye Diyanet Vakfı Đslam Ansiklopedisi, Vol. 5, 112-114, 112. For the conquest of Basra, also see, Fattah and Caso, A Brief History of Iraq, 120-124. Finally the Eyalet of Shehrzor (including the contemporary

After the conquest of Iraq and establishment of a foothold in the Persian Gulf, in order to retain the Ottoman presence in the Gulf and to compete with the increasing Portuguese incursions into the region, the Ottomans decided to occupy the eastern littoral of the Arabian Peninsula. Between 1552 and 1555, they conquered this region entitled al-Hasa and established the Eyalet of al-Hasa in 1579. From then on, they tried to control the small sheikhdoms of Bahrain and Qatar. These sheikhdoms sometimes recognized the Ottoman sovereignty and sometimes resisted it via the Portuguese support during the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries.⁶⁴⁰

All in all, until the late sixteenth century, the Ottoman Empire consolidated its rule in the Middle East and established its administrative divisions there. However, there were different modes of governance over these vast territories from the late sixteenth to the nineteenth centuries. Aleppo and Damascus as well as the four eyalets of Iraq were generally ruled by the governors sent by the Porte until the early eighteenth century. In general, the Syrian Eyalets were living peacefully during these years; however, the Iraqi Eyalets were under Safavid pressure as well as the attacks of the nomadic tribes to the cities. These disturbances resulted in the relative backwardness of Iraqi Eyalets vis-à-vis the Syrian ones.⁶⁴¹ Unlike these centrally governed regions, the control of the mountainous regions of Lebanon (Cebel-i Lübnan), which was primarily inhabited by the Druzes and a Christian Arab community called the Maronites, was given to the local Druze dynasties.⁶⁴² The Druzes established

Kirkuk and its environs) was established as a frontier post against Iran in 1549. See André Raymond, “Ottoman Legacy in Arab Political Boundaries,” in L. Carl Brown (ed.), Imperial Legacy: The Ottoman Imprint on the Balkans and the Middle East, (New York: Columbia University Press, 1996), 115-128, 122.

 

⁶⁴⁰ For the establishment of the Eyalet of al-Hasa, see Jon E. Mandaville, “The Ottoman Province of al-Hasā in the Sixteenth and Seventeenth Centuries,” Journal of the American Oriental Society, Vol. 90, No. 3 (July - Sep., 1970): 486-513.

 

⁶⁴¹ Fattah and Caso, A Brief History of Iraq, pp. 126-127.

 

⁶⁴² These dynasties were the Ma’n dynasty, which ruled the region between 1516 and 1697, and Shihab dynasty between 1697 and 1841. Philip Khoury Hitti, Lebanon in History: From the Earliest Times to the Present, (London: Macmillan, New York: St. Martin’s Press, 1967), 371, 387.

almost an independent rule; they sometimes remained allegiant to the Empire by sending their taxes properly, and other times resisted against the Ottoman administration.

The presence of the third holy site of Islam, namely Jerusalem, and the strategic significance as a crossroad between Syria and Egypt as well as a centre for the protection of pilgrimage routes, made Palestine a significant region for the Ottoman Empire. During the sixteenth century, Palestine was totally part of the Eyalet of Damascus and divided into five sanjaks, some of which were governed by local rulers and others by centrally appointed governors.⁶⁴³

During the seventeenth century, the Ottoman administration in Hejaz faced the problem of the struggle for power between the Amirs of Mecca and the Ottoman beylerbeys of Jeddah. Whenever incapable beylerbeys were sent by the Porte, the Amirs began to increase their authority vis-à-vis the central administration. This was generally acquiesced by the Porte if the Amirs were able to control the nomadic tribes, which might pose a problem to the settlements in this region.⁶⁴⁴ In Yemen and al-Hasa, Ottoman administrators had to collaborate with the local tribes and sheikhdoms to maintain the Ottoman presence in the region at least nominally.⁶⁴⁵ Unlike the seventeenth century, in which Ottoman central administration was still significant despite some challenges, the eighteenth century was an age of decentralization. Almost all the Middle Eastern provinces were either ruled by local notables, whose members were recognized as governors, or by some governors appointed by the Porte, but

⁶⁴³ These sanjaks were Gazza, Jerusalem, Nablus, Lajjun and Safed. Among them, Nablus and Lajjun were ruled by local rulers (Mansur ibn Furaiqh and Turabai tribe respectively) to reward their allegiance to the Empire during the Ottoman campaign over the Mamluks; others were ruled by the governors sent directly by the Porte. See Moshe Sharon, “Palestine under the Mameluks and the Ottoman Empire (1291-1918),” in Michael Avi-Yonah (ed.), A History of Israel and the Holy Land, (New York and London: Continuum, 2003), 272-322, 286-294.

 

⁶⁴⁴ Mustafa Sabri Küçükaşçı, “Mekke: Osmanlı Dönemi,” in Türkiye Diyanet Vakfı Đslam Ansiklopedisi, Vol. 28, 563-572, 563.

 

⁶⁴⁵ In Yemen, there was not much disturbance during the seventeenth century; the status quo was preserved. However, in al-Hasa, the Ottomans had to encounter both the Portuguese threat and, more important than that, the rebellion of the Beni Khalid tribe; therefore, the Ottoman rule in the Eastern Arabia was very much challenged in this period. See Mandaville, “The Ottoman Province of al-Hasā in the Sixteenth and Seventeenth Centuries,” 501.

acted almost independently. The Ottoman military as well as economic decline was the reason for this delegation of local authority.⁶⁴⁶

In sum, unlike Anatolia or Rumelia, the Ottomans were not strongly present in the Middle East; they preferred the establishment of the system of indirect taxation (saliyane) from the beginning and to govern the region via intermediary local notables. As Philip Hitti writes, “Turks came and went as officials, but there was no Turkish colonization of the land.”⁶⁴⁷

Meanwhile, during the eighteenth century, the Ottoman Middle East faced three significant external threats, contributed to the loosening of Ottoman presence in the region. The first one was from the East, namely from Qajar Persia. Accordingly, the the ambitious Qajar ruler, Nader Shah attacked Ottoman Iraq two times (in 1733 and 1746) in the first half of the eighteenth century. Although, the cities of Mosul, Baghdad and Basra resisted these attacks, the environs of these centres were very much ruined.⁶⁴⁸ The second threat was from the South; namely from the Wahhabi movement of Arabia. After the alliance of anti-Ottoman al-Saud family of Najd with this movement in 1744, the Ottoman

⁶⁴⁶ Damascus was ruled by al-Azm family from 1724 until 1807 with some intervals; the members of same family were also appointed as governors of Sidon and Tripoli as well. See Philip Khoury Hitti, History of the Arabs: From the Earliest Times to the Present, (London: Macmillan, New York: St. Martin’s Press, 1964), 731. Two years later, the administration of Mosul was delivered to Jalili family, who would rule the region until 1834. Fattah and Caso, A Brief History of Iraq, 132-134. In Baghdad, the administration of the descendants of the freed Georgian/Caucasian slaves of the two Beylerbeys, Hasan and his son Ahmet Paşa, who ruled Baghdad between 1702 and 1747, lasted until 1831. This period was called as the Mamluk rule in Baghdad, reminding the freed Caucasian slaves ruling Egypt from the thirteenth until the sixteenth centuries. Fattah and Caso, A Brief History of Iraq, 128-129. In Lebanon, the Shihab dynasty continued their autonomy until 1841; however, during the eighteenth century, two significant rivals contested their rule. These were the two governors of Acre, Zahir al-Umar al- Zardani (c. 1690-1775) and Jazzar Ahmed Paşa (1720-1804), who had extended their rule over almost the entire Palestine. These governors came to their posts by force and then recognized by the Porte. See Gudrun Kramer, A History of Palestine: From the Ottoman Conquest to the Founding of the State of Israel, translated by Graham Harman and Gudrun Kramer, (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 2008), 61. For a detailed account of Palestine under these two governors also see Amnon Cohen, Palestine in the Eigtheenth Century: Patterns of Government and Administration, (Jerusalem: Magnes Press, 1973).

 

⁶⁴⁷ Hitti, History of Syria, 671. For the mediation of the local notables see, Hourani, The Emergence of the Modern Middle East, 11-12.

 

⁶⁴⁸ Yusuf Halaçoğlu, “Bağdat: Osmanlı Dönemi” in Türkiye Diyanet Vakfı Đslam Ansiklopedisi, Vol. 4, 433-437, 435.

presence in Hejaz was very much threatened. The Wahhabi rebellion, which reached its zenith in the first decade of the nineteenth century could only be suppressed in 1818 and devastated the holy cities of Mecca and Medina as well as other cities of Hejaz like Taif and Jeddah.⁶⁴⁹ The final threat came from the West in 1798, when Napoleon Bonaparte invaded Egypt and expanded northward into Palestine. There, he was stopped by the Governor of Acre, Jezzar Ahmed Pasha, and forced to retreat in 1801. Although this invasion was quite short and proved futile, it demonstrated the vulnerability of the Ottoman Empire’s Middle Eastern territories against the Western colonial expansion.⁶⁵⁰

Under the Ottoman rule, Middle East preserved much of its prosperity thanks to the Ottoman system of capitulations, despite the changing trade routes from Eastern Mediterranean to the Atlantic as a result of geographical explorations.⁶⁵¹ Through these concessions, European merchants had not only traded goods, some of them established industrial facilities in the Levant, from the the eighteenth century onwards, contributing to local economies.⁶⁵² Although the interior parts of Lebanon and Palestine were very much isolated from international trade until the nineteenth century, in the littoral regions significant commercial centres such as Beirut and Acre emerged. In Iraq, after a short period of reconstruction in the mid-sixteenth century, Iranian attacks and tribal pillages resulted in a gradual economic decline in the seventeenth century.⁶⁵³ Until the attacks of the Wahhabis, the Hejaz region retained its prosperity, thanks to the Ottoman subsidies in the form of gifts from the Sultan and the finance of the pilgrimage process.⁶⁵⁴ What is more, between 1516 and 1800, urbanization was

⁶⁴⁹ Kurşun, “Osmanlı Devleti Đdaresinde Hicaz (1517-1919),” 319-320.

 

⁶⁵⁰ For the details of Napoleon’s invasion of Egypt, see Paul Strathern, Napoleon in Egypt, (New York: Bantam Books, 2008).

 

⁶⁵¹ Hitti, History of Syria, 671

 

⁶⁵² Hitti, History of Syria, 673.

 

⁶⁵³ Jane Hathaway, The Arab Lands under Ottoman Rule, 1516-1800, (London: Pearson, 2008), 229.

 

⁶⁵⁴ Kurşun, “Osmanlı Devleti Đdaresinde Hicaz (1517-1919),” 318.

the case in Arab eyalets of the Ottoman Empire, urban population increased significantly, both through immigration from the countryside and other provinces and through the transfer of military personnel and government officials.⁶⁵⁵ In sum, although the Ottoman Empire established a relatively loose administration, it contributed to the development of the region as much as its financial resources were available. However, the Ottoman economic decline, maladministration of the Ottoman provincial bureaucrats, and the internal and external disturbances resulted in the limited development of the Ottoman Middle East.

 

10.1.2. The Ottoman Rule in the Middle East in the Late Nineteenth and Early Twentieth Century:

The nineteenth century of the Ottoman Middle East can be summarized by three words: centralization, reform, and foreign intervention. Introduction of a new order, namely Tanzimat, transformation of existing political and socio- economic structures albeit in a limited way, and the penetration of European Great Powers into the region had crucial implications for the Middle East.

To start with the centralization, it can be argued that great territorial losses in the eighteenth century, especially in the Rumelian lands of the Empire, forced the Ottoman Sultans to increase state control over the provinces; most of which were governed by local notables. This transformation was essential to link the periphery to the centre efficiently. Therefore, from 1830s onwards, under the rule of Mahmud II, centralization was imposed on the Arab provinces of the Empire. The first step of centralization was to replace the governors appointed from the local notable families with the ones sent by the Porte. In Baghdad, the Mamluk rule was ended in 1831 with the replacement of the last Mamluk governor Davud Pasha with a governor directly sent by the Porte.⁶⁵⁶ In Mosul, the Jalili period ended in 1834 with the appointment of governors from the

 

 

⁶⁵⁵ Hathaway, The Arab Lands under Ottoman Rule, 1516-1800, 230.

 

⁶⁵⁶ Yusuf Halaçoğlu, “Bağdat: Osmanlı Dönemi” 436.

centre.⁶⁵⁷ With the establishment of the Province of Basra in 1888, the process of centralization of Iraq was completed; from then on, Ottoman Iraq was composed of three provinces until their unification under the state of Iraq after the First World War.

