A new view of medieval Persian history

1989 ◽  
Vol 121 (1) ◽  
pp. 113-121
Author(s):  
J. M. Rogers
Keyword(s):  
Seventeenth Century ◽  
Sixteenth Century ◽  
Fifteenth Century ◽  
Ethnic Diversity ◽  
Source Material ◽  
Conspicuous Feature ◽  
Ottoman History ◽  
The Right ◽  
As If ◽  
New View

A conspicuous feature of Ottoman history from the sixteenth century onwards, or even of fifteenth-century Mamluk Egypt, is that the mass of surviving administrative documents, well complemented by European sources, makes it possible to apply a range of economic and social concepts to illuminate their economy and society. For Persia the documents are far fewer and, even where, as in seventeenth-century Iṣfahān, the extant Safavid documents are exceptionally well complemented by European source material, doubts, often of a Marxian or Braudelian order, on the legitimacy of applying European concepts to Persian society are often entertained. In other periods the paucity of material is compounded by ethnic diversity – tribal versus settled populations; Turks versus Iranians or Iranians versus Turco-Mongols, all with deeply rooted authentic traditions – which is rarely documented, let alone explained, by the contemporary historians. It is almost as if the right kind of anthropologist could do more than the historian to exploit what material there is.

scholarly journals “Turkish” Textiles in South-Eastern and East-Central Europe in the Early Modern Period: The Evidence of Transylvanian Customs Accounts

2020 ◽  
Vol 24 (4-5) ◽  
pp. 363-382
Author(s):  
Mária Pakucs-Willcocks
Keyword(s):  
Seventeenth Century ◽  
Sixteenth Century ◽  
Early Modern ◽  
Fifteenth Century ◽  
Ottoman Empire ◽  
Early Modern Period ◽  
East Central Europe ◽  
East Central ◽  
Modern Period ◽  
Serial Data

Abstract This paper analyzes data from customs accounts in Transylvania from the middle of the sixteenth century to the end of the seventeenth on traffic in textiles and textile products from the Ottoman Empire. Cotton was known and commercialized in Transylvania from the fifteenth century; serial data will show that traffic in Ottoman cotton and silk textiles as well as in textile objects such as carpets grew considerably during the second half of the seventeenth century. Customs registers from that period also indicate that Poland and Hungary were destinations for Ottoman imports, but Transylvania was a consumer’s market for cotton textiles.

John Foxe and some Sources for Lollard History: Notes for a Critical Appraisal

1965 ◽  
Vol 2 ◽  
pp. 251-257 ◽  
Author(s):  
J. A. F. Thomson
Keyword(s):  
Sixteenth Century ◽  
Fifteenth Century ◽  
Critical Appraisal ◽  
Source Material ◽  
John Foxe ◽  
Careful Scrutiny ◽  
History Of ◽  
Acts And Monuments

Of all the early but non-contemporary works which throw light on the history of Lollardy, the Acts and Monuments of John Foxe is undoubtedly the most important. Although it contains many tendentious comments, the products of an age when religious passions burned fiercely, comments which are of greater value to the historian of sixteenth-century propaganda than to the student of fifteenth-century heresy, it would be unwise to reject its source-value on these grounds. Besides Foxe’s comments, it also contains material, sometimes no longer extant in other records, which Foxe claimed to draw from the original accounts of the heresy trials, and, for the early sixteenth century, memories of observers, and it is some of this material which I wish to consider today. Because Foxe is noted as a propagandist, his reliability has sometimes been questioned, so the first task of the historian is to subject his excerpts from documents and his other source-material to a more than usually careful scrutiny. In cases where the original sources are still extant, these can be used to reach some estimate of his accuracy in general; in cases where they are not, other records can sometimes serve as a cross-check.

The Date and Significance of the Imbangala Invasion of Angola

1965 ◽  
Vol 6 (2) ◽  
pp. 143-152 ◽  
Author(s):  
David Birmingham
Keyword(s):  
Seventeenth Century ◽  
Sixteenth Century ◽  
Fifteenth Century ◽  
Oral Traditions ◽  
African History ◽  
Documentary Evidence ◽  
Long Distance ◽  
Late Fifteenth

The study of Central African history is still in its infancy. Valuable indications can, however, be obtained by combining the study of oral traditions with that of Portuguese documentary evidence for events taking place near the coasts. It has long been known, for instance, that the overthrow of the powerful Songye rulers of the Luba country indirectly caused long-distance migrations, one of which, that of the Imbangala, came into contact with the Portuguese in Angola. Previous analyses of this migration have suggested that it culminated in the early seventeenth century. In this paper an attempt has been made to show that the Imbangala arrived in Angola much earlier, probably by the mid sixteenth century and certainly before 1575. This date indicates that the Luba invasion of Lunda, which was the direct cause of the migration, probably took place in the late fifteenth and early sixteenth centuries. Finally, it has been tentatively suggested that the overthrow of Songye rule and the establishment of a new, expansionist Luba empire might have taken place as much as a century earlier, from the fourteenth to the fifteenth century.

