Publications by Faculty & Alumni

This dissertation is the first comprehensive study of the formative but obscure time in Ottoman history known as the Interregnum (1402–1413). The Interregnum was a period of dynastic warfare following the Battle of Ankara, in which the Ottoman Sultan Yildirim Bāyezīd I was crushed by the Central Asian conqueror Timur and his empire was dismembered. The ensuing struggles for the succession between Bāyezīd's heirs were bloody and socially divisive, making the Interregnum one of the most complex and troubled periods in Ottoman history.

Despite the fact that the Interregnum played a formative role for the later Ottoman Empire, this period has received little scholarly attention to date, and even its events are largely unknown. This is due to the extreme complexity of the period's politics, which involved many internal factions and foreign powers, as well as the varied nature of the sources available for its study. This dissertation is a detailed reconstruction of events based on the available sources, and also a study of the political culture of the period in question. Specific themes addressed include attitudes on fratricide and dynastic succession and the role of the Interregnum in the appearance of the first Ottoman historical literature in the courts of the rival princes, which reflects the unique political concerns of the time. Specifically, it is argued that two works composed in the court of the winner of the Interregnum Sultan Mehemmed I represent a deliberate attempt to justify his actions against his brothers. In order to explore this theme, extensive original translations of these works are provided, as well as of many other relevant sources. The present study will be essential reading for scholars in the broader field of Ottoman studies, since it sheds light on the politics of a formative period in Ottoman history. It will also interest historians concerned with the role of periods of political instability and civil strife in shaping the politics and historical consciousness of a society.

This dissertation studies the concept of sulh , i.e. peacemaking or amicable settlement, in Islamic law. Through a survey of exegetical and legal works dating from the 8th to the 13th centuries C.E., I trace its development as one of the nominate contracts of Islamic law and one of the institutionalized methods for dispute resolution alongside qadā' ‘adjudication’ and tahkīm ‘arbitration’. I also examine the role of sulh in two different settings: the Ottoman qādī courts from the 16th to the 18th centuries C.E. and the venues for dispute resolution in the American Muslim community today.

Although sulh is commanded by the primary sources of Islamic law, it is adjudication by qādī that dominated juristic attention and contemporary studies of Islamic law. Qadā' appears as the preeminent avenue for channeling disputes according to the sharī`ah whereas sulh a mechanism operative only within the informal, private settings of Muslim social life. I find that this focus on adjudication has obscured not only the significance that Islamic law accords to sulh, but the fact that its scope extends unto the context of the courtroom. The Ottoman court records illustrate that sulh had played a considerable role in the Ottoman justice system in various jurisdictions throughout the empire during the period studied.

Although they were in favor of settlements arrived at through mutual compromise, jurists were concerned to ensure that they were equitable and in harmony with other Islamic principles. Thus, they debated when judges should encourage sulh and when he should proceed to adjudicate, and scrutinized sulh contracts to ensure they did not contravene rules on ownership and transfer of property. They also created a new role for sulh as a contract: it not only functions to terminate an existing dispute, but also to avert future conflict by regulating the use of property in neighborly and communal settings. And as the American Muslims attempt to reconcile the dual legal frameworks governing their lives in the United States today, one secular and one Islamic, and explore the alternatives provided by Islamic law for dispute resolution, their legal discourse shows that the ideals of sulh continue to rank high in the eye of the Muslim individual as well as community at large.

My dissertation, Signs taken for Wonder: Nineteenth Century Persian Travel Literature to Europe is a re-examination of the significance of Persian travel narratives to Europe for Qajar Iran (1796–1925). Through textual and contextual analysis of Qajar travel accounts to Europe, I have demonstrated the ways in which Qajar historiography's focus on travelogues as sites of Europe is a result of an anticipatory history that reads the nineteenth century in light of later developments that the historical actors themselves could not have foreseen. This has led to the omission of certain nineteenth century travelogues from the historiography and also blinded historians to other interpretive possibilities of these texts, specifically the ways in which they narrate Qajar Imperial power, reveal changes in the writing culture of Iran in the nineteenth century, and demonstrate the state's growing interest in geographical knowledge.

By shifting my analytical framework from “what” was written to “why” these travelogues were written, and more importantly, how they were consumed, I argue for an interpretation of travel literature to Europe as narrators of the power of the Qajar court, and later in the century, that of Iran's territorial integrity. Additionally, by contextualizing the travelogues within the larger body of geographical and historical writings of their own period, I demonstrate the ways in which these texts interacted with other types of narratives, such as chronicles, geographies, and the court's official gazette.

My thesis examines the formation of a uniquely Ottoman theory of rulership during the age of Suleiman the Lawgiver (1520–1566) through an extensive study of political treatises written in this period, most of which are in manuscript form and new to current scholarship. My thesis shows that a paradigmatic transformation took place in political reasoning that in turn led to a new mode of political writing and an extensive reshuffling of political ideals, visions, symbols, and theories in this period that had a lasting impact on the way the Ottoman ruling elite viewed their ruler, government, and society.

The conventional perception of rulership as a continuation of the historical caliphate with the claim of presenting the sultan as the universal head of the Muslim community lost its appeal. Instead, because of the permeation of Sufistic imageries into political theory, the caliphate was defined as a cosmic rank between Man and God, attained in the spiritual sphere. The pursuit of moralism and piety in rulership that dominated the previous political theory gave way to legalism that evaluated governance by the ruler's observation of laws rather than his moral behavior. In this approach, the observance of customs, religious code, and sultanic laws became the touchstone for measuring the quality of government that was previously gauged on the basis of the sultan's piety.

The focus of political analysis shifted from the personality of the ruler to the existing government, its institutions, and procedural practices. In contrast to previous conceptions that reigned supreme in political theory, in the new paradigm, the grand vizier replaced the sultan as the center of government. The sultan was then conceived to be a distant but a legitimating figure for the dynasty while the grand vizier was promoted to the position of actual ruler in the Ottoman state. Consequently, relatively divorced from the moralistic, idealistic, personality-oriented, and sultan-centric paradigm in political reasoning, this realist and empirical approach to the question of rulership promoted such ideas as ‘government by law’ and ‘institutional continuity of the state’ as primary objectives of rulership.