Establishment of central rule in Syria had already started with the replacement of the last governor from al-Azm family, Abdullah al-Azm Pasha with Genç Yusuf Paşa in 1807. However, the real centralization would have to wait the end of the Egyptian occupation between 1831 and 1841. Hence effective Ottoman control could only be established after 1841 and this process was not as smooth as in the case of Ottoman Iraq particularly because of the special condition of Lebanon. The power vacuum in Lebanon after 1841 with the end of Shihab rule was filled by the Maronites.⁶⁵⁸ This created a significant contention between the Druzes and Maronites, which resulted in a civil strife.⁶⁵⁹ After initial Druze rebellions against the Ottomans and clashes with the Maronites in 1845 and 1852, the most significant civil strife was fiercely erupted in 1860. This time, the Muslims of Damascus also participated to the strife by attacking the Christians. Upon the request of the Great Powers, particularly of France, which supported the Maronites, the Ottoman Foreign Minister, Fuad Paşa, resolved the conflict after a brief military operation. In 1861, Mount Lebanon was established as an autonomous mutasarrıflık⁶⁶⁰ governed by a Christian governor appointed

⁶⁵⁷ This was followed by the provision of complete subordination of the quasi-independent Kurdish Sanjaks. In 1834, the governance of Revanduz was taken from the Soran tribe; Imadiye was relieved from the governance of Behdinan tribe in 1839, and Suleymaniye from the Baban tribe in 1850. After the establishment of relative centralization, in 1851, the status of Mosul was degraded to sanjak and became a part of Baghdad Province; it only reacquired the status of province in 1878. Ahmet Gündüz, “Musul: Osmanlı Dönemi” 366.

 

⁶⁵⁸ Accordingly, Bashir Shihab II, who had been ruling Lebanon since 1788, supported the Egyptian invasion; therefore when Đbrahim Paşa (1789-1848), the son of Kavalalı, was retreating from Syria and Palestine, he decided to leave Lebanon in 1841. This created a political vacuum in the region, since some of the Druze families followed him. Tufan Buzpınar, “Lübnan: Osmanlı Dönemi,” in Türkiye Diyanet Vakfı Đslam Ansiklopedisi, Vol. 27, 248-254, 250.

 

⁶⁵⁹ Engin Deniz Akarlı, The Long Peace: Ottoman Lebanon, 1861-1920, (Berkeley: University of Columbia Press, 1993), 28

 

⁶⁶⁰ An administrative unit smaller than province and larger than a district. The provinces were composed of several mutasarrıflık.

by the Porte and an administrative council (meclis-i idâre), established along sectarian lines. With these regulations, the position of the Maronites was strengthened vis-à-vis the Druzes, and there began a relatively peaceful period in the region.⁶⁶¹

In this period of centralization, the territories of Palestine was divided into two and given under the authorities of two distinct provinces. Accordingly, Acre, Nablus and Jerusalem was attached to the Province of Sidon (after 1888, the Province of Beirut), while the East of the Jordan River was attached to the Province of Damascus. In 1872, Jerusalem was turned out to be an autonomous mutasarrıflık (comprising contemporary city of Jerusalem, Hebron, Jaffa and Gazza) just as Mount Lebanon, for its special status as being a sacred city for three monotheistic religions.⁶⁶²

Although, Ottoman efforts for centralization were relatively successful in the Syrian and Iraqi provinces, in the Arabian Peninsula, the establishment of Ottoman central control had significant difficulties. The problem of dual governance in Hejaz continued during the nineteenth century; however, the balance was tilted towards the Amirs of Mecca because of the lack of a long- standing Ottoman presence in the region.⁶⁶³ In Yemen, the Ottomans tried to establish central administration several times during this period; however, they always encountered with the resistance of the Zaydi Imams. This resulted in

 

 

 

 

 

⁶⁶¹ Kais Firro, “The Ottoman Reforms and Jabal al-Duruz, 1860-1914,” in Itzchak Weismann and Fruma Zachs, Ottoman Reform and Muslim Regeneration: Studies in Jonour of Butrus Abu- Manneh, (London and New York: I. B. Tauris, 2005), 149-164, 150-151; Akarlı, The Long Peace, 31-32.

 

⁶⁶² Kramer, A History of Palestine, 41.

 

⁶⁶³ Between 1858 and 1887, there were only four Amirs against seventeen Ottoman governors. This situation could only change after 1887 with the appointment of Mustafa Safvet Paşa, who remained in power until 1913. See William L. Oschenwald, “Ottoman Subsidies to the Hijaz, 1877-1886,” International Journal of Middle East Studies, Vol. 6, No. 3 (July, 1975): 300-307,

301.

futile campaigns in the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries, contributing to the depletion of material and human resources of the Empire.⁶⁶⁴

The second concept depicting the nineteenth century Ottoman Middle East was reform, which emerged out of the Tanzimat process. Accordingly, not only the Ottoman provinces in the region was tried to be brought under central administration, but also new forms of governance were introduced. According to Gudrun Kramer, during the nineteenth century, the state intervened more strongly in the fields of economics, law and infrastructure; what is more, the fields, which had not previously dealt by the state such as sanitation and education, were brought under state control.⁶⁶⁵ One of the most significant achievements was the establishment of assemblies, which resulted in popular participation into provincial governance. Accordingly, in 1840s, administrative assemblies (meclis-i idâri) were established; they were composed mainly of local notables appointed by the governor. This indicated that the power of notables had not ended completely; rather, it survived under some degree of governmental control.⁶⁶⁶ These assemblies were followed by municipal assemblies (meclis-i beledî) in 1860s, which incorporated propertied classes of urban population to the governance of cities. Finally, in 1870s, in provincial level, general assemblies (meclis-i umûmi) were established. According to Kramer, all these new structures contributed to the participation of the people in the decision-making processes:

Mediated through the elites, local populations gained their first access to political and administrative decision-making, from city planning and land assignments to the allocation of tax farms so important socially and economically.⁶⁶⁷

 

 

⁶⁶⁴ For a detailed account of the Ottoman campaigns in Yemen in this period see, Caesar E. Farah, The Sultan's Yemen: Nineteenth-Century Challenges to Ottoman Rule, (London and New York: I. B. Tauris, 2002)

 

⁶⁶⁵ Kramer, A History of Palestine, 75.

 

⁶⁶⁶ Hourani, The Emergence of the Modern Middle East, 51.

 

⁶⁶⁷ Kramer, A History of Palestine, 74.

Besides the establishment of assemblies, several laws contributed to the reorganization of the Middle East. Two of them were of considerable significance. The first one is the Land Law of 1858, which, according to Haim Gerber, “[…] was destined to become one of the main pivots on which most of the agrarian issues in the Middle East turned in the subsequent century.”⁶⁶⁸ By this law, state ownership over the imperial possessions, which had long been out of governmental control because of decentralized provincial administration, was reasserted. This would later establish the base to distribute lands to landless peasants and to curb the power of local land-owning notables.⁶⁶⁹ The second law was the Provincial Law of 1864, which transformed eyalet to province, sanjak to mutasarrıflık, and added new structures, such as kaza (district) and nahiye (sub- district).⁶⁷⁰ In sum, this law not only eradicated the ambiguous administrative relationship between the centre and the periphery but also established a provincial government based on Ottoman citizenry.

Although these laws could not always be implemented properly, there were significant developments in the Ottoman Middle East, particularly in the second half of the nineteenth century. For example, in Baghdad, under the governorship of Midhat Paşa (1822-1884) between 1869 and 1872, the peasants were given lands, the bedouin attacks to cities were prevented and some of them were settled, steamship companies were established to increase regional trade, newspapers were published, education and sanitation were given significance.⁶⁷¹ With the provision of relative security and stability, in this period Beirut, Jaffa and Jerusalem emerged as prosperous cities as a result of Ottoman infrastructure

⁶⁶⁸ Haim Gerber, The Social Origins of the Modern Middle East, (Boulder: Lynne Rienner Publications, 1987), 67.

 

⁶⁶⁹ Stanford J. Shaw and Ezel Kural Shaw, History of the Ottoman Empire and Modern Turkey, 2 Volumes, (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1977), Vol. 2, 114.

 

⁶⁷⁰ Shaw and Shaw, History of the Ottoman Empire and Modern Turkey, Vol. 2, 89. For the application of Land Law in the Ottoman Middle East, see Gerber, The Social Origins of the Modern Middle East, 73-90.

 

⁶⁷¹ Mustafa Cezar (ed.), Mufassal Osmanlı Tarihi, 6 Volumes, (Đstanbul: Đskit Yayınevi, 1972), Vol. 6, 3160-3163; for the implementation of Provincial Law and Land Law in Ottoman Iraq, see Charles Tripp, A History of Iraq, (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press), 15-18.

building and the expansion of international trade.⁶⁷² In Mosul, regional trade was developed; there emerged a primitive industry of leather tanning as well as cotton and woollen textiles.⁶⁷³ In Hejaz, new governmental buildings and waterways were established; the infrastructure of the province was developed considerably, particularly as a result of the Ottoman subsidies.⁶⁷⁴ Besides land reform, economic development and infrastructure building, sanitation and education were improved. Particularly, the quarantine services were introduced in the Middle East to cope with the most significant epidemic of the nineteenth century, namely cholera. What is more, new schools were established with a modern curriculum in order to decrease illiteracy. For example, in Palestine, at the outbreak of the World War I, there were 95 primary and 3 secondary schools with 8250 students.⁶⁷⁵ All in all, in the nineteenth century, the region was tried to be modernized albeit in a limited way because of the decline of Ottoman financial capabilities.

The last concept for depicting the nineteenth century Ottoman Middle East was foreign intervention. During the nineteenth century, the Middle Eastern provinces of the Ottoman Empire were mainly under the penetration of four

 

⁶⁷² For the implementation of Tanzimat reforms in Palestine, see Donna Robinson Divine, Politics and Society in Ottoman Palestine: The Arab Struggle for Survival and Power, (Boulder: Lynne Rienner Publications, 1994); Haim Gerber, “A New Look at the Tanzimat: The Case of the Province of Jerusalem,” in David Kushner (ed.), Palestine in the Late Ottoman Period: Political, Social and Economic Transformation, (Jerusalem: Yad Izhak Ben-Zvi Press, 1986), 30- 45; Moshe Ma’oz, Ottoman Reform in Syria and Palestine, 1840-1861: The Impact of Tanzimat on Politics and Society, (Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1968); for the economic and social development of Jerusalem and Jaffa, see Ruth Kark, “The Contribution of the Ottoman Regime to the Development of Jerusalem and Jaffa, 1840-1917,” in Kushner (ed.), Palestine in the Late Ottoman Period, 45-58. For the implementation of Tanzimat reforms in Lebanon and development of Beirut see Akarlı, The Long Peace, 6-81.

 

⁶⁷³ For the development of Mosul’s economy in the nineteenth century, see Sarah D. Shields, “Regional Trade and 19th-Century Mosul: Revising the Role of Europe in the Middle East Economy,” International Journal of Middle East Studies, Vol. 23, No. 1 (Feb., 1991): 19-37.

 

⁶⁷⁴ For example, the budget of the province in 1884-1885 was approximately 25,5 million kurush,

24 million of which was paid as subsidy from the Ottoman Treasury. See, Oschenwald, “Ottoman Subsidies to the Hijaz, 1877-1886,” 301.

 

⁶⁷⁵ Kramer, A History of Palestine, 76.

states, being Iran, France, Britain and Germany.⁶⁷⁶ Among them Iran was the only Muslim actor, which tried to exert influence over the Shi’i population of Iraq. This created significant tensions between the Ottoman Empire and Iran and these tensions are examined in the next chapter of this dissertation.

The French and the British had already been present in the Middle East first as merchants and diplomats, and then as missionaries through capitulations from the late sixteenth century onwards. In the nineteenth century, however, there were some direct penetrations into the region. Especially France was an active participant into the internal disturbances of Lebanon, generally on the side of the Maronites. During the 1860 crisis, the French not only intervened diplomatically, but also militarily by sending a navy to the Eastern Mediterranean.⁶⁷⁷ From 1861 onwards, French presence in Lebanon increased considerably and French consuls serving in the region intervened in sectarian clashes until the end of the Ottoman rule and afterwards.⁶⁷⁸ On the other hand, the British generally favoured the Druzes, as Don Peretz writes the 1840 clashes between the Maronites and Druzes “[…] were related to the competition between France and Great Britain for influence in the Levant.”⁶⁷⁹

In addition to Levant, in the Persian Gulf, the Ottomans encountered the British penetration. From 1820 onwards, the British began to increase their naval presence in the region. After defeating the Qasimi tribal confederation, which had dominated the lands establishing contemporary United Arab Emirates, they began to sail freely in the Gulf and headed north for the control of other Sheikhdoms, such as Kuwait, Bahrain and Qatar. The signature of Maritime

⁶⁷⁶ A fifth actor might be the United States for the Protestant missionary activities in Anatolia as well as in the Middle East; however compared to other three states its presence in the region was quite limited.

 

⁶⁷⁷ For a detailed account of French interventions in Lebanon in the mid-nineteenth century, see Caesar E. Farah, The Politics of Interventionism in Ottoman Lebanon, 1830-1861, (London and New York, I. B. Tauris, 2000).

