CEU Electronic Theses and Dissertations, 2020
| Author | Avram, Antonia-Oana |
|---|---|
| Title | Sixteenth-Century Travel Literature Collectors and the Image of the Ottomans in Humanist Thought: Francesco Sansovino and Richard Hakluyt |
| Summary | The constant interaction with the Ottoman Empire in the early modern times made Europeans develop an array of possibilities on how to coexist, cooperate, and comprehend this Muslim society. These variants were not expressed only in diplomatic, economic, political, or even religious premises, but also in literary ones. With the advancement of the Ottomans in Europe and the increased interaction with their socio-cultural practices, a vast amount of histories, travelogues, and ethnographic material began to be printed in Europe, either for practical purposes or for the curiosity of the readers. Broadly, the image of the Ottomans emerging from these accounts was one that scared European audiences, but during the sixteenth century it slowly changed, as these descriptions began to display admiration towards the Ottoman Empire. In this thesis I analyse how sixteenth-century humanists’ editorial practices and intellectual endeavors were main factors in constructing in their printed works an ambivalent image of the Ottomans. To pursue this line on inquiry, I use as Sansovino’s and Hakluyt’s works as a case study. I argue that although from both of their works stems an ambivalent image of the Ottoman Empire, each of them has its particularities that are specific to the work of the two humanists. These individual features reflect the influences of various external factors and actors, but as humanists, Sansovino and Hakluyt needed to establish the authority and integrity of their arguments, by putting a lot of emphasis on the veracity of the sources they use and on the credibility of their authors. A close reading of the dedicatory letters, prefaces, correspondence, and paratexts of both Sansovino and Hakluyt reveals that the ambivalent image of the Ottomans that stems from their printed materials is the reflection of their humanist editorial and intellectual endeavors. |
| Supervisor | Hennings, Jan; Sebők, Marcell |
| Department | Medieval Studies MA |
| Full text | https://www.etd.ceu.edu/2020/avram_antonia-oana.pdf |
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