Imperial Meanderings and Republican By-Ways Robert Olson The Isis Press
I am delighted to present these twenty essays in the Isisiana Series. The seven articles in Part I deal with eighteenth century Ottoman topics. These essays are concerned particularly with the Tulip Period (Lille Devri), its consequences and the Ottoman-Iranian wars of the first half of the eighteenth century. Articles 1, 2 and 3 discuss aspects of the role of the Jews in the developments during this period, especially after the Patrona Halil rebellion in 1730. These three articles, along with article 1 in Part II which also deals with an aspect of Jewish-Young Turk relations, were attempts, at the time when I wrote them, to revise the then held views in the obtaining historiography. The other four articles, nos. 4, 5, 6 and 7 are concerned ...
Robert Olson (b. 1940) received his B. S. Degree from Bemidji State College in 1958 and his M. A. (1967) and Ph. D. (1973) from Indiana University. He is the author of The Siege of Mosul and Ottoman-Persian Relations, 1718-1743: A Study of Rebellion in the Capital and War in the Provinces of the Ottoman Empire (Bloomington, IN: Indiana University Press, 1975); The Ba'th and Syria, 1947-1979: An Interpretative Historical Essay (Rome: The Middle East Institute: 1980); The Ba’th in Syria, 1947-1982: The Evolution of Ideology, Party and State from the French Withdrawal to the Era of Hafiz al-Asad (Princeton, NJ: The Kingston Press, 1983); The Emergence of Kurdish Nationalism and the Sheikh Said Rebellion, 1880-1925 (Austin: University of Texas Press, 1989); The Emergence of Kurdish Nationalism, 1880-1891 (paperback of above). Dr. Olson is the editor of The Kurdish Nationalism Movement in the 1990s: Its Impact on Turkey and the Middle East (Lexington, KY: University Press of Kentucky, 1997); Islamic and Middle Eastern Societies (Brattleboro, VT; Amana Books, 1987); and co-editor of Iran: Essays on a Revolution in the Making (Lexington, KY: Mazda Press, 1981); Orientalism, Islam and Islamists (Brattleboro, VT: Amana Books, 1984). Three of Professor Olson's books have been translated into Arabic and Turkish. He is the author of some 75 research articles and numerous essays on Middle Eastern topics. Dr. Olson teaches Middle East and Islamic History at the University of Kentucky in Lexington, Kentucky in the United States.
Table of Contents
Notes on transliteration and spelling / X Preface / XI Introduction / XIII
Part I. Essays on Eighteenth Century Ottoman History 1. "The Esnaf and the Patrona Halil Rebellion of 1730: A Realignment in Ottoman Politics?" Journal of Economic and Social History of the Orient, vol. XVII, Part 3 (1974), 329-44 / 1
2 "Jews, Janissaries, Esnaf and the Revolt of 1740 in Istanbul: Social Upheaval and Political Realignment in the Ottoman Empire, "Journal of the Economic and Social History of the Orient, vol. XX, Part II (1977), 185-207 / 13
3. "Jews in the Ottoman Empire and Their Role in Light of New Documents: Addenda and Revisions to Gibb and Bowen," Tarih Dergisi, no. 7-8 (1976-77), 119-44. / 33
4. "The Ottoman Empire in the Middle of the Eighteenth Century and the Fragmentation of Tradition: Relations of the Nationalities (Millets, Guilds, Esnaf) and the Sultan in the Ottoman Empire," Die Welt des Islams, vol. XVII, 1-4 (1977), 72-77 / 55
5. "Some Comments on Eighteenth Century Ottoman Historiography, in Islamic and Middle Eastern Societies: A Festschrift in Honor of Professor Wadie Jwaideh, edited by Robert Olson (Amana Press, 1987), 137-51 / 61
6. "The Ottoman-French Treaty of 1740: A Year to be Remembered? The Turkish Studies Association Bulletin, vol. 15, no. 2 (September 1991), 347-56 / 75
7. "Conclusion," of The Siege of Mosul and Ottoman-Persian Relations, 1718-1743; A Study of Rebellion in the Capital and War in the Provinces of the Ottoman Empire (Indiana University Press, 1975), 185-202 / 83
Part II. Twentieth Century History of Turkey
1. "The Young Turks and the Jews: A Historiographical Revision," Turcica, vol. XVII (1986), 219-35 / 101
2. "The Remains of Talat: A Dialectic Between Republic and Empire," Die Welt des Islams, vol. XXVI (1986), 46-56 / 119
3. "Five Stages of Kurdish Nationalism: 1880-1980," Journal of Muslim Minority Affairs, vol. XII, no. 2 (July 1991), 391-409 / 127
4. "The Second Time Around: British Policy Towards the Kurds (1921-22), Die Welt des Islams, XXVII (1987), 91-102 / 147
5. "The Churchill-Cox Correspondence and the 'Battle' over Kurdistan: Its Consequences for British Policy Towards Turkey from 1921-1923," International Journal of Turkish Studies, vol. 5, nos. 1 & 2 (Winter, 1990-91), 121-36 / 157
6. "The International Consequences of the Sheikh Sait Rebellion," in Naqshbandis: Cheminements et situation actuelle d'un ordre mystique musulman, edited by March Gaborieau, Alexandre Popovic et Thierry Zarcone (Istanbul: Editions Isis, 1990), 379- 406 / 175
7. "Foreign Policy of the Soviet Union toward the Turkoman Rebellion in Eastern Iran in 1924-1925 and the Kurdish Rebellion of Shaykh Said in Eastern Turkey in 1925: A Comparison," Central Asian Survey, vol. 9, no. 4 (1990), 75-83 / 203
8. "Kurds and Turks: Two Documents Concerning Kurdish Autonomy in 1922 and 1923," Journal of South Asian and Middle Eastern Studies, vol. XV, no. 2 (1991), 20-31 / 213
9. "Al-Fatah in Turkey: Its Influence on the 12 March Coup," Middle Eastern Studies, vol. 9, no. 2 (May 1973), 197-205 / 225
10. "The Kurdish Question in the Aftermath of the Gulf War: Geopolitical Geostrategic Changes in the Middle East," Third World Quarterly, vol. 13, no. 3 (1992), 475-99 / 237