 

⁶⁷⁸ For a detailed account of French interventions in Lebanon after 1861, see John P. Spagnolo,

France & Ottoman Lebanon, 1861-1914, (London: Ithaca Press, 1977).

 

⁶⁷⁹ Don Peretz, The Middle East Today, (Westport: Preager, 1994), 91.

Truce Agreement between Britain and Qasimi Sheikhs in 1853 created some kind of a British protection; this system of “Trucial States” was extended to Bahrain in 1861.⁶⁸⁰ What is more, the British acquired the monopoly of administering steamships in Euphrates and Tigris Rivers. They also tried to control the entrance of the Red Sea by occupying Aden in 1839.⁶⁸¹

The Ottoman response to the British and French presence in the Middle East had different strategies. The first strategy was the extension of the rights of the communities targeted by the external powers. In order to prevent direct French interventions in the Levant, bureaucratic reforms enhancing the autonomy of Mount Lebanon and incorporating non-Muslim components of the region into decision-making processes were tried to be implemented. Demonstrating the Ottoman presence in the regions where European Powers became actively penetrated was another strategy. In Ottoman provinces of Iraq, particularly under the governorship of Midhat Paşa, political and economic presence of the British was tried to be balanced through enhancing the Ottoman sovereignty in al-Hasa region with the reestablishment of the Province of al- Hasa, consolidating the Ottoman claims over Kuwait against the pro-British Kuwaiti ruling elite, namely al-Sabah family, and establishing a rival steamship company breaking the British Lynch Company’s monopoly.⁶⁸² A third strategy particularly implied in the Hamidian era was Pan-Islamism, which intended to arouse Muslim solidarity. Subsidizing the tribal chieftains as well as the sheiks and ulama proved futile in general. Finally, and most importantly, from the late

⁶⁸⁰ Within this system, the Gulf sheikhdoms accepted British protection against any kind of foreign aggression at the expanse that their foreign policy would be conducted by Great Britain; what is more, in 1892 they agreed not to sell or lease their territories to any other state but Great Britain. These agreements established a significant British control of the Persian Gulf from the second half of the nineteenth century onwards. See Uzi Rabi, “British Possessions in the Persian Gulf and Southwest Arabia: The Last Abandoned in the Middle East,” in Zach Levey and Elie Podeh (ed.), Britain and the Middle East: From Imperial Power to Junior Partner, (Eastbourne: Sussex Academic Press, 2008), 264-282, 265-266.

 

⁶⁸¹ Rabi, “British Possessions in the Persian Gulf and Southwest Arabia,” 267.

 

⁶⁸² For a detailed account of the Ottoman reaction against British presence in the Persian Gulf, Midhat Paşa’s and his successors’ policies in the region see Frederick Anscombe, The Ottoman Gulf: The Creation of Kuwait, Saudi Arabia, and Qatar, (New York: Columbia University Press, 1997).

1880s onwards, the strategy of balancing imperialist powers threatening the Ottoman Middle East with another imperialist power, namely Germany, was tried to be implemented. The Berlin-Baghdad railway project, which could never be completed, was an example of Ottoman-German cooperation in the Middle East.⁶⁸³

All in all, in the nineteenth century, the Ottoman Empire interested in the Arab provinces of the Middle East more than any other period; despite the shortcomings of the Ottoman administration in the region, the failure of most of the reforms initiated after Tanzimat period, the economic destructiveness of the capitulatory regime, and the insufficient level of development for most of the region, all the Ottoman initiatives served the maintenance of Ottoman sovereignty over the Middle East until the end of the First World War. In other words, the Ottoman targets of centralization and modernization might not be realized fully; however, the real motive behind these targets, namely the preservation of territorial integrity of the Middle East could largely be ensured.

 

10.2.         The Ottoman Travellers’ Perception of the Middle East

 

 

10.2.1.               The Middle Eastern Cities:

The Ottoman travellers’ perception of the Middle Eastern cities was not much different from their perceptions of the cities of other parts of the world. Generally the criteria for their appreciation of a city were the degree of its orderliness and the existence of “the traces of civilization” (âsâr-ı medeniyet). What is more, they did not forget to mention urban duality, the dichotomical composition of quarters within the city based on these criteria.

Arguably, the Ottoman travellers did not depict Iraqi cities as positively as the Syrian ones, since they perceived the former more underdeveloped. For example, with regard to Mosul, Âli Bey mentioned about the disorderliness of the city; he particularly criticized that the shops were extremely small, while the

⁶⁸³ For a detailed account of German interventions see Đlber Ortaylı, Osmanlı Đmparatorluğu’nda Alman Nüfuzu, (Đstanbul: Đletişim Yayınları 1998).

coffeehouses were the largest buildings in the market. According to him, this indicated that the city’s inhabitants preferred to waste their time by idly sitting in the coffeehouses, instead of dealing with and enlarging their businesses.⁶⁸⁴ Similarly, the infrastructural inferiority of Basra was bitterly criticized in the travelogue of Cenap Şehabettin, who wrote that the streets of this city were not paved with stone, therefore, in case of a heavy rain entire city turned out a huge swamp: “There is no stone, when there is no stone, there is no pavement; urban hygiene is almost impossible without pavement […] Therefore, streets are dirty and tangle as bowels filling the abdomen of Basra.”⁶⁸⁵ These criticisms demonstrate that the Ottoman travellers accused the local inhabitants’ indifference and laziness as an important reason for underdevelopment.

Instead of Mosul and Basra, it was Baghdad that attracted the attention of the travellers the most. They could not hide their excitement to see this city, which had once been the centre of Islamic civilization. For them, Baghdad was a city visualized in their dreams for a long time. For example, Cenap Şehabettin wrote that he could not sleep the night before they arrived in Baghdad and dreamed the city as the “Eden on earth”: “Baghdad! This beautiful name promises my imagination so much, it elevated me on extensive visions and poetic hopes.”⁶⁸⁶ However, when the Ottoman travellers saw the city, they were generally disappointed and began to criticize some of its aspects. For example, Đsmail Hakkı underlined the inhabitants’ lack of being timely as the basic reason for the decadence of this city, which had once been the centre of religious as well as positive sciences. For him, the reason of absence of arts, sciences and commerce in the city was that its inhabitants could not understand the value of time and they passed their time idly without working for ameliorating their life standards.⁶⁸⁷ Despite this critical tune, the travellers also preferred to emphasize

⁶⁸⁴ Âli Bey, Seyahat Jurnali, 58.

 

⁶⁸⁵ Cenap Şehabettin, Afak-ı Irak, 68.

 

⁶⁸⁶ “Bağdat! Bu güzel isim hayâlime neler vaad ediyor, beni ne vâsi tasavvurlara ve ne şâirâne ümitlere yükseltiyordu.” Cenap Şehabettin, Afak-ı Irak, 88.

 

⁶⁸⁷ Babanzade Đsmail Hakkı, Irak Mektupları, 115-116.

the potential of this city besides its shortcomings. For Cenap Şehabettin, “[…] degradation never brought silence, dwellings full of joy and happiness emerged along Tigris out of the ruins of shattered silky and golden palaces.”⁶⁸⁸ Therefore, what made a city alive was not its buildings but its inhabitants; “[…] a city will not vanish if its inhabitants continue to manifest their existence.”⁶⁸⁹ Similarly, Đsmail Hakkı stated that the population density of Baghdad was increasing day by day because people came to this city to live in a civilized way. He wrote that “as long as the idea of civilization spreads in this country, the population density of Baghdad will continue to increase.”⁶⁹⁰ In other words, for the travellers, current problems of the city were not eternal and insurmountable, as long as human potential had been preserved, they could be overcome.

The account of three prominent cities of Syria and Lebanon, namely Aleppo, Damascus and Beirut, was more positive compared to the Iraqi cities because of their more advanced level of development. For example, Âli Bey admired the city of Aleppo; he described its ordered stone houses, paved streets, prosperous market, whose inhabitants were famous for wealthy and honest merchants.⁶⁹¹ Damascus and Beirut, on the other hand, were generally presented in a comparative way. Đsmail Hakkı emphasized the traces of civilization in both cities such as electricity, trams, newly established modern avenues and quarters. However, unlike Beirut, which was eager to absorb all elements of modernity immediately, Damascus was a conservative city. He wrote that the material and moral elements of “the East” and “Arabness” was reflected in this city more than Beirut.⁶⁹² Similarly, Ahmet Şerif argued that unlike Beirut, Damascus resisted the passage of time and preserved its unique characteristics. He wrote that

⁶⁸⁸ Cenap Şehabettin, Afak-ı Irak, 91.

 

⁶⁸⁹ Cenap Şehabettin, Afak-ı Irak, 91.

 

⁶⁹⁰ “Fikr-i temeddün bu memlekette taammüm ettikçe Bağdat’ın kesefât-ı nüfusu artacaktır.” Babanzade Đsmail Hakkı, Irak Mektupları, 122.

 

⁶⁹¹ Âli Bey, Seyahat Jurnali, 18.

 

⁶⁹² “Şam tamamen bir Şark ve Arap şehridir.” Babanzade Đsmail Hakkı, Irak Mektupları, 32.

“Damascus was insisting on progressing through preserving its oldness to the degree that Beirut was rushing for acquiring another existence.”⁶⁹³ Although he criticized this Damascene conservatism for slowing down progress,⁶⁹⁴ he liked it, since he detested the hypocritical nature of Beirut, a city, which was alienating itself from the Ottomanness while being westernized.⁶⁹⁵

The inhabitants of both cities were appreciated for some of their qualities and criticized for others. For example, Đsmail Hakkı praised the inhabitants of Beirut for their diligence and cleverness; he argued that they had a natural inclination for every kind of trade as well as money-changing business.⁶⁹⁶ Ahmet Şerif did the same for the Damascenes, who were naturally inclined to trade; he wrote that they would occupy a significant post in the world of trade if they could be equipped with the means of contemporary material developments.⁶⁹⁷ However, unlike the deep ignorance of the lower echelons of the Damascene society and lack of intellectual production by the upper echelons,⁶⁹⁸ according to Đsmail Hakkı, the brilliant intelligence of the inhabitants of Beirut directed them towards literature and language education as well as politics. He wrote that neither in Anatolia, nor in Rumelia there was a city having the ability to compete with Beirut in terms of “general knowledge” (malûmat-ı umûmiye).⁶⁹⁹ Ahmet Şerif was also aware of this intellectual capacity; however, he criticized it for being anti-Ottoman: “You understand that in Beirut there is a significant idea of progress, a movement, whose importance and power cannot be denied, and an

⁶⁹³ “Beyrut başka bir varlık kazanmaya ne kadar aceleci ise, Şam, eskiliğini koruyarak ilerlemekte o kadar ısrarcıdır.”Ahmet Şerif, Arnavutluk'da, Suriye'de, Trablusgarp'ta Tanîn, 110.

 

⁶⁹⁴ Ahmet Şerif, Arnavutluk'da, Suriye'de, Trablusgarp'ta Tanîn, 110.

 

⁶⁹⁵ Ahmet Şerif, Arnavutluk'da, Suriye'de, Trablusgarp'ta Tanîn, 153.

 

⁶⁹⁶ Babanzade Đsmail Hakkı, Irak Mektupları, 17.

 

⁶⁹⁷ Ahmet Şerif, Arnavutluk'da, Suriye'de, Trablusgarp'ta Tanîn, 110.

 

⁶⁹⁸ Ahmet Şerif, Arnavutluk'da, Suriye'de, Trablusgarp'ta Tanîn, 153.

 

⁶⁹⁹ Babanzade Đsmail Hakkı, Irak Mektupları, 19.

intellectual current, with the condition that there is no trace of Ottomanness in all of these.”⁷⁰⁰ In other words, this intellectual current fed itself not from Ottomanness, but from external resources (such as missionary schools), which alienated the inhabitants of Beirut from the Ottoman Empire. Therefore, he wrote that he preferred the ignorance of Anatolia to the intellectual awakening of Beirut since the latter had nothing to do with Ottomanness while the former had nothing but Ottomanness.⁷⁰¹ Similarly, and almost with the same discourse with Cenap Şehabettin’s account of Alexandria, Ekrem Bey wrote that he did not admire Beirut, because the city was in an ambivalent position; it was neither an Eastern, nor a Western city:

Beirut did not impress me much. A little remained from its old Arab-Syrian characteristics; it did not deal out from the modern culture and civilization – it was a soulless Mediterranean port city populated by the higher echelons of the Christian community. The people thought that they had a non plus ultra Parisian refinement. In reality, with the contemporary words, they were chatty, arrogant and superficial snobs.⁷⁰²

 

Therefore, the Ottoman travellers sought for the traces of civilization in the cities they visited in the Ottoman Middle East; however, they wanted to see these traces of civilization in a setting where the peculiar characteristics of the cities preserved.

