28 Introduction
re-introduced Aristotelian ideas by speaking of the three possible constitu-
tions (monarchy, aristocracy, and democracy) before then moving on to pro-
posals for military reform (although he copied the discussion of Aristotelian
governments from a translation of Kâtib Çelebi). Müteferrika’s ideas clearly
fitted into the intellectual climate of his era, reflected in the numerous transla-
tions of Aristotle’s works and the emphasis on innovation in various scientific
fields. On the other hand, the idea of the superiority of European military orga-
nization can also be found in other works from his time, often by making use of
the concept of “reciprocity” (mukabele bi’l-misl) and of the idea that Europeans
had first copied the Ottomans. In this context, the reader will follow the trans-
lation movement through the eighteenth century and Ahmed Resmî’s call
for peace and for a new understanding of international politics in the 1770s.
We will also delve into the various viewpoints, some more traditionalist and
others in a more “Westernizing” vein, of statesmen who formed the circle around
Selim III and prepared his reforms. The chapter ends with the defenses
of Selim III’s reforms by “Koca Sekbanbaşı” (1804; probably to be identified
with Vasıf Efendi) and Dihkanizade Kuşmani (1806), just before Mahmud II’s
major reforms that began with the 1826 massacre of the janissaries, an event
which, in many ways, marks the beginning of modernity in Ottoman state
history.
In the conclusion we will try to sketch the results of the abovementioned
research and to clarify the links between Ottoman political ideas and the
development of power politics in the Ottoman Empire. In addition, we will
bring together material on the development of a number of fundamental con-
cepts, such as justice, law, state, the world order, and so forth, in an attempt to
initiate conceptual history within Ottoman studies. Finally, we will attempt
to compare our findings with how political ideas developed in the other great
Islamicate polities of the period, namely those that were flourishing in Persian
and Indian lands. Two appendices will add a comparative timeline of histori-
cal events and political works, with reference to the chapters-cum-ideological
categories as described above, and short samples of translated texts, thereby
allowing the book to also be used as a textbook for Ottoman political thought.