Between past and present: Exploring religion, science and history in the Near East, c. 1650--1790.

摘要

This dissertation examines the writings of French and British diplomats, natural historians, clergy, leisured men, and a few women, who traveled to the western Ottoman Empire from the mid-seventeenth through the late eighteenth centuries. It argues that at the end of the eighteenth century Europeans had not yet broken with the ancient classical and biblical traditions, nor were they convinced of their superiority over the Ottoman Turks. The first part of the dissertation argues that the travelers tried to corroborate and experience as many aspects of the Bible as possible in order to create a lived faith, a faith based on immediate contact with the biblical past. The travelers' efforts to construct a lived faith remained constant throughout the period, showing that the eighteenth century was not a period of increasing secularization in Europe. The second part of the dissertation argues that the travelers continued to value the natural historical and geographical knowledge found in the ancient texts. The travelers sought to bring order to the ancient texts by matching their observations with those of the ancients, and in the process they placed the authority of the ancients on new grounds. The travelers recast the authority of the ancients as local knowledge, which was reliable and trustworthy because it stemmed from the observations of local informants. The second half of the dissertation argues that the travelers' narratives displayed not a belief in European superiority but a profound sense of insecurity and uncertainty in their relations with the Ottomans. The travelers not only recounted many positive characteristics displayed by the Ottomans, but presented a consistent argument throughout the period that Europeans would do well to learn from the Ottoman example.