Besides these basic metropolitan cities of the Ottoman Middle East, sometimes, the Ottoman travellers were surprised when they saw extremely developed small towns, which surpassed the metropolitan cities in terms of orderliness. The town of Zahle, in Mount Lebanon, was one of such surprises. Accordingly, Đsmail Hakkı described excellent hotels and casinos of this town

⁷⁰⁰ “Anlarsınız ki, Beyrut’ta önemli bir ilerleme fikri, önemi ve kuvveti inkar edilemez bir hareket, fikir cereyanı var. Fakat bütün bunlarda Osmanlılıktan bir nişane bulunmamak şartıyla.” Ahmet Şerif, Arnavutluk'da, Suriye'de, Trablusgarp'ta Tanîn, 153.

 

⁷⁰¹ Ahmet Şerif, Arnavutluk'da, Suriye'de, Trablusgarp'ta Tanîn, 160-161.

 

⁷⁰² Italics added. “Beyrut beni fazla etkilemedi. Eski Arap-Suriye özelliklerinden geriye fazla bir şey kalmamış, modern kültür ve uygarlıktan da henüz nasibini almamıştı – üst sınıf Hıristiyn topluluğunun yaşadığı ruhsuz bir Akdeniz liman şehriydi. Đnsanlar, ‘non plus ultra’ bir Paris inceliğine sahip oldukları zannı içindeydiler. Gerçekte bugün kullanacağımız ifadelerle, geveze, kendini beğenmiş ve yüzeysel züppelerdi.”Avlonyalı Ekrem Bey, Osmanlı Arnavutluk’undan Anılar (1885-1912), 113.

attracting British and American travellers; he wrote that the level of its urban development could not be seen in most of the cities of the Empire. He was amazed when he learned that two newspapers were published in this small town, which had subscribers even from the United States.⁷⁰³ The level of development in the villages of Mount Lebanon also surprized the travellers. Ahmed Şerif wrote that since this part of the province could be able to escape from the oppression of the previous administration (namely, the Hamidian administration) because of its special status, the inhabitants of the region were able to develop their environment. He wrote that these villages were in a position envying even the most prosperous cities of our Anatolia.⁷⁰⁴ Similarly, Đsmail Hakkı admired the diligence of the inhabitants of the Mount Lebanon and their establishment of fertile fields. He wrote: “The samples of civilization, created by the hands of human beings through an ordered patience and effort, also attract the admiration and astonishment of the visitors.” ⁷⁰⁵

However, the Ottoman travellers were aware that these developments emerged out of not only local peoples’ efforts but also external interventions. What they criticized was, therefore, not the achievements of these regions, but their achievement through external help instead of the efforts of the Ottoman administration. Therefore, their perception of the Druzes was very much negative. For example, Ahmet Şerif wrote that the Druzes were quite intelligent and curious; however they were deceitful as well. He argued that during his stay in Mount Lebanon, they were watching him with “a sarcastic and contemptuous smile” (alaylı ve küçümseyici bir tebessüm).⁷⁰⁶ What is more, he wrote that they were ambitious to hide their morality and traditions, particularly their religious

⁷⁰³ Babanzade Đsmail Hakkı, Irak Mektupları, 25. Similarly, Ahmet Şerif wrote that Zahle was quite ordered compared to Anatolia; its inhabitants were quite civilized and progressed so that their eyes were shining from their intelligence. Ahmet Şerif, Arnavutluk'da, Suriye'de, Trablusgarp'ta Tanîn, 109.

 

⁷⁰⁴ Ahmet Şerif, Arnavutluk'da, Suriye'de, Trablusgarp'ta Tanîn, 109.

 

⁷⁰⁵ “Dest-i beşerin bir sabr-u gayret-i muntazama ile vücûda getirmiş olduğu âsâr-ı umrân dahi ayrıca zâirin takdîr ve hayretini celbediyor.” Babanzade Đsmail Hakkı, Irak Mektupları, 23.

 

⁷⁰⁶ Ahmet Şerif, Arnavutluk'da, Suriye'de, Trablusgarp'ta Tanîn, 104.

principles; he found the upper echelons of the Druze community upright but ignorant.⁷⁰⁷ He defined them as people who were accustomed to rule.⁷⁰⁸

Besides the cities of Bilâd al-Sham and Iraq, the cities of Arabian Peninsula, such as Jeddah, Aden, Bahrain, or Kuwait were also narrated in the travelogues on the Ottoman Middle East; their perception was mostly negative because of their backwardness. Particularly, Jeddah and Aden were the most pejoratively narrated cities. Ekrem Bey perceived Jeddah as terribly dirty, desolated and silent; while Cenap Şehabettin argued that the city lost its former fame as the “Paris of the Red Sea” to the newly established ports along the Western shores of the Red Sea, namely, Massawa, Suakin and Port Sudan.⁷⁰⁹ This was presented as an indication of the Western superiority over the East since the latter cities were established by the Western colonial powers. Similarly, the Ottoman travellers criticized Aden for being totally deprived of any natural beauties. Cenap Şehabettin defined the city as a “huge piece of coal tumbling over the sea”, “a black soil, namely, a soil of negro”⁷¹⁰ The only duty of the city was to serve the British as a gatekeeper for the protection of British presence in the Indian Ocean and the Red Sea.⁷¹¹ Rüşdi Paşa mentioned about the backwardness of another Yemeni port, Hudaydah, which attracted attention with the lack of a port for the transfer of goods and people. The only governmental buildings in the city were the governor’s office and an uncompleted hospital.⁷¹²

Among the cities of the Arabian Peninsula, Kuwait and Bahrain were the only ones deserved relatively positive narration because of the British investment in these cities. After seeing the small and miserable port cities of the region, Ekrem Bey described Kuwait as a rich and big city “[…] if such strong

⁷⁰⁷ Ahmet Şerif, Arnavutluk'da, Suriye'de, Trablusgarp'ta Tanîn, 124.

 

⁷⁰⁸ Ahmet Şerif, Arnavutluk'da, Suriye'de, Trablusgarp'ta Tanîn, 216.

 

⁷⁰⁹ Cenap Şehabettin, Afak-ı Irak, 43.

 

⁷¹⁰ Cenap Şehbettin, Afak-ı Irak, 49.

 

⁷¹¹ Cenap Şehabettin, Afak-ı Irak, 91.

 

⁷¹² Rüşdi Paşa, Yemen Hatırası, 66.

adjectives could be used for the conditions of Arabs,” and appreciated its vivid commercial life.⁷¹³ Similarly, Bahrain attracted Ali Suad’s admiration both for its natural beauties and infrastructural development. He wrote that the progress of Bahrain attracted his attention; the docks which he had seen one year earlier were advanced into the sea and he was also informed that large stores for commercial goods would be built in a year.⁷¹⁴ Regarding the merchants of the city, he wrote that when he was invited to a merchant’s store, he encountered with two Egyptian journals, al-Muktataf and al-Menar, and this made him conclude that “Arabs try to read regularly such journals published in their own language. Even, for those having some social rank, such attention included most of the political journals.”⁷¹⁵

All in all, there was no monolithic perception of the Middle Eastern cities in civilizational terms. The Ottoman travellers sometimes praised the cities without the traces of civilization or sometimes disliked the ones with them. In other words, there were some accounts criticizing the establishment of Westernized cities for they were loosing their Ottoman character; on the other hand, there were other accounts admiring the achievements of Western influence over the urban space.

 

10.2.2. The Critique of the Ottoman Rule in the Middle East and the Perception of the Precursors of Arab Nationalism

One of the most significant aspects of the travelogues regarding the Middle East was a fierce critique of the Ottoman administration in the region, since most of these travelogues were either written or published in the post- Hamidian period. To start with, the post-Hamidian travellers accused the Hamidian administration of neglecting the Middle Eastern provinces and for not

⁷¹³ “[…E]ğer Arapların şartları için bu kadar yüksek sıfatlar kullanmak caiz ise […]” Avlonyalı Ekrem Bey, Osmanlı Arnavutluk’undan Anılar (1885-1912), 151.

 

⁷¹⁴ Ali Suad, Seyahatlerim, 19.

 

⁷¹⁵ “Araplar kendi lisanlarında çıkan böyle mecmuâları muntazaman okumaya gayret ederler. Hele biraz mevkî-i içtimaîsi olanlarda bu dikkat cerâid-i siyasîyenin ekserîsini ihâtâ eder.” Ali Suad, Seyahatlerim, 21.

investing properly in this region. For example, Rüşdi Paşa argued that one of the most significant reasons for the rebellions in Yemen was the lack of proper Ottoman investment in the region. He wrote that the financial resources invested in the province were extremely limited; even the amount of twenty-five years of Ottoman investment in the region was only one fifth of the one year salary of the existing officials serving in the province.⁷¹⁶ Based on his previous experiences in Massawa controlled by the Italian colonial administration, Rüşdi Paşa argued that the Italians could only establish their rule strongly in Massawa after properly investing in this city.⁷¹⁷ Similarly, Ahmed Şerif argued that the reason behind continuous rebellions of the Druzes against the Ottoman Empire was the lack of Ottoman investment in the Mount Lebanon.⁷¹⁸ Đsmail Hakkı wrote along the samel line for the countryside of Iraq; he even wrote that after the collapse of the Abbasid rule, Iraq had not seen any material improvement except for the brief but efficient governorship of Midhat Paşa.⁷¹⁹

The Ottoman travellers criticized the Hamidian administration not only for the insufficient level of material investment; they also emphasized that more important than the lack of material improvement, the Ottomans failed to invest in the Middle Eastern provinces morally. In other words, they could not establish an understanding of Ottomanness in the region. For example, with regard to Syria and Lebanon, Ahmed Şerif implied that one of the main reasons of the emerging Arab discontent in the Ottomans was the Ottoman failure of creating a common identity. He wrote:

The history of the last centuries recorded no event of civilization regarding Ottomanness in this region […] The Ottoman historiography always remained alien to this region and the Ottoman government preserved its position as a visitor sojourner.⁷²⁰

⁷¹⁶ Rüşdi Paşa, Yemen Hatırası, 67.

 

⁷¹⁷ Rüşdi Paşa, Yemen Hatırası, 70.

 

⁷¹⁸ Ahmet Şerif, Arnavutluk'da, Suriye'de, Trablusgarp'ta Tanîn, 230.

 

⁷¹⁹ Babanzade Đsmail Hakkı, Irak Mektupları, 204.

 

⁷²⁰ Ahmet Şerif, Arnavutluk'da, Suriye'de, Trablusgarp'ta Tanîn, 128.

Ahmed Şerif added that the Ottoman Empire only conquered this region without conquering the hearts and the spirits of its inhabitants. Accordingly, although Syria was a beautiful land full of clever people inclined to civilization, the Ottoman Empire failed to create a sense of common citizenry.⁷²¹ Similarly, with regard to Mount Lebanon, he wrote that what the Ottomans solely did was to send troops to suppress the continuous rebellions of the Druzes. Although his initial perception of the Druzes was very much suspicious, after perceiving the Ottoman neglect, he found the anger and the enmity of the Druzes towards the central administration relatively understandable.⁷²² Accordingly, he wrote:

When the days are passing, it is seen that we have not a genuine knowledge of the Druzes; they are not monstrous, blood-shedding people, on the contrary, they have qualities as in other Ottomans. Although some ideas against us are settled in their minds for several reasons, indeed, they are not but human beings. Now, the real talent was to clear the ideas and emotions settled against the Ottomans and the government and to find the required method to transform them into a useful societal component, into citizens.⁷²³

 

Another criticism was directed to the Ottoman intellectuals by Ali Suad, who accused them of not having proper knowledge of the Ottoman Middle East. He wrote that these so-called intellectuals were working on solutions in Đstanbul for the weaknesses of the state, on a green table with a strong self-confidence, but without experiencing the problems of different regions of the Empire.⁷²⁴ This confidence stemmed from the feeling that every issue can be fully understood after reading and learning from the books. Ali Suad underlined the insufficiency

 

 

 

⁷²¹ Ahmet Şerif, Arnavutluk'da, Suriye'de, Trablusgarp'ta Tanîn, 128.

 

⁷²² Ahmet Şerif, Arnavutluk'da, Suriye'de, Trablusgarp'ta Tanîn, 230.

 

⁷²³ “Günlerimiz geçtikçe görülüyordu ki, Dürzîler hakkında hiç gerçek bilgilere sahip değiliz, onlar, canavar, kan dökücü adamlar değil, aksine, bütün diğer Osmanlılar gibi, bunlara da meziyetler var. Kendilerinde bir çok etkenlerin tesiriyle bazı fikirler yerleşmiş ise de, gerçekte bize karşı bir insandan başka bir şey değiller. Şimdi asıl hüner onlarda Osmanlılara ve hükümete karşı yerleşen fikirleri ve duyguları gidererek, kendilerini faydalı bir toplumsal organ, birer vatandaş haline getirmekte ve bunun için takibi gereken usûlü arayıp bulmakta.” Ahmet Şerif, Arnavutluk'da, Suriye'de, Trablusgarp'ta Tanîn, 232-233.

