Writing History at the Ottoman Court

Ottoman historical writing of the 15th and 16th centuries played a significant role in fashioning Ottoman identity and institutionalizing the dynastic state structure during this period of rapid imperial expansion. This volume shows how the writing of history achieved these effects by examining the implicit messages conveyed by the texts and illustrations of key manuscripts. It answers such questions as how the Ottomans understood themselves within their court and in relation to non-Ottoman others; how they visualized the ideal ruler; how they defined their culture and place in the world; and what the significance of Islam was in their self-definition.

Review:

[T]he rich and nuanced exposition of the wide range of texts and images explored . . . that constitutes [the] valuable contributions to scholarship.June 2014

[T]his volume's great strength is its many original contributions to the study of the long sixteenth century. Those looking for the freshest new work on the classical age, along with a wonderful essay on nineteenth-century Ottoman historiography, will find this book a rich read.

Collectively, the essays in the volume merit recognition in their effort to recover the lesser-heard voices of Ottoman historiography while engaging with the question of how history writing was used in constructing, questioning, and negotiating what constituted 'Ottomanness' at certain critical historical moments. In so doing, the volume contributes to a wider understanding of the contexts of textual and visual production, reading, and using history that extend beyond the confines of the Ottoman Empire.

The cliche 'a gem of a book' holds true for this volume, as it is the crystallized form of seven Ottoman specialists' groundbreaking, extensive research.

[T]his edited book is highly recommended to scholars who are interested in early modern and modern Ottoman history writing.

[These essays] make a significant contribution to a relatively new strand of Ottoman research that takes as its subject Ottoman reading communities, literacy practices, and the roles that particular texts played in Ottoman society.

Each article has the potential to spark lively academic discussion and offer alternative vistas in Ottoman historiography . . . Such ground-breaking edited volumes will set the intellectual agenda for future studies as long as they adopt a rigorous methodological approach, as this volume clearly does.