332 chapter 8
The main obstacle and opponent for this new political pole remained the
janissary corps, which, as seen, had by then been transformed into a socio-
political formation with corporate features, and which was determined to keep
its share in the “political nation” following the last great revolts at the begin-
ning of eighteenth century. It was this complex system of alliances, conflicts,
and interests that in many ways determined the struggle of political ideas
throughout the rest of the eighteenth century.
1 The Eighteenth Century and Its Intellectual Climate: on Ottoman
“Traditionalism”
From the perspective of political writing, the eighteenth century contains
two blossomings of original works: one during Ahmed III’s reign, either at
its beginning or during the “Tulip Period”, and one during and after the long
and disastrous war with Russia in the last quarter of the century. The gap be-
tween the two groups, some forty years of almost total silence, is puzzling, al-
though it roughly coincides with the long interval of peace, something which
was so unusual for Ottoman history. Indeed, it seems as if eighteenth-century
political authors increasingly concentrated on matters of warfare, as if they
perceived military defeats as the only problem of the state. Moreover, at first
glance, many texts written during the first of the two periods seem to consti-
tute a retreat from the bold Khaldunism of Kâtib Çelebi or Na’ima (although
Ibn Khaldun’s work would continue to exert serious influence, especially after
it was translated in 1730 by Pirizade Mehmed Sahib Efendi).18 They give the
impression of a simple continuation of the “mirror for princes” genre; one
may even be tempted to say they constitute its swansong. They are devoted to
giving concrete advice on specific institutions, with a clear emphasis on the
army, which was bound to dominate Ottoman political thought throughout
the century. However, while they omit wholesale any reference to a Golden
Age, they differ from earlier works such as those by Mustafa Ali, Akhisari, and
Koçi Bey. It looks like early and mid-eighteenth-century Ottomans had lost
the feeling of urgency that dominated the work of their predecessors of the
early seventeenth century, and this is all the more strange when set against the
treaty (ibid., 217–218 and 237–238). Interestingly, in 1700 Rami had copied Kâtib Çelebi’s
Mizanü’l-hakk (ibid., 28–29).
18 Ibn Haldun – Pirizade 2008. However, as Henning Sievert showed, it was primarily
through Na’ima’s adaptation, rather than Pirizade’s translation, that Khaldunism perme-
ated Ottoman thought during the eighteenth century: Sievert 2013, 179–180.