 

⁷²⁴ Ali Suad, Seyahatlerim, 22.

of such knowledge by attributing Đstanbul an “arrogant and conceited morbid atmosphere,” disturbing the discreet handling of the problems.⁷²⁵

Another reason for the discontent of the local population was the maladministration of the Ottoman officials. Especially, the Hamidian regime was accused of sending incapable officials to the region, which served for nothing but alienating the local inhabitants from the Ottoman Empire. While Đsmail Hakkı directed this accusation for Iraq, Ahmed Şerif did the same for Mount Lebanon and Syria, and Rüşdi Paşa for Yemen.⁷²⁶ In this respect, one of the most detailed critiques was made by Ali Suad regarding the incapacity of Ottoman local officials in Iraq. He first questioned the concept of administration (idare):

What is the meaning of the word “administration”? If it is the preservation of the existing order, then there is no need to governors, investigations, inspections for that; because a court, a committee of cabî, and an excellent police force would suffice. But if it means the advancement of trade and agriculture through social and economic thinking and ascension of the general conduct through affecting the morality by [providing] progress and order in these blessed regions, our officials never do this. In order to think in such a way, we need people armour-plated their strong character with high knowledge and scientific principles.⁷²⁷

 

After putting this basic criticism, he argued that it was very easy to accuse local people of their backwardness; however, indeed what they did was to imitate the officials governing them:

There, it is easy to see that a generous and prosperous man is chaste and thief at the same time. The integration of these two opposites by men who are

⁷²⁵ “[…] hodpesend ve mağrur heva-yı mâriz […] ” Ali Suad, Seyahatlerim, 22. Ahmet Şerif made a similar criticism targeting himself; he pitied about his ignorance about the conditions of the regions he visited prior to his voyage. Accordingly, he wrote that although he could tell about America or French political system in detail, he knew nothing about Mount Lebanon before his travel. Ahmet Şerif, Arnavutluk'da, Suriye'de, Trablusgarp'ta Tanîn, 173-174.

 

⁷²⁶ Babanzade Đsmail Hakkı, Irak Mektupları, 205-206; Ahmet Şerif, Arnavutluk'da, Suriye'de, Trablusgarp'ta Tanîn, 231; Rüşdi Paşa, Yemen Hatırası, 189.

 

⁷²⁷ “Đdâre kelimesinin medlûlü acaba nedir? Eğer hâl-i hazırı idâme ise bunun için valilere, teftişlere, tahkîklere hiç lüzum yok, çünkü bir mahkeme ile, bir câbi heyeti ve bir de gayet mükemmel bir kuvve-i zâbıta kâfi… Yok eğer içtimaî, iktisadî düşüncelerle ziraat ve ticareti ilerletmek, ve bu tarîkle bu mübârek yerlerin intizam ve terakkî yoluna eslâkı esasıyla hatta maneviyata da tesir ederek ahlâk-ı umûmiyenin i’lâsı ise memurlarımız bunu katiyen yapmıyor. Bunu düşünmek için malumât-ı âliye ve esasât-ı fenniyeyi kendi şime-i metînesine yerleştirmiş, insandan zırhlılarımız olmalı.” Ali Suad, Seyahatlerim, 44-45. Câbi is a kind of tax collector who collects the rent of the estates of religious foundations and alms regularly paid for the state.

sometimes a brave and sensitive knight and sometimes suspicious and even a coward bribe-taker is because of their habit of walking under the shadow of the chief officials there. If the official is crooked, then the shadow will crook as well, if he is straight, its shadow will straighten. If the official embraces his political duty, everyone will walk in a straight way. If he cannot, then everything will reverse. What a sorrowful existence!⁷²⁸

 

Being aware of these problems, which were contributing to the anti- Ottoman sentiments in the region, the Ottoman travellers, particularly Ahmed Şerif and Đsmail Hakkı directed attention to the “issue of Turkishness-Arabness” (Türklük-Araplık meselesi) in detail in their travelogues. Ahmed Şerif argued that Arabness was extremely dominant in Syria:

In this country, the inhabitants cannot be separated and classified in accordance with their religion; these people are not Muslim, Christian or Jewish in appearance. They are only Arabs. For their emotions, Arabness has the priority. Actually, in this region Arabness tied people spiritually and emotionally to each other with a strong tie and sincerity so much that this human community stands like an example of unity while the discussions and conflicts of nationality and religion, the disputes among the components are going on.⁷²⁹

In other words, he emphasized Arabness as a distinct characteristic separating a group of Muslim people from the rest. Contrarily, Đsmail Hakkı rejected the discussions on Turkishness-Arabness by cursing those who initiated such treacherous debates against the integrity of the Empire. He argued that this issue was promulgated by some neurotic, seditious and exaggerating Syrians:

I completely understand that this threatening sword, which is wanted to be established as a kind of blackmail against the current Ottoman government by some people, is so rusty that it cannot even cut a piece of cigarette paper. I see that those, who produce such infusions of sedition and discord in order to appease their daily anger and ambitions or to benefit from it, are nothing but lunatics who shout in the midst of a desert and find no single audience. Whomever I talked cursed those who spread such fake words.⁷³⁰

 

⁷²⁸ “Âlicenap ve müreffeh bir adamın orada afîf ve aynı zamanda hırsız olduğunu görmek kolaydır. Bazen merd ve hassas bir şövalye, bazen şüpheli ve belki denî bir mürteşî olan bu adamların bu iki zıtları cem’ etmeleri, oradaki rüesâ-yı memuriyenin gölgesinde yürümeye alışmış olmalarındandır. Memur çarpıksa gölgesi de çarpılır; doğru ise gölgesi de doğrulur! Memur vazîfe-i siyasîyesini ihâtâ ettiyse herkes doğru gider. Etmedi ise her şey tersine döner. Ne hazîn bir mevcudiyet!...” Ali Suad, Seyahatlerim, 52.

 

⁷²⁹ Ahmet Şerif, Arnavutluk'da, Suriye'de, Trablusgarp'ta Tanîn, 127-128.

 

⁷³⁰ “Tamamen anladım ki, bazı kimseler tarafından hükümet-i hâzıra-i Osmaniyeye karşı bir nev’i şantaj olmak üzere istimâl edilmek istenilen bu seyf-i tehdîd bir sigara kağıdını kesemeyecek derecede paslıdır. Bu kâbil fitne ve tefrîka nasihatlerini – bir iki günlük hırs veya hiddetlerini teskîn veya menfaatlerini temîn maksadıyla – verenlerin çöl ortasında bağıran, etrafında bir tek

What is more, Đsmail Hakkı replied two significant criticisms directed against the centralization policies, namely the efforts for the prevention of the teaching of the Arabic language and the prohibition of the appointment of officials from the Arabs. With regard to the former criticism, he wrote that the government showed significant attention to the teaching of Arabic and made it compulsory in the entire Ottoman schools; what is more, during the new constitutional period, the teaching of Arabic became more widespread.⁷³¹ Meanwhile he answered the claims that the Arabs were not being appointed as officials as such:

In the civil service, nationality is not a criterion. The criteria are merit, authority and knowledge of the official language. Except for the inhabitants of Beirut and Mount Lebanon, we are contently observing that the most intellectual and educated people from the other Arab provinces had the knowledge of Turkish language.⁷³²

Despite this issue of Turkishness-Arabness, some of the travellers were praising the continuation of the local Muslims’ allegiance to the Ottoman government and the Caliph/Sultan. For example, Ekrem Bey, who was sent with Ottoman warships to the Persian Gulf in 1905 in order to “demonstrate the presence of Turkish navy in the remotest parts of the Arabian Peninsula,” mentioned that although the local inhabitants of the Red Sea ports had so far seen more impressive warships of different nations, the effect of the presence of Turkish navy was extraordinary.⁷³³ He narrated the sailing of hundreds of Arabs

müstemi' bulunmayan mecnûnlardan ibâret olduğunu görüyorum. Kimi gördüysem bu gibi erâcifi neşr edenlere lanethûn oluyor idi.” Babanzade Đsmail Hakkı, Irak Mektupları, 47-49.

 

⁷³¹ Babanzade Đsmail Hakkı, Irak Mektupları, 49. Similarly, Ahmed Şerif emphasized the Turkish respect to the “noble Arab community” because of Islam; he found this sincere respect to this “honourable, clean and eminent community” extremely appropriate. He argued that the Ottomans should learn Arabic not only for religious or literary purposes but for understanding millions of Ottoman citizens who could not speak Turkish and having a significant place in the Ottoman trade. In other words, he did not mention about teaching them Turkish; but rather encouraged the Ottomans to learn Arabic. Ahmet Şerif, Arnavutluk'da, Suriye'de, Trablusgarp'ta Tanîn, 143-144, 181.

 

⁷³² “Memuriyette cinsiyet ve kavmiyet aranmaz, memuriyette liyâkat ve iktidar ve lisân-ı resmîye vukûf aranır. Nefs-i Beyrut ahâlisi ile Cebel ahâlisi müstesna olmak üzere diğer vilâyet-i Arabîyede az çok münevver-ül efkâr ve tahsîl görmüş kimselerin lisân-ı Türkî'ye vâkıf olduklarını mâalmemnûniye görüyoruz.” Babanzade Đsmail Hakkı, Irak Mektupları, 54.

 

⁷³³ Avlonyalı Ekrem Bey, Osmanlı Arnavutluk’undan Anılar (1885-1912), 143.

to the Ottoman warships when they approached to the port cities and their exclamation of “May the God always make the Sultan triumphant.”⁷³⁴ He exclaimed: “What an allegiance to the Caliph, what a power existed behind this simple wish of these ignorant people.”⁷³⁵ He stated that it was this simple but strong allegiance that resulted in the centuries-long grandeur of the Empire.⁷³⁶

All in all, according to the Ottoman travellers, the emergence of Arab discontent against the Ottoman central administration owed much to the internal deficiencies of the Empire in investing in these regions both materially and morally. The corruption of the Ottoman officials serving in the region contributed to the alienation of local people as well. This maladministration consolidated the sense of Arabness; however, still, according to some of the Ottoman travellers, since such problems were evident in other parts of the Empire, the Arab complaints did not have a solid ground. Finally, despite all these problems, some travellers tried to demonstrate that the local people (probably, the lower echelons of the society, not the intellectuals) still felt a strong allegiance to the Ottoman governments and the Caliph. In sum, what the travellers aimed was to consolidate the sense of common identity, namely Ottomanness, in order to prevent further alienation of the Arabs and subsequent disintegration of the Empire.

 

10.2.3. Ottoman Traveller’s Perception of Foreign Intervention into the Middle East

The Ottoman travellers mentioned about the impact of European powers’ interventions into the Middle East politically, economically and culturally. However, the degree of criticism is lower compared to the critical tune in the travelogues on North Africa because despite there was a significant European penetration in the region, it did not take the form of total colonial invasion as in

⁷³⁴ Avlonyalı Ekrem Bey, Osmanlı Arnavutluk’undan Anılar (1885-1912), 143.

 

⁷³⁵ Avlonyalı Ekrem Bey, Osmanlı Arnavutluk’undan Anılar (1885-1912), 143.

 

⁷³⁶ Avlonyalı Ekrem Bey, Osmanlı Arnavutluk’undan Anılar (1885-1912), 143-144.

the case of Algeria or Tunisia. In terms of political intervention, the Ottoman travellers criticized the British presence in the Persian Gulf and the armament of the Gulf Sheikhdoms as well as Yemen. Babanzade perceived Kuwait as the Iraq’s “only depot of illegal weapons” (yegâne eslihâ-yı memnuâ deposu) and accused its ruler, Sheikh Mubarak al-Sabah (1837-1915), for his hypocrisy. On the one hand, the Sheikh was preserving its allegiance to the Ottoman Empire nominally; however, on the other hand, he was establishing good relations with the British at the expanse of the Ottomans.⁷³⁷ Similarly Rüşdi Paşa accused the colonial powers, which had been controlling the western shores of the Red Sea, of exporting weapons and ammunition to the Zaydi Imams.⁷³⁸ Therefore, to suppress the Yemeni rebellion, the Ottoman government should prevent the import of modern armaments to Yemen not militarily but diplomatically, through negotiating with the Great Powers.⁷³⁹

The Ottoman travellers criticized the economic penetration of the colonial powers into the Middle East as well. For example, Đsmail Hakkı stated that in Damascus, there were some local products, which still preserved the admiration of the world such as curtains, cloths, wooden crafts or desserts. However, he wrote, “against the unbearable and great material and moral incursions of the Western civilization, it is evident that they will deplete and disappear one day.” ⁷⁴⁰ In other words, he claimed that without modernization, local economies could hardly resist European capitalist mentality based on the production of cheap and rapidly consumable products.

Finally, Ahmet Şerif criticized the cultural penetration of the colonial powers, especially of the French, through missionary activities. He argued that

⁷³⁷ Babanzade Đsmail Hakkı, Irak Mektupları, 233-235.

 

⁷³⁸ Rüşdi Paşa, Yemen Hatırası, 56-57.