Symbol Infancy

2016 ◽  
Author(s):  
Joseph Mazur
Keyword(s):  
Twentieth Century ◽  
Seventeenth Century ◽  
Sixteenth Century ◽  
Science Fiction ◽  
Fifteenth Century ◽  
Symbolic Manipulation ◽  
Arithmetic Operations ◽  
Symbolic Algebra ◽  
First Approximation

This chapter discusses the evolution of symbolic algebra that began in the first half of the sixteenth century. Algebra was not always called algebra. In the mid-fifteenth century some Italian and Latin writers called it Regula rei e census. The twentieth-century mathematician and science fiction author Eric Temple Bell allegedly remarked that in the mid-seventeenth century, mathematicians were able to introduce negative and rational exponents because symbolic manipulation liberated their thinking from the wilderness of words. The chapter considers the contributions of the Arab algebraist al-Qalasādi, who used letters of the Arabic alphabet to denote arithmetic operations and whose notation was clearly an attempt at symbolizing algebra through abbreviations, a first approximation to what we would consider true symbols. It also examines how Italy cultivated the seeds of algebra, citing in particular Gerolamo Cardano's Ars Magna.

Wangara, Akan and Portuguese in the fifteenth and sixteenth centuries. I. The matter of Bitu

1982 ◽  
Vol 23 (3) ◽  
pp. 333-349 ◽  
Author(s):  
Ivor Wilks
Keyword(s):  
Seventeenth Century ◽  
Sixteenth Century ◽  
Early Modern ◽  
Fifteenth Century ◽  
Trade Agreements ◽  
Late Medieval ◽  
Modern Times ◽  
The World ◽  
Early Modern Times ◽  
Late Fifteenth

In late medieval and early modern times West Africa was one of the principal suppliers of gold to the world bullion market. In this context the Matter of Bitu is one of much importance. Bitu lay on the frontiers of the Malian world and was one of its most flourishing gold marts. So much is clear from sixteenth- and seventeenth-century writings, both African and European. A review of this body of evidence indicates that the gold trade at Bitu was controlled by the Wangara, who played a central role in organizing trade between the Akan goldfields and the towns of the Western Sudan. It is shown that Bitu cannot be other than Bighu (Begho, Bew, etc.), the abandoned Wangara town lying on the northwestern fringes of the Akan forest country, which is known (from excavation) to have flourished in the relevant period. In the late fifteenth century the Portuguese established posts on the southern shores of the Akan country, so challenging the monopolistic position which the Wangara had hitherto enjoyed in the gold trade. The Portuguese sent envoys to Mali, presumably to negotiate trade agreements. The bid was apparently unsuccessful. The struggle for the Akan trade in the sixteenth century between Portuguese and Malian interests will be treated in the second part of this paper.

The Church and Russian Foreign Policy, 1480–1725

2020 ◽  
Vol 54 (1-3) ◽  
pp. 7-50
Author(s):  
Paul Bushkovitch
Keyword(s):  
Foreign Policy ◽  
Seventeenth Century ◽  
Sixteenth Century ◽  
Fifteenth Century ◽  
Orthodox Church ◽  
War And Peace ◽  
Russian Foreign Policy ◽  
Rhetorical Style ◽  
The Church ◽  
Distinct Role

Abstract Russian historians have traditionally seen the church as merely the handmaiden of the state. Yet in the realm of foreign policy the heads of the Orthodox Church in Russia played a distinct role from the end of the fifteenth century to peter’s time. They were participants in the most important decisions (though not in routine affairs), especially about war and peace. In wartime the metropolitans and bishops produced exhortations to the army. In the sixteenth century these were not only calls to fight the infidel but frequently sermons to the Russians to be better Christians. After the mid-seventeenth century the sermons at the time of war, now in Western rhetorical style, came from a wider group of clergy and were more uniformly calls to fight for Orthodoxy. In Peter’s time such sermons became secular justifications for the wars.

