Travel and Artisans in the Ottoman Empire

 It has often been assumed that the subjects of the Ottoman sultans were unable to travel beyond their localities - since peasants needed the permission of their local administrators before they could legitimately leave their villages. According to this view, only soldiers and members of the governing elite would have been free to travel. However Suraiya Faroqhi's extensive archival research shows that this was not the case. Pious men from all walks of life went on pilgrimage to Mecca, slaves fled from their masters and craftspeople travelled in search of work. Faroqhi shows that even those craftsmen who did not travel extensively had some level of mobility and that the Ottoman sultans and viziers, who spent so much effort in attempting to control the movements of their subjects, could do so only within often very narrow limits. Challenging existing historiography and providing an important new perspective, this book will be essential reading for students and scholars of Ottoman history. 

 Introduction PART I: Travels An Edirne scholar on Ottoman architecture and politics: The pilgrimage account of Abdurrahman Hibri Bringing back keepsakes from seventeenth-century Mecca Evliya Celibi's tales of Cairo's guildsmen Travellers and sojourners in mid-sixteenth century UEskudar Immigrant tradesmen as guild members - or the adventures of Tunisian fez-sellers in eighteenth-century Istanbul Refugees and asylum seekers on Ottoman territory in the early modern period The image of Europe in the reports of the Ottoman ambassadors of the eighteenth century Ottoman travellers to Venice PART II: Artisans 9. Repairs to the Ottoman fortress of Hotin 10. Ottoman artisans under Selim III 11. Ottoman textiles in early modern Europe 12. Seventeenth and eighteenth-century artisans negotiating guild agreements in Istanbul 13. Christian and Jewish artisans in late eighteenth-century Istanbul 14. Istanbul halva manufacturers in the mid-eighteenth century 15. Keeping artisans in their places - or how to run a guild 16. At the Ottoman Empire's industrious core: The Story of Bursa Purchasing guild and craft-based offices in the Ottoman central lands