 

⁷³⁹ Rüşdi Paşa, Yemen Hatırası, 190-192.

 

⁷⁴⁰ “Birçok mahsûlat ve masnûat-ı Şâmîye daha vardır ki buhar, elektrik gibi kuvve-i cedîde-i tabiattan istifâde etmedikleri halde yine bütün cihânda mergubiyet ve itibarlarını muhafaza edebilmişler.” Babanzade Đsmail Hakkı, Irak Mektupları, 37. “Ancak medeniyet-i garbiyenin maddî, ve manevî istilâ-yı müdhiş ve mukavemetsûzu karşısında bunların da bir gün munkarız ve ma'dum olacağı muhakkak görünüyor.” Babanzade Đsmail Hakkı, Irak Mektupları, 37.

these cultural interventions disturbed the Ottoman identity of the youngsters of Beirut and fostered anti-Ottomanism. He mentioned that this was quite natural because of the “most evident law of the universe,” namely “the strong’s right to chew and swallow the weak” (kuvvetlinin zayıfı çiğnemek ve yutmak hakkı).⁷⁴¹ He complained that the elite of Beirut began to send their children to missionary schools where they were obliged to attend Sunday masses and if they resisted, they would be expelled from the school. After mentioning this, he wrote: “Poor freedom of conscience! You have been violated by the ones who were taunting you to us everyday.”⁷⁴² He criticized the missionaries as such:

Talk with the missionaries and the teachers of the school. They speak sweetly. They speak nothing but humanity, civilizing the underdeveloped places and adorning them with the light of knowledge. Politics, is it possible? They never think about that. But, there is a big difference between words and actions. In essence, they are enemies of our Ottomanness, our Islam. They are always working against these.⁷⁴³

 

In sum, he concluded that under this “foreign education” Beirut was distancing itself from the Ottomans, while Anatolia was getting closer with its “national education.”⁷⁴⁴

Arguably, in these travelogues it is this cultural dimension that attracted the attention of the reader the most. In other words, for the travellers, the material encroachments of the Western powers might be prevented in one way or another; however, the alienation of local inhabitants of the region through cultural penetration of the West could not be cured easily. Indeed, their criticism of this cultural penetration reflected their anti-colonial stance; their emphasis on

⁷⁴¹ Ahmet Şerif, Arnavutluk'da, Suriye'de, Trablusgarp'ta Tanîn, 154.

 

⁷⁴² “Zavallı vicdan hürriyeti! Başkaları tarafından her gün başımıza kakıldığı halde, yinde onlar tarafından nasıl tecâvüzlere uğruyorsun, bedbaht kutsal hak…” Ahmet Şerif, Arnavutluk'da, Suriye'de, Trablusgarp'ta Tanîn, 155.

 

⁷⁴³ “Misyonerlerle ve okulun öğretmenleriyle görüşünüz. Ağızlarından bal akar. Đnsâniyetten, geri kalmış yerleri medenîleştirmekten ve irfân nûru ile süslemekten başka şeylerden bahsetmezler. Siyaset, o hiç mümkün mü? Bunu düşünmezler bile. Fakat sözler ile hareketlerde ne kadar zıddiyet vardır. Bunlar esasta bizim Osmanlılığımıza, Đslamlığımıza düşmandırlar. Hep onun aleyhine çalışıyorlar.” Ahmet Şerif, Arnavutluk'da, Suriye'de, Trablusgarp'ta Tanîn, 155.

 

⁷⁴⁴ Ahmet Şerif, Arnavutluk'da, Suriye'de, Trablusgarp'ta Tanîn, 160-161.

the significance they attached to the Arabic people in general and the Arab language in particular aimed to demonstrate that they did not perceive the Arabs as inferior, or second-class citizens.

 

To conclude, the Ottoman travellers’ perception of the Arab provinces of the Empire in the Middle East has some similarities and differences with their perceptions of North Africa, which was also a part of the Ottoman Empire. To start with, for both territories, the concept of urban duality prevails; the Middle Eastern cities including a significant Western community, such as Beirut, were evaluated in a way to employ urban duality, in other words, the different composition of Muslim and non-Muslim quarters of the city. Similar to the Ottoman travellers’ accounts of the North African cities, the Middle Eastern cities were criticized for loosing their peculiar characteristics at the expanse of modernization. Moreover, the nomadic people of the Middle East were evaluated negatively as in the case of the nomadic people of North Africa and the Hamidian administration was criticized for its neglect of the region as in the case of North Africa. Although the degree of the critique directed towards European colonialism was lower in the Ottoman accounts of the Middle Eastern provinces compared to North Africa because of the lack of direct colonial expansion in the Middle East, still material and moral infiltration of the European colonial powers was critically evaluated by the Ottoman travellers.

Besides these similarities, the issue of Arab nationalism attracted the attention of the Ottoman travellers visiting the Arab provinces of the Middle East unlike the ones visiting the North Africa. Indeed the latter group of travellers criticized the Arabs of North Africa for loosing their identities under colonial administration, while the former group criticized the Arabs for bringing their identity to the forefront. In other words, for the Arabs living under colonial rule, Arabness was perceived as the only way of survival, while for the Arabs living under the Ottoman rule, bringing the Arabic identity to the forefront was even cursed because of its facilitation of the disintegration of the Empire.

CHAPTER 11

 

 

THE OTTOMAN TRAVELLERS’ PERCEPTION OF IRAN

 

 

11.1.       Ottoman-Iranian Relations during the Eighteenth and Nineteenth Centuries

The long and exhausting wars between the two great Muslim Empires of the Middle East, namely the Ottoman Empire and Safavid Persia, had came to an end with the Treaty of Zohab (or Kasr-ı Şirin) signed in 1639. This treaty established the boundary between these two empires, which survived with little change until modern times. However, the vague delimitation of the boundary did not necessarily mean the end of inter-imperial rivalry; rather, during the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries, Ottoman-Iranian relations experienced significant problems, which brought these two Islamic empires into a series of wars or lesser clashes for regional domination.

The first problem continuously disturbing Ottoman-Iranian relations was the tribal question. The borderland was inhabited by several nomadic tribes, which had not recognized the established boundaries; depending on the conditions of pastures, they frequently passed the border to feed their herds. What is more, these tribes changed their allegiance from one empire to another quite often. As Rudi Matthee writes, the loyalty of the tribes might be bought but it could never be taken for granted.⁷⁴⁵ This shifting loyalty provided the borderlanders with a significant autonomy from both empires, which they utilized to a great extent. In sum, both the Ottoman Empire and Iran suffered from unamenable tribal formations preventing them from establishing effective control over their borders.

Continuous border breaches by the nomadic tribes produced the second major problem of Ottoman-Iranian relations, namely the border delimitation

⁷⁴⁵ Rudi Matthee, “The Safavid-Ottoman Frontier: Iraq-i Arab as Seen by the Safavids,”

International Journal of Turkish Studies, Vol. 9, No. 1-2 (Summer, 2003): 157-174, 165.

problem. The disputed territories on the borderlands resulted in a series of wars between two empires particularly during the first half of the eighteenth century, at the end of which several treaties were signed to affirm the original provisions of the Treaty of Zohab.⁷⁴⁶ Particularly, the campaigns of Nader Shah (r. 1736- 1747) against the Ottoman Empire resulted in several significant Ottoman defeats; however when the Treaty of Kurdan was signed in 1746 at the end of these long campaigns, the boundary established in 1639 did not change.⁷⁴⁷

After Nader Shah’s death, the relations between Iran and the Ottoman Empire entered into a period of relative tranquillity until 1776 because of the Ottoman wars in the West and the inter-dynastic rivalry in Iran, which Shaw labels as “the longest continuous period of peace in [the Ottoman-Iranian] history.”⁷⁴⁸ In this period, although the Ottoman Empire was encouraged by some other Islamic states, such as the Hyderabad Nizamate of India and Durrani Empire of Afghanistan, to wage a war against Iran, the Ottoman Sultans preferred to remain committed to the existing treaties with their Eastern neighbour, and even advised these Islamic states to develop friendly relations with Iran.⁷⁴⁹ In sum, the first half of the eighteenth century was a period of war

 

⁷⁴⁶ Between 1723 and 1746, there were four Ottoman-Iranian wars fought between 1723-1727,

1730-1732, 1735-1736, and 1742-1746.

 

⁷⁴⁷ For a detailed analysis of Nader Khan’s campaigns against the Ottoman Empire see Stanford Shaw, “Iranian Relations with the Ottoman Empire in the Eighteenth and Nineteenth Centuries,” in Peter Avery, Gavin Hambly and Charles Melville (eds.), The Cambridge History of Iran, From Nader Shah to the Islamic Republic, 7 Volumes (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1991), Vol. 7, 297-313, 298-309.

 

⁷⁴⁸ After Nader Shah’s death Iran experienced a series of civil wars and impermanent governments under the short rules of Afsharid and Zand dynasties. This period could only come to an end with the establishment of Qajar rule in Iran in 1779. See Shaw, “Iranian Relations with the Ottoman Empire in the Eighteenth and Nineteenth Centuries”, 311.

 

⁷⁴⁹ During his reign, besides his campaigns against the Ottoman Empire, Nader Shah also attacked Afghanistan and India; therefore the Sunni Muslim dynasties ruling in these regions suffered much from Iranian aggressiveness. Immediately after Nader Shah’s death, the Nizam of Hyderabad, Qamer-ud-din Chin Kilidj Khan (r. 1720-1748), wrote a letter to the Ottoman Sultan Mahmud I (r. 1730-1748) in 1748 and encouraged him to initiate a religious/military campaign against the Shi’i Iran. Similarly, in 1762, the founder of Durrani dynasty as well as modern Afghanistan, Ahmed Shah Durrani (r. 1747-1773) wrote a letter to the Ottoman Sultan Mustafa III (r. 1757-1774) and demanded him to attack Iran as well. Both Sultans responded that they would follow the previous treaties with Iran. For these letters and the responses of the Ottoman

between Iran and the Ottoman Empire, and the lack of detailed border delimitation contributed much to the continuity of these wars, however, the second half of the century was a period of relative peace not because the border issue had been resolved, but because of other internal and external threats that these two empires had to face.

Besides the tribal and border problems, the third significant problem between the Ottoman Empire and Iran, which had descended from the early sixteenth century onwards, was the sectarian dispute between the Sunni and Shi’i communities of these states. Accordingly, since the onset of the Safavid threat, the Ottomans perceived Shi’i Islam quite negatively. The Shi’i propaganda over the nomadic Turcoman tribes of southern and eastern Anatolia in the first decades of the sixteenth century resulted in a significant uprising in 1511, which could hardly be suppressed. Particularly, the Ottomans had perceived this religious problem as one of the pretexts to engage in a war against a heretic sect for almost all the subsequent Ottoman-Safavid wars until the late seventeenth century.⁷⁵⁰ The perception of the Shi’i sect as a heresy continued until the eighteenth century; for example, in Revan Fetihnâmesi (The Letter of Conquest of Yerevan) written by Kemani Mustafa Ağa after the conquest of Revan in 1723, the Ottoman army was labelled as “the warriors fought in the name of Islam” (guzzât-ı Đslam) while the Iranian troops were labelled as “the enemy of the religion” (düşman-ı din).⁷⁵¹

The end of the Safavid dynasty and the enthronement of Nader Khan as the Shah of Iran in 1736 transformed the Sunni-Shi’i cleavage to a considerable degree. Because of his previous achievements such as the provision of internal

Sultans see Yusuf Hikmet Bayur, “Nadir Şah Afşar’ın Ölümünden Sonra Osmanlı Devleti’ni

Đran’ı Đstilaya Kışkırtmak Đçin Yapılan Đki Deneme,” Belleten, No. 46 (1948), 403-487.

 

⁷⁵⁰ For a brief analysis of Ottoman-Safavid relations see Feridun Emecen, “Osmanlı Devleti’nin ‘Şark Meselesi’nin Ortaya Çıkışı: Đlk Münasebetler ve Đç Yansımaları,” in Tarihten Günümüze Türk-Đran Đlişkileri Sempozyumu, 16-17 December 2002, Konya, (Ankara: Türk Tarih Kurumu Yayınları, 2003), 33-48.

