A History of Ottoman Political Thought Up to the Early Nineteenth Century - (Handbook of Oriental Studies: Section 1; The Near and Middle East)

About the Book

In A History of Ottoman Political Thought up to the Early Nineteenth Century, Marinos Sariyannis offers a survey of Ottoman political literature, from its beginnings until the beginning of the Tanzimat reforms.

Book Synopsis

In A History of Ottoman Political Thought up to the Early Nineteenth Century, Marinos Sariyannis offers a survey of Ottoman political texts, examined in a book-length study for the first time. From the last glimpses of gazi ideology and the first instances of Persian political philosophy in the fifteenth century until the apologists of Western-style military reform in the early nineteenth century, the author studies a multitude of theories and views, focusing on an identification of ideological trends rather than a simple enumeration of texts and authors. At the same time, the book offers analytical summaries of texts otherwise difficult to find in English.

Review Quotes

[...] 'The last paragraph of the book, and especially its questions for further research, is a reminder of the fact that we are still at the beginning of a long journey of exploring the interplay between ideas and realities that shaped the human experience of the Ottoman centuries. In this regard, this book constitutes an encouraging first step toward a richer understanding of the intellectual and cultural history of the Ottoman Middle East and Balkans.'

Deniz T. Kılınçoğlu, in Wiener Zeitschrift Für Die Kunde Des Morgenlandes. Vol. 110 (2020), pp. 406-408



'A History of Ottoman Political Thought up to the Early Nineteenth Century by Marinos Sariyannis (and a chapter by E. Ekin Tuşalp Atiyas) is a major contribution to research on Ottoman intellectual history and an essential reference work on the development of Ottoman political thought. Traditionally, the field of intellectual history has not been a key focus of Ottoman historians, though there have been some classic monographs which address particular themes, works, or authors. This volume, however, is almost unprecedented in its broad scope and deep reading of authors who wrote over the course of more than four centuries of Ottoman intellectual history, and it is the first systematic effort to reconstruct the broad history of pre-modern Ottoman political thought.'[...]

Henry Shapiro, Jerusalem, in Orientalistische Literaturzeitung, 114-6 (2019), Islam, pp. 471-473

"A stunning accomplishment in that field. [...] The book is extensive in scope and rich with issues needing to be addressed." By Linda T. Darling in the Journal of the American Oriental Society 141/4 (2021)

"This book should have been published decades ago. [...] Based on both primary and secondary sources, the book provides a rich account of Ottoman thought in historical context. [...] it breaks new grounds for thinking and research by bringing together the scattered resources of the field in a highly analytical fashion." Deniz T. Kılınçoğlu in Wiener Zeitschrift Für Die Kunde Des Morgenlandes 110 (2020)

"A History of Ottoman Political Thought up to the Early Nineteenth Century by Marinos Sariyannis (and a chapter by E. Ekin Tuşalp Atiyas) is a major contribution to research on Ottoman intellectual history and an essential referencework on the development of Ottoman political thought. [...] The authors have made a major contribution and done a valuable service to their field." Henry Shapiro in Orientalistische Literaturzeitung 114/6 (2019)

About the Author

Marinos Sariyannis, Ph.D. (2005), Aristotelian University of Thessaloniki, is Research Director at the Institute for Mediterranean Studies/FORTH, Rethymno, Greece. He has published several articles on Ottoman history and culture.
E. Ekin Tuşalp Atiyas, Ph.D. (2014), Harvard University, is Assistant Professor of Humanities at Boğaziçi University, Istanbul. She focuses on seventeenth-century Ottoman social and intellectual history. She is contributing a chapter to this book.