The Formation of Official Historians under the Ottoman Empire

Abstract

After the beginning of the 18th century, Ottoman historical writing was dominated by official historians ("Vekayi'-nuvis"), who continued to record Ottoman history and were consecutively appointed from the beginning of the 18th century to the end of Ottoman empire. Their style of historical writing is very rare not only under the Ottoman dynasty but also in all the whole of the Islamic world. Regarding the research to date on this subject, not many scholars have examined the careers of "official historians" thoroughly, and consequently regard the process of their formation as static. The purpose of this paper is to reconsider the process of that formation through examining the careers of the first four historians, Na'ima (d.1716), Sefik (d.1715), Rasid (d.1735) and Kucukcelebizade (d.1769). Na'ima was appointed by grand vezir Amcazade Huseyn in order to complete a draft of sarihu'l-Menarzade. Sefik was probably nominated twice, firstly by grand vezir Rami (though this appointment is very doubtful), secondly by grand vezir Sehid 'Ali. Sefik wrote two works, but neither is a normal chronicles and have no relationship the chronicles of Na'ima and Rasid. Rasid was firstly appointed by Sehid 'Ali in order to chronicle the reign of Sultan Ahmed III in 1714/5. Reappointed by Nevsehirli Ibrahim in 1717,Rasid was ordered to continue his work. But soon after that, Nevsehirli changed his order from recording the reign of Sultan Ahmed III to continuing the chronicle of Na'ima. This change is important because continuous chronicling of Ottoman history began from this time. Kucukcelebizade became a successor to Rasid and began to write from the end of Rasid's chronicle in 1723,after which continuous chronicling and appointment of official historians was normalized. In the Ottoman empire, there were many "temporary official historians" appointed by Sultans or influential persons before the "continuous official historians" i.e.vekayi'-nuvis. For example, we can identify Nergisi, Nulhimi and Abdi. Of course they were officially appointed, but never composed continuous chronicles or were appointed consecutively. The author considers the appointments of Na'ima, Sefik and Rasid (until Nevsehirli's changing his order) as "temporary". "Continuous official historians" only appeared after Nevsehirli changed his order in 1717. The result of this survey shows that a change from "temporary official historian" to "continuous official historian" happened around so-called "Tulip era" (1718-1730). This process of a formation of the official historians may parallel the development of the bureaucracy from the 17th century on.