Dreams and Lives in Ottoman Istanbul: A Seventeenth-Century Biographer's Perspective: 19 (Birmingham Byzantine and Ottoman Studies)

Dreams And Lives In Ottoman Istanbul Explores Biography Writing And Dream Narratives In Seventeenth-century Istanbul. It Focuses On The Prominent Biographer 'aṭā'ī (d. 1637) And With His Help Shows How Learned Circles Narrated Dreams To Assess Their Position In The Ottoman Enterprise. This Book Demonstrates That Dreams Provided Biographers Not Only With A Means To Form Learned Communities In A Politically Fragile Landscape But Also With A Medium To Debate The Correct Career Paths And Social Networks In Late Sixteenth And Early Seventeenth-century Istanbul. By Adopting A Comparative Approach, This Book Engages With Current Scholarly Dialogues About Life-writing, Dreams, And Practices Of Remembrance In Habsburg Spain, Safavid Iran, Mughal India And Ming China. Recent Studies Have Shown The Shared Rhythms Between These Contemporaneous Dynasties And The Ottomans, And There Is Now A Strong Interest In Comparative Approaches To Examining Cultural Life. This First English-language Monograph On Ottoman Dreamscapes Addresses This Interest And Introduces A World Where Dreams Changed Lives, The Dead Appeared In Broad Daylight, And Biographers Invited Their Readers To The Gardens Of Remembrance.-- The Biographer Between This World And The Hereafter -- Collection Of Lives As A Well-ordered Garden -- From This World To The Realm Of Dreams -- The Dead And Visits From The Hereafter. Asli Niyazioglu. Includes Bibliographical References (pages 117-144) And Index. Half Title 2 Title Page 4 Copyright Page 5 Dedication 6 Contents 7 Acknowledgements 9 Note on Transliteration and Manuscripts 11 Introduction 13 1 The biographer between this world and the hereafter 29 Patrons and adversaries 32 Sufi sheikhs and the very special dead 39 Father and son 44 2 Collection of lives as a well-ordered garden 54 Ottoman biographers and Sufi lives: an overview 56 A well-ordered garden: empire, decorum and exclusivity 59 Gardener at work: ‘Aṭā’ī and his sources 71 3 From this world to the realm of dreams 78 Dreams, careers and biographers 80 Nightmares on the Sufi path 83 The hereafter in the mirror of dreams 86 4 The dead and visits from the hereafter 93 The living and the dead in early seventeenth-century Istanbul 94 Apparitions and embraces 96 Dreams and tokens of remembrance 102 Epilogue 110 Appendix: Sample biographical notice 112 Bibliography 115 Index 136