 

⁷⁵¹ Münir Aktepe, 1720-1724 Osmanlı-Đran Münasebetleri ve Silahşör Kemani Mustafa Ağa’nın Revan Fetihnamesi, (Đstanbul: Đstanbul Üniversitesi Edebiyat Fakültesi Yayınları, 1970), 41.

stability and external security, Nader Shah had a significant legitimacy in the eyes of the Iranian people. Being aware of his legitimacy and strength, before his enthronement, he convened the representatives of the ulama, the governors and other prominent bureaucrats of the state, and told them that he would accept to be enthroned as the Shah of Iran only if the Iranians accepted to pay respect to the four caliphs after the prophet, to abandon the militant Safavid version of the Shi’i faith, and to adopt the Jafari sect, which was closer to the Sunni understanding of Islam. Although the ulama initially resisted these demands, they reluctantly seemed to accept them in order not to challenge the authority of Nader Shah.⁷⁵² After that, in the same year, Nader Shah sent an envoy to the Porte and demanded the Ottoman Empire to accept the Jafari sect as the fifth sect of Islam following the prophetic tradition (ehl-i sünnet).⁷⁵³ After consulting the Ottoman ulama, the government rejected this offer, and one of the Ottoman bureaucrats, the former defterdar (the official who heads the provincial treasury) of Yerevan and Baghdad, Mehmed Ragıb Efendi (1698-1763) was commissioned to write a pamphlet focusing on the abandonment of hostilities between Sunni and Shi’i sects, to establish friendly relations between Iran and the Ottoman Empire, and, if possible, to contribute to the unity of Islamic world through eliminating sectarian differences.⁷⁵⁴ Unfortunately, his pamphlet Tahkîk ve Tevfîk (Investigation and Adaptation) could not contribute to achieve these targets, since the rejection of Nader Shah’s proposal resulted in another Ottoman-Iranian war between 1742 and 1746. During the war, Nader Shah occupied one of the holy cities of the Shi’i sect, Najaf, and convened another assembly bringing together the Shi’i ulama from various countries in 1743. The result of this assembly was the same with the one held in 1736. Nader Shah once more declared the Jafari sect as the official sect of Iran and demanded the

⁷⁵² Mehmet Saray, Türk-Đran Đlişkileri, (Ankara: Atatürk Araştırma Merkezi Yayınları, 1999), 69.

 

⁷⁵³ The other four sects following the prophetic tradition were Hanafi, Shafii, Maliki and Hanbali

sects.

 

⁷⁵⁴ For the full text of this pamphlet see Ahmet Zeki Đzgöer, Tahkik ve Tevfik: Osmanlı-Đran Diplomatik Münasebetlerinde Mezhep Tartışmaları, (Đstanbul: Kitabevi, 2003).

Ottoman ulama to accept it as the fifth sect of Sunni version of Islam. The second rejection of these proposals by the Ottoman government intensified the war, which ended with a treaty reaffirming the borders reached at 1639, and excluding a provision with regard to the approval of the Jafari sect as the fifth sect of Islam.⁷⁵⁵

In sum, during the eighteenth century, both the Ottoman Empire and Iran wanted to end the Sunni-Shi’i cleavage; however the attempts were made in such a way that no outcome had emerged out of years of debate. Indeed, Nader Shah tried to end hostilities through legitimizing the Shi’i faith by making the Ottoman Empire accepted the Jafari sect as the fifth sect of Islam following the prophetic tradition. Ottomans, on the other hand, were reluctant and even reactive to do so for religious as well as political considerations. Instead, they wanted a solution resolving the differences between the Sunni and Shi’i sects and to create a unity rather than legitimizing the existing division through accepting a fifth sect. Since this unity would be established under the leadership of the sole legitimate religious authority, namely the Caliph, Iranians did not accept it. After Nader Shah’s death, the sectarian issue was not brought to the forefront until the late nineteenth century, when the Hamidian Pan-Islamism once more initiated the discussion of ending the division between the Sunni and Shi’i Islam.

The three problems between the Ottoman Empire and Iran, namely the shifting allegiances of the tribes, the lack of delimitation of the Ottoman-Iranian border and the sectarian cleavages continued during the nineteenth century as well. However, except for a brief war between 1820 and 1823, the relations were more tranquil if not peaceful. One significant reason for this transformation was the common external threats menacing both empires and their internal processes of modernization. During the nineteenth century, Ottoman Empire and Iran became the target of the Great Power rivalry, particularly between Russia and Britain. While Russia pursued the policy of reaching warm waters through the

⁷⁵⁵ Elton L. Daniel, The History of Iran, (Santa Barbara: Greenwood Press, 2000), 95. For a detailed analysis of Nader Shah’s policies of Jafari sect see Ernest Tucker, “Nader Shah and Jafari Maddhab Reconsidered,” Iranian Studies, Vol. 27, No. 1-4 (1994): 163-179.

Ottoman and/or Iranian soil and thereby cutting the British colonial route to India, Britain tried to prevent the realization of this policy. While the Ottoman Empire had to wage exhausting wars against Russia in the years 1806-1812, 1828-1829, 1853-1856, and 1876-1877, Iran had to fight with both Russia and Britain. The Russo-Iranian Wars of 1806-1813 and 1826-1828 resulted in the loss of significant Iranian territories in the Caucasus to Russia; this was followed by the Russian capture of some Iranian-controlled territories in Central Asia in the mid-nineteenth century. Iran also fought with Britain on the disputed territories in the Afghani-Iranian border between November 1856 and April 1857. All these wars with imperial powers depleted the financial resources of both empires and contributed to their decline.

On the other hand, these military defeats inflicted the idea of modernization in both Empires. The Ottoman modernization began to intensify by the turn of the nineteenth century under the rules of Selim III and Mahmud II, while Iran followed the suit during the tenure of Naser-ud-din Shah (r. 1848- 1896). The reasons and the paths of modernization for both empires were quite similar. Both of them accepted their military, technological and institutional deficiencies vis-à-vis Europe and thus perceived Europe both as a model of change and a significant threat to their very existence. This resulted in selective modernization; both empires tried to modernize without adopting the moral elements of European civilization. What is more, both of them started their modernization in the military field and then widen its scope to the institutional and educational structure of the respective empires. The establishment of modern institutional forms for better governance and modern schools for better education were the common paths they followed.⁷⁵⁶

However, the degree of modernization in the Ottoman Empire and Iran were not the same. According to Nikkie Keddie, the modernization of the

⁷⁵⁶ For a detailed account and literature of Ottoman modernization see Part III of this dissertation. For a brief introduction to Iranian modernization see Monica Rigger, “The Discourse on Modernization and the Problem of Cultural Integrity in the Nineteenth Century Iran,” in Rudi Matthee and Beth Baron (eds.), Iran and Beyond: Essays in Middle Eastern History in Honor of Nikkie R. Keddie, (Costa Mesa: Mazda Publishers, 2000), 56-69.

Ottoman Empire was earlier and more successful than Iran because of three factors:⁷⁵⁷ First of all, compared to the Ottoman Empire, nomadism was more prevalent in Iran. During the nineteenth century, as a result of Ottoman settlement policies, the number of nomads considerably declined in the Ottoman Empire; while in Iran the nomadic peoples constituted almost one third of the total Iranian population during most of the century.⁷⁵⁸ This lower degree of urbanization resulted in the slower dissemination of modernization into the society. Secondly, centralization and institutionalization was stronger in the Ottoman Empire compared to Iran; despite the internal problems of the Empire, there was dynastic continuity unlike its Eastern neighbour. More permanent state tradition resulted in a more continuous and courageous modernization in the Ottoman Empire. Finally, the Ottoman Empire’s relations with the West were more developed. Ottoman Empire had been open to European trade long before Iran; indeed the Iranian trade with the West was done through the Ottoman Empire. This facilitated the Ottoman encounter with Western modernization earlier than Iran. Taha Akyol adds a fourth factor contributing to earlier, faster and stronger modernization of the Ottoman Empire; he argues that the Hanafi jurisprudence, which the Ottoman legal system was based on, was more flexible compared to the rigidity of the Shi’i jurisprudence of Iran. In other words, in general, the Ottoman ulama were less reactive to modernization compared to the Shi’i ulama. Therefore, Ottoman legal transformation could be realized more easily compared to Iran.⁷⁵⁹

Although both the Ottoman Empire and Iran had to wage their attention and resources to encounter foreign encroachments in the external sphere and modernization in the internal sphere during the nineteenth century, the three

⁷⁵⁷ Nikkie R. Keddie, “Socio-economic Change in the Middle East since 1800,” in Abraham L. Udovitch, The Islamic Middle East, 700-1900: Studies in Economic and Social History, (Princeton: The Darwin Press, 1981), 765.

 

⁷⁵⁸ Nikkie R. Keddie and Mehrdad Amanad, “Iran under the Late Qajars, 1848-1922,” in Avery [et.al.] (eds.), The Cambridge History of Iran, Vol. 7, 174-212, 174.

 

⁷⁵⁹ Taha Akyol, Osmanlı’da ve Đran’da Mezhep ve Devlet, (Đstanbul: Doğan Yayıncılık, 1999), 195.

traditional problems (border disputes, borderlander tribes and Sunni-Shi’i cleavage) between these two empires did not come to an end. Starting with the tribes, the shifting allegiances of the nomadic tribes living in the border regions continued to be a major problem. Both states pursued the policy of hosting the tribes which had created several troubles in the neighbouring states.⁷⁶⁰ Similarly, the problem of delimitation of the border continued until the early twentieth century. The Ottoman-Iranian War of 1820-1823 ended with the Treaty of Erzurum, which once more confirmed the borders reached at 1639. However, the disputes over the control of Muhammarah and Shatt-al-Arab continued until the end of 1840s, when, through the mediation of the British and the Russians, a border delimitation commission was established in 1848. The commission’s studies continued for four years; however it failed to resolve the problem.⁷⁶¹ The only outcome of this commission for the purposes of this dissertation was a detailed travelogue on the borderland between two empires, written by one of the members of the Ottoman delegation, Mehmed Hurşid, and entitled Seyahâtnâme- i Hudûd (The Travelogue of the Borders).

In addition to the border delimitation and tribal questions, the Sunni-Shi’i cleavage continued during the nineteenth century as well.⁷⁶² The Treaty of Erzurum attempted to resolve several questions regarding this issue such as the

⁷⁶⁰ For example, after the Ottoman Empire appointed Halid Paşa the leader of Baban tribe of Iraq, as the governor of Suleymaniye in 1806 after the former governor Đbrahim Paşa, the nephew of Đbrahim Paşa from the same tribe, Abdurrahman Paşa, revolted against the Ottoman Empire in the early nineteenth century and after being defeated by the Governor of Baghdad, he fled to Iran. Although the Ottoman government demanded from its Iranian counterpart to return Abdurrahman Paşa, the then Iranian Shah, Feth Ali (r. 1797-1834), refused to do so. See Mehmet Saray, Türk-Đran Đlişkileri, 79-80.

 

⁷⁶¹ For a detailed study on the border delimitation commission, see Kashani-Sabet, “Fragile Frontiers: The Diminishing Domains of Qajar Iran;” Richard Schofield, “Narrowing the Frontier: Mid-Nineteenth Century Efforts to Delimit and Map the Perso-Ottoman Boundary,” in Roxane Farmanfarmaian (ed.), War and Peace in Qajar Persia: Implications Past and Present, (London and New York: Routledge, 2008), 149-173.

 

⁷⁶² For a detailed account of Ottoman apprehension of Shi’iism and Shi’i politics within the Ottoman Empire ,see Gökhan Çetinsaya, The Ottoman Administration of Iraq 1890-1908, (London: RoutledgeCurzon, 2005); Meir Litvak, Shi’i Scholars of Nineteenth Century Iraq, (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1998); Faruk Yaslıçimen, “Sunnism Versus Shi’ism? Rise of the Shi’i Politics and of The Ottoman Apprehension in Late Nineteenth Century Iraq,” Unpublished MA Thesis, (Ankara: Bilkent University, 2008).

free passage of Iranian pilgrims to Mecca, Medina and the holy Shi’i shrine cities in Ottoman Iraq, free trade of Iranian merchants in the Ottoman Empire and the opening of mutual diplomatic representations in Teheran and Đstanbul.⁷⁶³ However, particularly after the 1847 Treaty, which had confirmed these provisions, Iran intensified Shi’i propaganda in the Ottoman Empire, particularly in the region called Atabât-ı Âliye comprising the holy shrines of the Shi’i faith, such as Kazimeyn, Karbala, Najaf and Samarra. In this period, Ottoman government took some measures to prevent further Shi’i infiltration into the region such as the authorization of the Ottoman courts to handle with the legal cases between Iranian pilgrims coming to these holy shrines and the Ottomans, and the prohibition of land purchas by Iranians in these regions.⁷⁶⁴

In 1870, Iran was shattered by a significant famine and subsequent plague claiming the lives of one tenth of the Iranian population. Naser-ud-din Shah himself was among the survivors of the disease. After his recovery, he decided to pay a visit to the holy shrines in Iraqi provinces of the Ottoman Empire and demanded Ottoman permission. The Ottomans were initially reluctant; however they perceived this visit as an opportunity for better relations with their Eastern neighbour. Therefore, they gave permission to the Shah.⁷⁶⁵ This travel increased the hopes for normalization of relations with Iran, even some Ottoman newspapers began to mention about a prospective alliance and even the unity of these two Islamic states.⁷⁶⁶ However, particularly during Hamidian period, these hopes soon waned because of two significant problems, being the intensification of Shi’i propaganda activities in Iraq after Shah’s visit and the Iranian discontent about Hamidian policy of Pan-Islamism.

⁷⁶³ Saray, Türk-Đran Đlişkileri, 81.

