346 chapter 8
Istanbul to a father who was an imperial kapıcıbaşı. He succeeded his brother as
derebey of Canik (the province of Samsun in the Black Sea) and participated in
the Russo-Ottoman war of 1768–74; during these years, he extended his domin-
ions west to Trabzon, Sivas, and Erzurum. In 1778 his enmity with the neighbor-
ing derebey family of the Çapanoğulları cost him his office and his rank; he fled
to the Crimea until he was reinstated in 1781. Canikli wrote Tedâbîrü’l-gazavât
(“The expedients of war”, which was also copied under the titles Tedbîr-i nadir,
tedbîr-i cedîd-i nadir, Canikli Ali Paşa ’nın risalesi, and Nesayihü’l-mülûk) in 1776,
during his participation in campaigns in Iraq and the Crimea.44 He begins by
explaining how he came to write the treatise, in the context of his continu-
ous efforts to improve the army and the welfare of his subjects, as a response
to the short war waged by Zand Karim Khan, the new Persian ruler, against
Baghdad, which necessitated “new measures”. Composed in a rather awkward
style, which implies an author more used to action than writing, Canikli’s trea-
tise is reminiscent of Defterdar and his copyists, as it essentially is a “mirror for
princes” adjusted for the specific issues of its day. One should note the same
emphasis on consultation, which would be increasingly marked throughout
the rest of the century, the same suggestion for life-long appointments, and a
similarly moralistic view on the virtues required of a vizier.
Finally, the work of Süleyman Penah Efendi constitutes one of the most
original specimens of “traditionalist” political advice of the eighteenth century.
In sharp contrast, and although it has been known since the early 1940s, mod-
ern scholarship had neglected it almost completely until recently. Like Canikli
Ali Pasha, Penah Efendi was also connected to the provinces, although in a
different way. The son of Ismail Efendi of Tripolitsa (the capital of Ottoman
Peloponnese/Morea), he was born in Istanbul in 1740 and entered the scribal
service, initially in the service of the grand vizier Küçük Mustafa Pasha. He
worked as a scribe in various governmental branches and was present at the
1770 revolt in Morea. He died in Istanbul in 1785, the same year that he wrote
his treatise variously known as Süleyman Penah Efendi mecmuası (“Süleyman
Penah Efendi’s manuscript”), Mora ihtilâli tarihi, or Mora ihtilali tarihçesi
(“History of the upheavals in Morea”).45 As demonstrated by its title, the first
third of Süleyman Penah Efendi’s text is a narrative of the 1770 revolt in the
44 Canikli Ali Paşa – Özkaya 1969 (transcription pp. 135–173). On Canikli and his treatise
cf. Cvetkova 1975; Schaendlinger 1992, 250–252; Aksan 2011; Menchinger 2017, 85–86.
45 The only edition of this work is Penah Efendi – Berker 1942–1943 (there is also a Greek
translation and study: Penah Efendi – Sarris 1993). See also Cezar 1986, 142–145; Telci 1999;
Sabev 2006, 313; Ermiş 2014, 122ff., esp. 126–128 and 140–144. For the part related to the
Peloponnese cf. Alexander 1985, 47–49, 117; Gündoğdu 2012, 25–27, discovered an anony-
mous narrative of the 1770 revolt, which seems to have common sources with (or whose