The Proper Order of Things : Language, Power, and Law in Ottoman Administrative Discourses

The Proper Order of Things demonstrates how early modern Ottoman territorial control, both in general practice and in the specific contexts of Greater Syria and occupied Hungary, was enabled through the creation of a particular web of textual authority. The book therefore focuses attention on an Ottoman paper trail of legal edicts, administrative reports, and reflective treatises that extended the jurisdiction of sovereign power through an evolving textual corpus. This corpus sublimated anxieties of fragmented regional power to assertions of imperial universalism. Formalized registers and circulated protocols fostered the development of a trifecta of imperial order: the emergence of an elite administrative class defined in and through an emerging court bureaucracy; the circulation of a documentary corpus of edicts that promulgated and registered imperial supremacy via a specific idiom of power; and the establishment of a dynastic linguistic and legal medium that defined the shape, even if it did not control the content, of intellectual activity, speculative inquiry, and literary stylizations. The Proper Order of Things thus argues that a link between territorial and textual authority also formalized a particular discourse that became the means by which the Ottoman establishment managed distance and organized diversity into an ordered system of state power. This discourse created a particular orientation to authoritative texts and bridged the divide between conceptual or ideological frameworks and administrative practices. The "natural order of the state" was an early modern mania for the Ottoman Empire. In a time of profound and pervasive imperial transformation, the ideals of stability, proper order, and social harmony were integral to the legitimization of Ottoman power. And as Ottoman territory grew, so too did its network of written texts: a web of sultanic edicts, aimed at defining and supplementing imperial authority in the empire's disparate provinces. With this book, Heather L. Ferguson studies how this textual empire created a unique vision of Ottoman legal and social order, and how the Ottoman ruling elite, via sword and pen, articulated a claim to universal sovereignty that subverted internal challengers and external rivals. The Proper Order of Things offers the story of an empire, at once familiar and strange, told through the shifting written vocabularies of power deployed by the Ottomans in their quest to thrive within a competitive early modern environment. Ferguson transcends the question of what these documents said, revealing instead how their formulation of the "proper order of things" configured the state itself. Through this textual authority, she argues, Ottoman writers ensured the durability of their empire, creating the principles of organization on which Ottoman statecraft and authority came to rest. -- Provided by publisher Cover -- Contents -- Acknowledgments -- Transliteration and Pronunciation -- Introduction: The Structure of Empire and a Grammar of Rule -- PART I: ESTABLISHING GENRES -- 1. The Sovereign State: Spatial and Textual Politics in Early Modern Eurasian Courts -- 2. The State of Stability: The Kanunname as a Genre of Administrative Governance -- 3. The Bureaucratic State: Reforming Documentary Practices -- PART II: PERFORMING PRACTICES -- 4. The Brokered State: "The Past Is No Longer the Present" in the "Land Between the Rivers"--5. A State of Rebellion: The Reterritorialization of Ottoman Sovereignty in Greater Syria -- PART III: OBJECTIFYING GENERIC POLITICS AND PRACTICES -- 6. On the Perfect State: An Ottoman Vision of Order -- Conclusion: The Archiving State -- Notes -- Bibliography -- Index -- A -- B -- C -- D -- E -- F -- G -- H -- I -- J -- K -- L -- M -- N -- O -- P -- Q -- R -- S -- T -- U -- V -- W -- Y -- Z Introduction : The Structure Of Empire And A Grammar Of Rule -- The Sovereign State : Spatial And Textual Politics In Early Modern Eurasian Courts -- The State Of Stability : The Kanunname As A Genre Of Administrative Governance -- The Bureaucratic State : Reforming Documentary Practices -- The Brokered State : The Past Is No Longer The Present In The Land Between The Rivers -- A State Of Rebellion : The Re-territorialization Of Ottoman Sovereignty In Greater Syria -- On The Perfect State : An Ottoman Vision Of Order -- Conclusion : The Archiving State. Heather L. Ferguson. Includes Bibliographical References And Index.