Chapter 10 From the ‘Scribe of Satan’ to the ‘Master of Belâgât’: Ottoman Chief Scribes and the Rhetorics of Political Survival in the Seventeenth Century
In: Dimensions of Transformation in the Ottoman Empire from the Late Medieval Age to Modernity
Author:
Ekin Tuşalp-Atiyas
Ekin Tuşalp-Atiyas
Search for other papers by Ekin Tuşalp-Atiyas in
Current site
Google Scholar
PubMed
Search for other papers by Ekin Tuşalp-Atiyas in
Current site
Google Scholar
PubMed
Purchase instant access (PDF download and unlimited online access):
Abstract
In this chapter, Ekin Tuşalp-Atiyas describes the careers of two Ottoman chief scribes Şâmîzâde Mehmed (d.1663) and Râmi Mehmed (d.1708). Both men lived in the tumultuous socio-political milieu of the seventeenth century. Their lives and careers were shaped by the peculiar household (kapı) politics of the era and the patronage networks produced therein. The author studies the literature produced about their controversial legacies and tracks down the historical dynamics that first rendered them politically and culturally valuable and later totally dispensable.