Sources and Methods for Early Modern Ottoman History

Course content

This course aims to introduce students to critical issues and sources on Ottoman history from the 15th to the beginning of the 18 th century. Building upon research based on Ottoman state archives and using recent historiographical methodology on Ottoman history, the course analyses key themes, works, ideas and people on early modern Ottoman Empire. The will be three main sections, Historiography, Themes and Sources. In the Historiography section, Ottoman histariographical tradition until 1453 and the era of Suleyman the Magnificant will be analysed in seperate lectures. The decline paradigm and the transformation of the eighteenth century will form the subject matter for another two lectures. In the Themes section, Ottoman-European interactions, the issues of legitimacy, literacy and intellectual accumulation will be studied while introducing literary and artistics genres such as sefaretnames, surnames, nasihatnames and manuscript collections. In the Sources section, Ottoman chronicles and history writers as well as European travel writing literature will be analysed. Two seperate lectures will be devoted to Ottoman primary sources such as Mühimme-Ahkam defterleri, Şeriyye Sicilleri and Tereke Defterleri.