The Decline of Oligarchy in Seventeenth-Century Norwich

1974 ◽  
Vol 14 (1) ◽  
pp. 46-76 ◽  
Author(s):  
John T. Evans
Keyword(s):  
Seventeenth Century ◽  
Sixteenth Century ◽  
Fifteenth Century ◽  
General Pattern ◽  
Family Ties ◽  
Social Elite ◽  
Political Recruitment ◽  
Political Office ◽  
Provincial Capital ◽  
Almost All

The resurgence of oligarchies in England's provincial towns during the fifteenth century and their firm control over almost all aspects of civic life during the sixteenth century has received considerable attention and is apparently beyond dispute. The characteristic feature of this oligarchical control was the domination of the important civic offices by urban dynasties whose members practiced the most influential and lucrative trades, were the most affluent citizens, and were linked by close family ties. Comparatively few studies have been made of officeholders of the seventeenth century, especially for the period after 1660, yet the evidence so far accumulated suggests that officeholding remained the exclusive privilege of a closed social elite. Nevertheless, Norwich may provide an instructive exception. An examination of the pool of men eligible for political office in Norwich, the largest provincial capital, indicates that the door to political office was open to men of diverse social backgrounds and occupations to a greater extent than during the sixteenth century and apparently much more so than in the other large provincial capitals.Oligarchy may be defined as the possession and exercise of power by a few individuals either directly, as a consequence of holding the important political offices, or indirectly, as a consequence of controlling recruitment of officeholders and influencing their decisions. In the former case, which was the general pattern establishsed in those fifteenth and sixteenth-century towns which remained free from the intervention of territorial magnates, oligarchy implies further that the magistrates have either the exclusive privilege of appointing their own replacements or the ability to manipulate the mechanism of political recruitment involving a wider electorate through control of the processes of nomination and election of officeholders.

scholarly journals U traganju za povijesnim, kulturnim i umjetničkim identitetom umjetnika Schiavona: crtice iz povijesti njihove recepcije u 16. i 17. stoljeću

Ars Adriatica ◽  
2014 ◽  
pp. 313
Author(s):  
Ivana Prijatelj Pavičić
Keyword(s):  
Twentieth Century ◽  
Seventeenth Century ◽  
Sixteenth Century ◽  
Fifteenth Century ◽  
Contemporary Literature ◽  
Giorgio Vasari ◽  
Late Fifteenth

The author of the paper demonstrates how sixteenth- and seventeenth-century historiography applied a number of identity stereotypes which were linked to the Slavs, Dalmatians, Illyrians, Morlachs, and Croats in contemporary literature and scholarship to three well-known Schiavoni artists: Andrea Meldola (Andrija Medulić), Niccoló dell’Arca and Giulio Clovio (Julije Klović). For example, the qualifier ‘barbaric’, used to denote the work of Niccoló dell’Arca in sixteenth-century historiography from Bologna, represents one of the stereotypical characteristics about the Schiavoni which were frequent at the time.The first part of the article focuses on sixteenth-century interpretations of the Croatian and Macedonian identity (origin) of the famous painter of miniatures, Giulio Clovio (Julije Klović) in the works of his contemporaries such as Giorgio Vasari and Francisco de Holanda, followed by those in the nineteenth- and twentieth-century works of Ivan Kukuljević Sakcinski, Ivan Golub and Milan Pelc. Particular attention is given to the currently prevailing hypothesis that the Macedonian origin of Giulio Clovio (Julije Klović) might have been invented with the aim of testifying to his artistic and ancestral rootedness in the classical world.The second part of the article deals with records about Andrea Meldola and Niccoló dell’Arca in the writings of Italian historiographers Girolamo Borselli, Cherubino Cherardacci, Carlo Ridolfi and Marco Boschini, all of whom tried to interpret specific stylistic features in the works of these two artists as a consequence of what one can call their genotype and phenotype. The author of the article draws particular attention to the appearance of the ideologeme concerning the barbaric character of Niccoló dell’Arca in the records of Girolamo Borselli (late fifteenth century) and Cherubino Cherardacci (sixteenth century).

