Review

Author(s): Caroline Finkel

Review by: Caroline Finkel
Source: Bulletin of the School of Oriental and African Studies, University of London, Vol. 60,
No. 1 (1997), pp. 142-143
Published by: Cambridge University Press on behalf of School of Oriental and African Studies
Stable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/620793
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142 REVIEWS
system of their empire and hastened the Ottoman antecedents-Roman, Byzantine and
progress of its decline' (p. 192). Islamic-as well as of the conditions inherited
There are several diagrams and maps, the by the Ottomans in the lands over which they
most useful of which illustrate the Mamluk came to rule; this inheritance shaped Ottoman
Anatolian frontier in the second half of the rural organization in all its geographic vari-
ninth/fifteenth century (p. 46), Mamluk opera- ation. Inalcik's chapters on trade are of the
tions in the Taurus Mountains in 892/1487 utmost importance in that they add to the
(p. 150), and the Ottoman capture of Cilicia in familiar silk route a thorough analysis of routes
893/1488 (p. 166). The map of the Ottoman that are all too easily forgotten. He shows that
and Mamluk empires in the second half of the trading relations with the Black Sea region and
ninth/fifteenth century (p. 5) anachronistically Eastern Europe, as well as with the Persian
shows the Funj sultanate, which did not then Gulf and India, were vital to the Ottoman
exist. Some of the illustrations are also ana- economy in its early centuries. Inalcik also
chronistic: 'A Mamluk palace in Cairo' deals in detail with the political context within
(p. 155), and 'A Mamluk in full armour' which such trading relations functioned, indic-
(p. 170), show the neo-Mamluk domestic archi- ating how closely diplomatic activity was linked
tecture and panoply of the eighteenth and early to commercial considerations.
nineteenth centuries. Suraiya Faroqhi's section on the economic
One regrets to close with criticism of a and social history of the years 1590-1699 is
book which is so comprehensive in scope and prefaced by a useful chapter on the major
important in content, but no reader can fail to political events of the century--these are well-
observe the numerous and avoidable slips chosen and succinctly summarized. Like Inalcik
which disfigure its text. As a few examples out she is an extremely prolific writer, breaking
of many, one may instance the transformation new ground on many fronts, and here she has
of biographical dictionaries into 'bibliograph- the opportunity to bring together the fruits of
ical dictionaries' (p. 23), of a methodical survey her years of empirical research. In the course
into 'a methodological survey' (p. 64), of the of her contribution she clarifies the current
Ottoman Drang nach Osten into a more state of debate on the various topics which she
laborious drag nach osten (p. 60), and of casus treats; each of her topical chapters ends with a
belli into causus belli (pp. 104, 135). The names conclusion in which she proposes different ways
Mustafa and Ishak are repeatedly transliterated in which we may interpret the evidence she has
Mustafa' and and diacritics generally brought before us and draws our attention to
tend to be allotted
Ishd.k,or withheld in a wildly the most important issues. While it is a truism
haphazard manner. These and abundant similar that no new paradigms have been generated
faults detract from the quality and scholarly from within Ottoman history, familiarity with
authority of an otherwise significant work the debates of colleagues working on other
which breaks new ground in Ottoman- regions have clearly left their mark.
Mamluk studies. The introduction to Bruce McGowan's
P. M. HOLT
section on the eighteenth century (in fact,
1699-1812) is a rather cliched survey of the
period which was produced before the appear-
ance of the exciting research of a new generation
HALIL INALCIK and DONALD QUATAERT of scholars who are radically altering our view
(ed.): An economic and social history of this period: among such are Artan, Aksan,
of the Ottoman empire, 1300-1914. Zilfi and Salzmann, and out of their work is
coming the new language which will set the
xl, 1026 pp. Cambridge, etc.: terms of debate for the future. The hyperbole
Cambridge University Press, 1994. of unfit sultans, institutional decay, harem
?80. control of the state and economic and political
decline cannot compensate for a lack of
The economic and social history of the Ottoman analysis. By contrast, the main body of
empire has been slow in attracting the attention McGowan's contribution offers a very different
of researchers. However, during the last 20 view from usual. He is more familiar with the
years or so, this has become one of the most Rumelian provinces of the empire, and situates
vigorous fields of scholarly endeavour and now, his contribution firmly in Europe; he relies to
with the appearance of this dense volume, we a great extent on sources in Balkan languages-
have the first synthetic treatment which spans there are few enough Ottomanists who have
the full chronological and geographical range the capacity to do this. His discussion of the
of the empire. It is a decisive step away from ayan, local 'big men' whom he characterizes
the state-centred, sui generis history which as 'warlords', perhaps, on his reading, a not
prevailed for too long. The material presented totally inappropriate label for those in the
in this book is the work of five authors and Balkans, reminds us of the different trajectories
should be readily accessible to those who are in the west and east of the empire. The
not themselves Ottoman historians. Those who relatively few tables used in McGowan's piece
are, will find much that is familiar but also is indication of how little quantitative research
much that is not, and will refer to it time there has been on the eighteenth century.
and again. Quataert's is the contribution which relies
A glance at the bibliography to the 300 most heavily on recent archival research, an
years of Ottoman history covered by Halil indication of our ignorance hitherto of the
Inalcik indicates the extent to which this section Ottoman empire in the nineteenth century. His
is the culmination of a life's work. Among the books on the post-Industrial Revolution
most notable of his chapters are those on the Ottoman empire have broken new ground;
land regime, where he stresses the role of pre- together with his contribution to this volume,