11. "The Kurdish Question and the Kurdish Problem: Some Geopolitic and Geostrategic Comparisons," in Peuples Mdditerraneens, no. 68-69 Les Kurdes et Les Etats (July-December, 1994), 215-41 / 267
12. "The Kurdish Question and Turkey's Foreign Policy, 1991-1995: From the Gulf War to the Incursion Into Iraq," Journal of South Asian and Middle Eastern Studies, vol. XIX, no. 1 (Fall, 1995), 1-30 / 293
13. "The Kurdish Question and Chechnya: Turkish and Russian Foreign Policies Since the Gulf War: Middle East Policy, vol. IV, no. 3 (1996), 106-18 / 319
PREFACE
I am delighted to present these twenty essays in the Isisiana Series. The seven articles in Part I deal with eighteenth century Ottoman topics. These essays are concerned particularly with the Tulip Period (Lille Devri), its consequences and the Ottoman-Iranian wars of the first half of the eighteenth century. Articles 1, 2 and 3 discuss aspects of the role of the Jews in the developments during this period, especially after the Patrona Halil rebellion in 1730. These three articles, along with article 1 in Part II which also deals with an aspect of Jewish-Young Turk relations, were attempts, at the time when I wrote them, to revise the then held views in the obtaining historiography.
The other four articles, nos. 4, 5, 6 and 7 are concerned primarily with the ideas of change, continuity, traditionalism, modernism, dependency, political economy, ’decline’ and attempts to periodize these ideas and theories with regard to the first half of the eighteenth century. I present these essays here as they, I like to think, presaged many of the same topics that became so hotly debated from the 1970s to the 1990s.
All of the articles in Part II, with two exceptions, deal with Ottoman-Kurdish, Turkish-Kurdish and Kurdish history.
In order that the articles appear in terms of content as closely as possible to the originals there is some redundancy. I thought it best not to cull all extraneous materials so that the reader and researcher would have full access to all notes and appendices. For example, I have included Everard Fawkener's 1740 despatch to the Duke of Newcastle, the British Foreign Secretary, in both articles 2 and 3. On a few occasions I have had to insert a word or two to clarify my views. For example, in article 3 in Part II, I have indicated that I do not think that Sheikh Ubaydallah was a nationalist. I disagree with Wadie Jwaideh on this point.
Inevitably in articles, such as nos. 10-13, which deal with similar topics, there are redundancies that could not be eliminated without major rewriting entailing substantial expense. This would have defeated the purpose of presenting this collection of essays to a wider audience with the least possible cost.
Robert Olson
Introduction
Imperial meanderings is an apt title for the articles included in Part I. It was while I was a peace corps volunteer in Turkey in the early 1960s teaching in Salihli in the Gediz river valley just across the Bozdag mountain range from the Meander, now named Menderes, river valley that I first fell in love with the civilizations, history, cultures and languages of the peoples of Turkey and the Middle East. When I had a few days off or a vacation I loved to meander through, the Greek, Roman, Byzantine, Seljuk and Ottoman ruins as well as the still, existing buildings. In a one day excursion from Salihli I could reach Ephesus, Aphrodisias, Miletus, Didyma, Hierapolis, Pamukkale, Manisa and Alaşehir among many other places of interest. With a week's vacation I was able to reach Istanbul and see the mighty mosques of the Ottomans. Then, I was hooked for good. From that time onwards, my meanderings have never ceased.
In order to encompass the broadest possible swath of my interests I decided to pursue a graduate program in Ottoman studies. I was interested especially in the eighteenth century and the role the Arab provinces of the empire played in the Ottoman-Iranian wars of the second quarter of that century. When I commenced my graduate work in 1965, Ottoman studies was still dominated by imperial, political and administrative studies with a strong Eurocentric and Balkan bias. For that reason I determined to study Ottoman relations with Iran and the impact of those relations on the political economy of the empire. My intention was to study the periphery in order to define more accurately the center. The essays comprising Part I deal with these efforts.
Even though I commenced this research more than twenty-five years ago, I was delighted to learn upon reading Ariel Salzman's, "An Ancien Regime Revisited: 'Privatization' and Political Economy in the Eighteenth Century Ottoman Empire," (Politics & Society, vol. 21, no. 4 (1993), 393-424) excellent and award winning article in which she critiques much of the scholarly literature regarding different interpretations of eighteenth century Ottoman political economy over the past half century, that she credits my work as attempting "to sort out the parties and issues-taxes, credit, promotion to offices and malikane-involved in these events," i.e. the period from 1703 to 1768.1 still think, however, even after 25 years, that historians of the eighteenth century have given short shrift to the impact the Safavid and Afsharid empires had on the…
Robert Olson
Imperial Meanderings and Republican By-Ways
The Isis Press
The Isis Press Analecta Isisiana XXIII Imperial Meanderings and Republican By-Ways Essays on Eighteenth Century Ottoman and Twentieth Century History of Turkey Robert Olson