 

⁷⁶⁴ Saray, Türk-Đran Đlişkileri, 85.

 

⁷⁶⁵ According to Hasan Fasai, who had recorded this travel along with other developments in Iran, “[t]he first shah to travel peacefully from Persia to Iraq to perform the pilgrimage to the shrines of Emams and without the intention of conquering that region, was Naser-ud-din Shah.” Hasan Fasai’s Farsname-i Naseri was translated and edited by Heribert Busse as History of Persia under Qajar Rule, (New York and London, Columbia University Press, 1972), 368.

 

⁷⁶⁶ Saray, Türk-Đran Đlişkileri, 89.

Gökhan Çetinsaya summarizes the reasons for the revival of the Shi’i problem in the late nineteenth century.⁷⁶⁷ To start with, he focuses on the highly politicized nature of the Iraqi Shi’i community due to a specific Shi’i school of jurisprudence called Usûlî, which had been widely adopted in the Iraqi provinces in the eighteenth century and which argued for an active political role for the Shi’i ulama. Secondly, he mentions about the British intervention into this problem by controlling a major source of revenue for the Shi’i shrines in Iraq called the “Oudh Bequest.”⁷⁶⁸ This external infringement irritated the Ottomans more regarding the Shi’i propaganda activities. Third, after Naser-ud-din Shah’s visit, the Shi’i mollas called akhund intensified their missionary zeal to convert Sunni inhabitants of Iraq into Shi’i. All these factors forced the Ottoman governments to take more effective steps to prevent the dissemination of Shi’iism in Iraq. They tried to prevent the publishing of pamphlets criticizing the Sunni faith, repaired the Shi’i holy shrines and adorned them with precious gifts, increased dialogue with the prominent Shi’i ulama, and opened new schools in the region to enhance the allegiance of the youth to the state and the Caliph himself.⁷⁶⁹

As the Ottomans were concerned about Iranian infiltration into the Iraqi provinces of the Empire, Iranians were discontent about the Hamidian policy of Pan-Islamism. Indeed, from the Safavid period onwards, Iran had always been sceptical about the projects on the Islamic unity; indeed, Iranian fear from being assimilated within the Islamic community encouraged the adoption of the Shi’i

⁷⁶⁷ Çetinsaya, The Ottoman Administration of Iraq 1890-1908, 99-101.

 

⁷⁶⁸ The Oudh Bequest had been established by the King of Oudh in India, and provided significant sums of money for the holy Shi’i shrines in Iraq. After the British annexation of this Kingdom, the British had assumed the responsibility of distribution of the bequest; hence they directly involved in the Shi’i problem of the Ottoman Empire. According to Meir Litvak, between 1850 and 1903, the Oudh Bequest channelled over six million rupees from India through British mediation, to the Shi’i shrine cities of Najaf and Karbala. See Meir Litvak, “A Failed Manipulation: The British, the Oudh Bequest and the Shi’i Ulama of Najaf and Karbala,” British Journal of Middle Eastern Studies, Vol. 27, No. 1 (May 2000): 69-89.

 

⁷⁶⁹ Gökhan Çetinsaya, “The Caliph and Mujtahids: Ottoman Policy towards the Shiite Community of Iraq in the Late Nineteenth Century,” Middle Eastern Studies, Vol. 41, No. 4 (July 2005): 561-574, 564; Saray, Türk-Đran Đlişkileri, 99-100.

sect in this country. In other words, they perceived their Shi’i faith as a means to preserve their identity. Therefore, the Hamidian call for Islamic unity was encountered quite negatively in Iran. Particularly, Abdülhamid’s use of Jamaladdin Afghani to provide Iran’s participation into a prospective Islamic unity resulted in significant reactions in Iran. Afghani was sent by Abdülhamid to Teheran to meet the Shah and theprominent Shi’i ulama, and delivered the Sultan’s message of eliminating sectarian differences through a religious assembly consisting of Sunni and Shi’i ulama. However, the Iranian refusal directed Afghani to end this conciliatory approach and to call for the dethronement of the Shah.⁷⁷⁰ This angered the Iranians more and the Shah demanded Abdülhamid to imprison Afghani or send him to exile. Abdülhamid temporarily send him to London and allowed him to continue his activities there; however, after the British government demanded Afghani to stop his anti-Shah stance, he hosted Afghani once more in Đstanbul. Finally, the assassination of the Shah by one of Afghani’s followers in 1896 disturbed mutual relations more.

In sum, during the nineteenth century, the Ottoman-Iranian relations were far from being peaceful; this contributed much to the mutual negative perceptions developed by the Ottomans and Iranians regarding themselves. Such negative appreciation of the Iranians by the Ottomans was quite evident in the travelogues of the Ottoman travellers.

 

11.2.       Ottoman Travellers’ Perception of Iran in the Nineteenth Century

Unlike North Africa and the Arab provinces of the Ottoman Empire in the Middle East, Iran had not been a major destination of travel for the Ottoman travellers in the nineteenth century despite its geographical proximity. Except for diplomats⁷⁷¹ and merchants, who had served or made trade in Iran, Ottoman

 

⁷⁷⁰ His speeches in Iran accusing the Shah of “selling Iran to the infidels” resulted in his exile from the country in 1891. For the activities of Afghani in Iran see Nikkie R. Keddie, “The Origins of the Religious-Radical Alliance in Iran,” Past & Present, No. 34 (Jul., 1966): 70-80, 75.

 

⁷⁷¹ For a brief account of Ottoman diplomatic representations in Iran in the nineteenth century see Nejat Göyünç, “XIX. Yüzyılda Tahran’daki Temsilcilerimiz ve Türk-Đran Münasebetlerine

travellers passed along this country to reach other destinations.⁷⁷² Their perception of Iran had been influenced from two main factors, being different levels of development of these two empires and their sectarian differences. It has already been mentioned that the Ottoman Empire and Iran had experienced different levels of modernization during the nineteenth century; Iranian modernization was relatively later, less effective and less continuous. When the Ottoman travellers saw Iran, they usually engaged in comparisons between these two empires in a way to emphasize the higher level of modernization of their own Empire. For example, in his memoirs, Abdülhak Hamid (1862-1937) referred to a conversation between Mirza Malkom Khan (1833-1908), the Iranian Ambassador to London, and Arifî Paşa (1830-1897), one of the Ottoman ministers (and later Grand Vizier).⁷⁷³ Accordingly, Malkom Khan stated that after seeing Đstanbul, he had found no difference between the Ottoman capital and Teheran. Arifî Paşa later told Abdülhak Hamid that it was not quite surprising that Malkom Khan could not discern the “extreme difference” (fark-ı azîm) between these two capitals because he is both Iranian and of Armenian descent.⁷⁷⁴ In other words, his pride emerged out of his identity prevented him to appreciate the grandeur of Đstanbul vis-à-vis Teheran. Similarly, Münif Paşa, who served as the Ottoman Ambassador to Teheran two times, ⁷⁷⁵ wrote in one of his despatches that he had been discontent about the situation of his country and complained about the dullness in terms of progress; however, when he saw

Etkileri,” Atatürk Konferansları, 6 Volumes, (Ankara: Türk Tarih Kurumu Yayınları, 1975), Vol. 5, 271-280.

 

⁷⁷² Süleyman Şükrü passed Iran and reached Russia, Mehmed Fazlı passed along Iranian-Afghan border to reach Afghanistan, and Mehmed Hurşid travelled along the Ottoman-Iranian frontier for border delimitation.

 

⁷⁷³ Abdülhak Hamid had been to Iran during his father Hayrullah Efendi’s (1818-1866) embassy to Teheran between 1865 and 1866. Therefore, his memoirs included his observations in Teheran and became an interesting source for Ottoman perception of Iran.

 

⁷⁷⁴ Enginün (ed.), Abdülhak Hâmid’in Hatıraları, 70.

 

⁷⁷⁵ Münif Paşa served as the Ottoman Ambassador to Teheran between 1873-1877 and 1895- 1897.

Iran, he thanked God for the level of progress of the Ottoman Empire because Iran’s conditions “[…] were beyond imagination both in terms of bad governance and in terms of misery and ravage”.⁷⁷⁶ In another despatch he wrote that the Iranian authorities had established an army division based on the Ottoman model; however they could not preserve the order of these troops unlike the Ottomans.⁷⁷⁷

Lack of proper governance and the rule of law in Iran was another matter of criticism in diplomatic despatches. In one of such correspondence with the Grand Vizier, Münif Paşa exaggeratingly noted that no law and rule existed in Iran.⁷⁷⁸ Similarly Mehmed Rebiî Paşa, who was sent within a diplomatic envoy bringing the medals and gifts of Sultan Abdülhamid to Muzaffer-üd-din Shah (r. 1896-1907), wrote in his report submitted to the Sultan that the “Iranian realm is totally devoid of any kind of reordering and reform.”⁷⁷⁹ In sum, these diplomats underlined different levels of modernization between two states, and argued that despite the shortcomings of its modernization, the Ottoman Empire was in a better condition compared to Iran in terms of legal and institutional structure. The ultimate emphasis of Tanzimat intellectuals on the establishment of a new legal basis for the Empire was quite visible in such comparisons. What is more, they mentioned about Iranian failure in imitating some of the Ottoman practices, particularly the failure of ensuring the continuity of these modernizing moves.

Another indication of the Iranian inferiority vis-à-vis the Ottoman Empire in terms of modernization was the lack of city planning and squalidity of Iranian buildings. In one of his despatches, Münif Paşa wrote that from his childhood, he

⁷⁷⁶ “[…] gerek su-i idârece ve gerek fakr-u harâbiyetçe tasavvur olunacak derecenin mâ- fevkindedir.” This despatch was published in the newspaper Uhuvvet-i Fikriye on June 26, 1330 (July 9, 1914). For the transcription of this letter see Özgül, Münif Paşa, 288.

 

⁷⁷⁷ This despatch is dated 6 Cemaziyülahir 1292 (10 July 1875); see Ali Budak, Münif Paşa, 34.

 

⁷⁷⁸ “Đran’da hiç bir şey içün kanun ve kaide olmayıb […]” This despatch is dated 16 Receb 1290 (9 September 1873); for its transcription see Özgül, Münif Paşa, 292.

 

⁷⁷⁹ “Memâlik-i Đraniyye her türlü tanzimât ve tensikâttan külliyen mahrum” For the transcription of this report dated 28 Nisan 1314 (10 May 1898) see Nejat Göyünç, “Muzafferüddin Şah ve II. Abdülhamid Devrinde Türk-Đran Dostluk Tezahürleri,” in Đran Şehinşahlığı’nın 2500. Kuruluş Yıldönümüne Armağan, (Đstanbul: Milli Eğitim Basımevi, 1971), 159-162, 161.

dreamed of Iran as a place like paradise, however he had been disappointed when he saw miserable conditions of this country.⁷⁸⁰ These conditions were not only peculiar to the houses of ordinary people, but also even to the mansions of the Shah. When Münif Paşa was heading towards Teheran for his diplomatic service, on the way, he had been hosted in the mansion of the Shah in one of the smaller cities of Iran; this mansion was labelled by himself as the “villager’s house.”⁷⁸¹

Besides diplomatic despatches, the Ottoman travellers perceived Iranian cities and buildings quite negatively. For example, according to Süleyman Şükrü, Iranian cities were in an extreme disorder and misery, there was no architectural monument attracting the attention of the travellers.⁷⁸² What is more, he criticized the Iranians for being unaware of city-planning. For example, with regard to Zanjan, he wrote that the inhabitants of the city had established a tannery at the banks of the river passing through the city and disturbed its entire panorama.⁷⁸³

Mehmed Fazlı’s description of Meshed was not much different from Süleyman Şükrü’s accounts. Accordingly, Mehmed Fazlı was welcomed by a local notable to be stayed in his house; he described the way to his house as such:

The narrow and terrible streets that we passed while we were going to this house and the walls standing each other as if they would fall down, in sum, all the things that we saw were so dismal that they created gloominess and sorrow, grief and lapsing regarding our ideas about the civilization of the holy Meshed.⁷⁸⁴

 

In other words, Mehmed Fazlı had been thinking that Meshed was a city representing a particular (Islamic) civilization; however the appearance of the

 

⁷⁸⁰ This despatch is dated 11 Rebiulevvel 1290 (9 May 1873), for its transcription see Özgül,

Münif Paşa, 283.

 

⁷⁸¹ Ali Budak, Münif Paşa, 413.

 

⁷⁸² “[…] nazara çarpacak mebanii ve menazili, beğenilecek hiç bir semti yoktur.” Karçınzade Süleyman Şükrü, Seyahat-i Kübra, 135, 139.

 

⁷⁸³ Karçınzade Süleyman Şükrü, Seyahat-i Kübra, 140.

 

⁷⁸⁴ Mehmed Fazlı, Resimli Afganistan Seyahâtnâmesi, 33.

city disappointed him about the degree of civility of this city, which had been perceived as equally sacred by the Sunni and Shi’i communities.