Eunuchs in the Ottoman Empire

2019 ◽  
Author(s):  
J. Hathaway
Keyword(s):  
Nineteenth Century ◽  
Eighteenth Century ◽  
Seventeenth Century ◽  
Sixteenth Century ◽  
Fifteenth Century ◽  
Ottoman Empire ◽  
Historical Context ◽  
Prisoners Of War ◽  
East African ◽  
Young Turks

Abstract This article surveys the employment of eunuchs in the Ottoman Empire. After placing the use of court eunuchs in a global historical context, the study turns to the earliest eunuchs in Ottoman employ, who were probably Byzantine prisoners of war. By the early fifteenth century, East African harem eunuchs had become an important element of the palace eunuch population, and the article discusses their procurement and castration. The construction of Topkap Palace in newly-conquered Constantinople during the 1450s laid the ground for the dichotomy between African harem eunuchs and white Third Court eunuchs. An equally important watershed occurred in the late sixteenth century, when the Chief Harem Eunuch assumed the supervision of the imperial pious endowments for Mecca and Medina, making him one of the most powerful figures in the empire. By the late seventeenth century, deposed Chief Harem Eunuchs often commanded the eunuchs who guarded the Prophet Muhammads tomb in Medina. The influence of all palace eunuchs decreased during the eighteenth century, as the grand vizier acquired ever more control over the empires administration. Nineteenth-century reforms dealt a permanent blow to the harem eunuchs authority, which ended entirely when the Young Turks disbanded the harem in 1909.Аннотация Статья рассматривает вопрос о привлечении на службу евнухов в Османскои империи. После общего обзора роли придворных евнухов в глобальном историческом контексте, исследование обращается к первым евнухам на османскои службе, которые вероятно были византиискими военнопленными. К началу XV в. восточно-африканские евнухи гарема стали важнои фракциеи среди дворцовых евнухов в статье рассматривается методика их отбора и кастрации. Строительство дворца Топкапы в недавно завоеванном Константинополе в 50-х гг. XV в. положило начало дихотомии между африканскими евнухами Гарема и белыми евнухами Третьего Двора. Не менее важным рубежом становится и конец XVI в., когда старшии евнух Гарема принял на себя обязанности по управлению имперскими благотворительными пожертвованиями в Мекку и Медину, что сделало этого сановника одной из самых могущественных фигур империи. К концу XVII в. низложенные главные евнухи Гарема часто принимали командование над евнухами, охранявшими гробницу Пророка Мухаммеда в Медине. Влияние дворцовых евнухов оказывается ослабленным в XVIII столетии, по мере того как великии визирь получал все большую власть над управлением империи. Реформы XIX столетия нанесли решающии удар по власти евнухов Гарема, которая полностью сошла на нет при расформировании его младотурками в 1909 г.

scholarly journals Architectural framing in the iconostasis as an instrument of commenting on the sacred image

2019 ◽  
pp. 44-49
Author(s):  
S. Olianina
Keyword(s):  
Seventeenth Century ◽  
Sixteenth Century ◽  
Fifteenth Century ◽  
The Balkans ◽  
Multilevel Structure ◽  
Christian Origins ◽  
Sacred Image ◽  
Relationship Of ◽  
The Relationship ◽  
Written Sources

Before the seventeenth century, the icons in the Ukrainian iconostasis did not have frames as an arch or a blind arcade. The epistyles with images of Deesis of fourteenth – sixteenth century have not frames at all or the figures are divided by the rectangular pictorial frames. However, from the beginning of the seventeenth century, the icons of apostles in a Deesis row had already framing by carved frames like as the blind arcade. This practice quickly spreads and becomes the rule for the representation of apostles at the iconostasis throughout the seventeenth century. The Christian origins of tradition to decorate sacral images by blind arcade to be continue from Byzantium. It is very important that this design of the icons is characteristic of the Byzantine templons. The epistyles of templons from the twelfth – fifteenth century are mostly framing by blind arcade. The same principle of decoration is passed to the Balkans, where the blind arcade also is fixed in the design of the Deesis row. I argue that the blind arcade in the Ukrainian iconostasis in the design of the Deesis row comes from the Balkans The introduction of frames in the form of a blind arcade for icons of the Deesis row created compositional parallels between Ukrainian iconostasis and the iconostasis of the Balkans. This unity of the used compositional formulas reinforced the relationship of the Ukrainian iconostasis with the Balkan, and visually showed its Byzantine origins. On the basis of artistic and written sources, I demonstrate that blind arcade emphasized the eschatological meanings of the Deesis row. It was also a kind of marker that indicated the presence of this row in the multilevel structure of the monumental Ukrainian iconostasis of the seventeenth century.

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