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 REVIEWS
these provide an account of the various sectors
of the economy which, given the scope of his
research on this little-known topic, will not
easily be challenged. He identifies four periods
in Ottoman economic policy in the years
1812-1914: first, until 1826, the state tried to
maintain its monopolistic position and
demanded the retention of raw materials to
satisfy the domestic market; in the second
period, until c. 1860, the Ottomans participated
in the international tendency toward free trade;
this phase lasted, with lapses, until the Young
Turk Revolution of 1908 when protectionism
won out and a 'national economy' was the
result. Quataert locates the beginnings of
commercialization in agriculture in the mid
eighteenth century, when European demand
for raw materials began to rise as that for
manufactured goods fell. Although he concurs
with the accepted view that the international
economy shaped the nature and direction of
change in the nineteenth century, his analysis
affirms that the topos 'Sick Man of Europe',
which implies an externalist, Eurocentric view
of the later years of the empire, is no longer
sufficient for academic study of the period.
One of the most basic and most intractable
problems in Ottoman economic history is the
question of units of measurement, whether
monetary or avoirdupois. The diversity of
Ottoman units frequently impedes attempts at
quantitative measurement. Sevket Pamuk has
written a short survey of money in the Ottoman
empire from the minting of the first silver akCe
in 1326 to the eve of the First World War,
while Inalcik's appendix lists around 250
different weights and measures in use in the
period 1300-1600.
The approaches adopted by the authors are
as consistent as the available material allows.
Lacunae are inevitable: the cost of warfare in
social and economic terms is one example of a
topic that can barely be addressed for lack of
primary research. The periodization adopted is
the standard one: thus we have three centuries,
until 1600, of centralized government operating
a command economy, followed by the failure
of that system in the seventeenth century and
the search for a new equilibrium which is
characterized as as a period of transformation
rather than of 'decline'. The eighteenth century,
then, was a period of decentralization, with the
establishment of local dynasties encouraged by
the system of lifetime tax-farming, designed to
raise money more quickly, to which the state
resorted in the face of the military imperatives
of the last years of the seventeenth century.
Ottoman dependence on the West and concom-
itant Westernization reforms marked the nine-
teenth century. Readers may wonder, with
Faroqhi (p. 433), whether political conditions
are the prime determinant of economic conjunc-
ture; they may also ponder whether the avail-
able data and syntheses on economic and social
history can be fitted within the periodization
offered here.
For all the irritations encountered in reading
the text-indexing errors, incongruence
between footnotes and bibliography, tables
whose relationship to the text are not always
clear-this volume is a major achievement.
Ottoman history is here seen on its own terms.
The hypotheses offered by the authors in the
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143
course of their contributions, and the gaps in
our knowledge which they reveal, will
undoubtedly set the research agenda for the
foreseeable future.
CAROLINE FINKEL
FERYAD FAZIL OMAR: Kurdisch-
Deutsches Wdrterbuch(Kurmanc) /
Ferhenga Kurdi-Elmanf.xiv, 721 pp.
Berlin: Kurdische Studien Berlin im
VWB, 1992. DM 89.
Until recently the dearth of adequate dictionar-
ies of Northern Kurdish was one of the factors
which impeded the progress of Kurdish studies.
As the Kurdish problem in the Middle East
once more became acute in the 1980s and early
90s, and the needs and wishes of Kurdish
immigrants in the West came to be voiced more
articulately, the urgent need for more and
better dictionaries finally began to be met. The
years 1991-94, in fact, saw the publication of
an unprecedented number of such works.
Besides the work under review there was
a two-way Kurmanci-German dictionary,
D. Amirxan's W5rterbuch Kurdisch (Vienna:
Max Hueber, 2 vols., 1992). Two two-way
Kurmanci-Turkish dictionaries appeared in
1992 (D. Izoli, Ferheng, Kurdf-Tirki, Tiirkpe-
Kiirtge, Istanbul: Deng; Tori, Ferheng, Kurdf-
Tirki, Tiirkpe-KartCe,Istanbul: Koral), while
an edition of Joyce Blau's well-known diction-
ary, with a Turkish version added to the
original English and French translations, was
published in 1991 (Istanbul: Sosyal). Finally,
two two-way Kurmanci-English dictionaries
appeared in the same period (Baran Rizgar,
Kurdish-English, English-Kurdish (Kurmancf)
dictionary, London: M. F. Onen, 1992; A.
Amindarov, Kurdish-English, English-Kurdish
dictionary, New York: Hippocrene Books,
1994).
The author says in the preface that the
present work is intended for the use of Germans
learning Kurdish and Kurds learning German.
Mention is also made of meeting the needs of
scholars, with reference to the impressive
German tradition in the field of Kurdish
studies. The preface further offers a brief sketch
of the development of the Kurmanci literary
language (where the subdialects of Cezire and
Botan are called 'the oldest dialects ', seemingly
implying that Kurds in other areas remained
mute until later-but this may be quibbling).
The author, a Kurd whose native dialect is not
Kurmanci, states that he has incorporated the
vocabulary of classical and modem literary
works based on the speech of Cezire and Botan
(which could be called Standard Kurmanci),
and on the writings of some modem authors
from Badinan (Northern Iraq) and the former
Soviet Union. Moreover, field-work in Cizre
(Cezire) and Diyarbekir in Turkey, in
Qamishliye in Syria, and west of Lake Urmia
in Iran, enabled him to collect material from a
variety of spoken dialects.
The appearance of so many Kurmanci
dictionaries in the space of a few years is apt
to have the effect of making reviewers more
demanding and critical than they might other-