The Ottomans and the Balkans: A Discussion of Historiography (Ottoman Empire and Its Heritage) (Ottoman Empire and It's Heritage)

456 Pages·2002·27.09 MB·English

by  Fikret Adanir

THE OTTOMANS AND THE BALKANS
THE OTTOMAN EMPIRE
AND ITS HERITAGE
Politics, Society and Economy
EDITED BY
SURAIYA FAROQHI AND HALIL INALCIK
Advisory Board
Fikret Adanir • Idris Bostan • Amnon Cohen • Cornell Fleischer
Barbara Flemming • Alexander de Groot • Klaus Kreiser
Hans Georg Majer • Irene Melikoff • Ahmet Ya§ar Ocak
Abdeljelil Temimi • Gilles Veinstein • Elizabeth Zachariadou
VOLUME 25
THE OTTOMANS
AND
THE BALKANS
A Discussion of Historiography
EDITED BY
FIKRET ADANIR
AND
SURAIYA FAROQHI
BRILL
LEIDEN • BOSTON • KOLN
2002
This book is printed on acid-free paper.
Library of Congress Gataloging-in-Publication Data
The Ottomans and the Balkans : a discussion of historiography / edited by Fikret
Adanir & Suraiya Faroqhi.
p. cm. — (The Ottoman Empire and its heritage, ISSN 1380-6067 ;
v. 25)
Includes bibliographical references and index.
ISBN 9004119027 (hard cover : alk. paper)
1. Balkan Peninsula—Relations—Turkey—Historiography. 2. Turkey-
-Relations—Balkan Peninsula—Historiography. I. Adanir, Fikret. II. Faroqhi,
Suraiya, 1941- III. Series.
DR38.3.T9 O88 2002
949.6'02'072—dc21 2001037791
CIP
Die Deutsche Bibliothek - CIP-Einheitsaufhahme
The Ottomans and the Balkans : a discussion of historiography / ed. by
Fikret Adanir & Suraiya Faroqhi. - Leiden ; Boston ; Koln : Brill, 2002
(The Ottoman Empire and its heritage ; Vol. 25)
ISBN 90-04-11902-7
ISSN 1380-6076
ISBN 9004119027
© Copyright 2002 by Komnklijke Brill NV, Leiden, The Netherlands
All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, translated, stored in
a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic,
mechanical, photocopying, recording or otherwise, without prior written
permission of the publisher.
Authorization to photocopy items for internal or personal
use is granted by Brill provided that
the appropriate fees are paid directly to The Copyright
Clearance Center, Rosewood Drive 222, Suite 910
Danvers MA 01923, USA
Fees are subject to change.
PRINTED IN THE NETHERLANDS
CONTENTS
Acknowledgements vii
Introduction
Suraiya Faroqhi and Fikret Adamr 1
Chapter One. Bad Times and Better Self: Definitions of
Identity and Strategies for Development in Late Ottoman
Historiography, 1850-1900
Christoph Neumann
Chapter Two. Research Problems concerning the
Transition to Tourkokratia: the Byzantinist Standpoint
Klaus-Peter Matschke
Chapter Three. The Ottoman Empire in the Historiography
of the Kemalist Era: a Theory of Fatal Decline
Bii§ra Ersanh
Chapter Four. Non-Muslim Minorities in the
Historiography of Republican Turkey: the Greek Case
Hercules Millas
Chapter Five. Ottoman Rule Experienced and
Remembered: Remarks on Some Local Greek Chronicles
of the Tourkokratia
Johann Strauss
Chapter Six. Islamization in the Balkans as a
Historiographical Problem: the Southeast-European
Perspective
Antonina
Chapter Seven. The Formation of a 'Muslim' Nation in
Bosnia-Hercegovina: a Historiographic Discussion
Fikret Adamr
VI CONTENTS
Chapter Eight. Hungarian Studies in Ottoman History
David and Pal Fodor
Chapter Nine. Coping with the Central State, Coping with
Local Power: Ottoman Regions and Notables from the
Sixteenth to the Early Nineteenth Century
Suraiya Faroqhi
List of contributors
Bibliography
Index
ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS
In the course of putting together this volume, we have accumulated
quite a few debts. One of the most important is to Jeanne Adamr,
without whose help during the editing process, this volume would
still be a sheaf of unedited paper. She also has translated the arti-
cle by Klaus-Peter Matschke from the original German. On the
Bochum end, Christian Mady's help has been much appreciated,
especially with the Hungarian material, and Kerstin Engelbrecht and
Nicole Opa^chi also have contributed a great deal. As for the Munich
part of the operation, Ban§ Qali§an patiently has dealt with abstruse
library requests. Our thanks also go to Halil Inalcik, Gudrun Krae-
mer, Klaus Kreiser and Christoph K. Neumann, who have provided
many valuable suggestions with respect to content. Apart from the
material aid given, all these people's friendliness and good humor
have been a source of joy and inspiration.
We are grateful to our contributors as well; some of them have
waited patiently for many years. We also admire the energy of those
who have produced articles at very short notice. All of our fellow
workers have put up with our sometimes intrusive editing suggestions,
and we can never thank them enough for their spirit of cooperation.
This page intentionally left blank
INTRODUCTION
SURAIYA FAROQHI AND FIKRET ADANIR
In the present volume, the authors hope to contribute to the ongo-
ing discussion of historiography concerning the Ottoman Empire,
focusing on issues in one way or another relevant to the history of
southeastern Europe. Such an enterprise must be viewed in the con-
text of our discipline's self-examination, which has been going on
for more than twenty years, since Edward Said published his scathing
critique of 'orientalism'. Admittedly, Said's book but marginally
addressed itself to the work of Ottomanists; yet it did not fail to
make an impact on many thoughtful representatives of our field.1
In a different vein, our questioning also has been directed at the
performance of national states in general, with those established in
southeastern Europe, present-day Turkey included, as the center of
attention. This questioning has gained in urgency due to the con-
flicts of recent years. Given the political context, present-day rethink-
ing of Ottoman history will often include a re-examination of sultanic
policies vis-a-vis dissident provincials, with special emphasis on those
political measures evaluated negatively in the past.2 Conflicts encour-
aging such a re-evaluation of the performance of both multi-ethnic
empires and national states include the Cyprus war of 1974, the
Lebanon conflagration (1975-1990), repressive measures against the
Muslim minority in Bulgaria culminating in the mass expulsion of
1989, serious military confrontations in eastern Anatolia, and espe-
cially the horrors of the war in former Yugoslavia, of which the
1 Edward Said, Orientalism (New York, 1978). For much pertinent criticism of
Ottomanists' assumptions, see Rifa'at A. Abou-El-Haj, Formation of the Modem State,
The Ottoman Empire, Sixteenth to Eighteenth Centuries (Albany NY, 1991). For a recent
evaluation of primary and secondary sources on Ottoman history see Klaus Kreiser,
Der osmanische Staat 1300-1922 (Munich, 2001).
2 Engin Akarli, The Long Peace, Ottoman Lebanon 1861-1920 (Berkeley, 1993). For
a different perspective, see Ariel Salzmann, "An Ancien Regime Revisited: 'Priva-
tization' and Political Economy in the Eighteenth-century Ottoman Empire," Poli-
tics and Society 21,4 (1993), 393-423, and also Karen Barkey, Bandits and Bureaucrats,
the Ottoman Route to State Centralization (Ithaca, London, 1994).