Christopher Whitehead @AkbashEfendi

PhD from @OhioState studying the 17th-century Ottomans. 2024-25 NEH-ARIT postdoctoral fellow. Joined July 2020

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Paul Babinski @Paul_Babinski

8 months ago

The three languages of Ottoman learning: notes on Turkish grammar (with the conjugation of "sevmek", to love) recorded by the English orientalist John Greaves (1602-1652) on the flyleaf of a Persian-language grammar of Arabic, also annotated by Greaves. Bodleian, ms Pococke 28.

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Christopher Whitehead @AkbashEfendi

10 months ago

A scribe's (grimly optimistic) estimate of the number of Celali rebels killed during the campaigns of Kuyucu Murad Pasha in 1607-9: 126,690 people, listed according to which Celali leader they fought under.

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Christopher Whitehead @AkbashEfendi

10 months ago

Marmara Üniversitesi'nde (@TarihMarmara) konuşmayı organize eden arkadaşım Ayşegül Çimen’e teşekkür ediyorum, çok verimli bir sunum oldu sayesinde! youtube.com/watch?v=TkSoz3…

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Christopher Whitehead @AkbashEfendi

11 months ago

In the early 1700s, the ruler of the Georgian principality of Imereti told a janissary clerk that he was descended from the Biblical David. The clerk was skeptical, so looked it up in Yaqut's (d. 1229) Mu'jam al-Buldan, and concluded that this "David" was actually a Seljuk ruler.

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MarmaraTarihBölümü @TarihMarmara

11 months ago

Hatırlatma! Yarın saat 12:00'de Christopher Whitehead’i (@AkbashEfendi) misafir edeceğiz. Zoom Canlı Yayın Linki: bit.ly/3Twbey1

MarmaraTarihBölümü @TarihMarmara

12 months ago

Hatırlatma! Yarın saat 12:00'de Christopher Whitehead’i (@AkbashEfendi) misafir edeceğiz. Zoom Canlı Yayın Linki: bit.ly/3Twbey1

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Christopher Whitehead @AkbashEfendi

11 months ago

I'm happy to announce the publication of my article "The Early Career of Köprülü Mehmed Pasha: An Archival Reconstruction" in Review of Middle East Studies @RevoMES, open access here: bit.ly/4ezjhSv

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Paolo Sartori @PaoloSa86346296

a year ago

Summer's gone and we're back with a new #SICE blogpost about conversions and imperial history. Giorgio Rota takes us to the Caucasus, Iran and Russia to follow the exploits of Giorgi Saakadze , Aleksandr Kazembek, and Semën Atarshchikov, here at 👇👇👇 oeaw.ac.at/sice/sice-blog…

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Christopher Whitehead @AkbashEfendi

a year ago

"During summertime, the only person left in the castles in the interior of the country are the garrison commanders; everybody else leaves to take care of their own business. There are even some castles where, in the evening, the only guard is a single slave woman." (1573)

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Christopher Whitehead @AkbashEfendi

a year ago

Back in 2019, I planned to live in Istanbul for a year of dissertation research. Then Covid happened, and I had to leave early. Thanks to a fellowship from NEH-ARIT, I can finally make up the time. It's good to be back.

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Christopher Whitehead @AkbashEfendi

a year ago

A man who spent his youth as a page in Topkapı Palace reports that the first thing he did when he was finally allowed to leave (~1603) was to go home to see his mom, because he missed her: "Niçe niçe yıllardır ki valideciğime gayetle hasret olmağla valide du'acınıza gidüp...."

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Christopher Whitehead @AkbashEfendi

a year ago

Working on a new source, an account by an Ottoman official on the Georgian frontier in the 1720s. He absolutely hated the Georgians, but says they're loved by the people of the Black Sea: "Bu Karadeniz yalısında olan halk ekseri Gürcistan tarafını tutarlar, bu meşhur meseldir."

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Christopher Whitehead @AkbashEfendi

a year ago

And it wasn't just janissaries: in Saida and Beirut, even "fortress guards, musketeers, mercenaries, and followers of the Druze chiefs" claimed immunity from taxation (1654). There was a lot of disagreement in Ottoman society over exactly which groups deserved what privileges.