Selected Bibilography

Cohen, Amnon, Economic Life in Ottoman Jerusalem, Cambridge, 1989

Faroqhi, Suraiya, Kultur und Alltag im Osmanischen Reich: Vom Mittelalter bis zum Anfang des 20. Jahrhunderts, C. H. Beck, Munich, 1995

Fleischer, Cornell H., Bureaucrat and Intellectual in the Ottoman Empire: the Historian Mustafa Âli (1541-1600), Princeton, 1986
University of California edition forthcoming

Goodwin, Godfrey, The History of Ottoman Architecture, Thames & Hudson, New York, 1971

———, The Janissaries, Saqi Books, London, 1994

Inalcik, Halil, The Ottoman Empire: The Classical Age (1300-1600), Orpheus Publishing, New Rochelle, 1989

Inalcik, Halil and Quataert, Donald, eds., An Economic and Social History of the Ottoman Empire 1300-1914, Cambridge, 1994

Itzkowitz, Norman, Ottoman Empire and Islamic Tradition, University of Chicago, 1972

Kafadar, Cemal, Between Two Worlds: The Construction of the Ottoman State, University of California, 1995

Kinross, John Patrick Douglas Balfour, Baron, The Ottoman Centuries: The Rise and Fall of the Turkish Empire, Quill, New York, 1977
N.B.: Although by far the most commonly available text, Lord Kinross's account is dated and should be taken cum grano salis.

Köprülü, M. Fuad, (and Leiser, Gary, trans. and ed.)The Origins of the Ottoman Empire, SUNY, 1992

Kunt, Metin, and Woodhead, Christine, eds., Süleyman the Magnificent and His Age: The Ottoman Empire in the Early Modern Word, Longman, London and Singapore, 1995

Lewis, Bernard, Istanbul and the Civilization of the Ottoman Empire, University of Oklahoma, 1963

Malcolm, Noel, Bosnia: A Short History, Macmillan London, New York University, 1994.

———, Kosovo: A Short History, New York University, 1998.

Necipoglu, Gülru, Architecture, Ceremonial, and Power: The Topkapi Palace in the Fifteenth and Sixteenth Centuries, MIT Press, Cambridge and London, 1991

Nicolle, David, and McBride, Angus, Armies of the Ottoman Turks, Osprey Publishing, London, 1983

Nicolle, David and Hook, Christa, The Janissaries, Osprey Publishing, London, 1995

Peirce, Leslie P., The Imperial Harem: Women and Sovereignty in the Ottoman Empire, Oxford, 1993

Shaw, Stanford, History of the Ottoman Empire and Modern Turkey, Volume I: Empire of the Gazis: The Rise and Decline of the Ottoman Empire 1280-1808, Cambridge, 1976

Stierlin, Henri, and Vogt-Göknil, Ulya, Architecture of the World: Ottoman Turkey, Benedikt Taschen Verlag, 1965(?)

Fiction

Andric, Ivo, The Bridge on the Drina, University of Chicago, 1977
Nobel Prize-winning Bosnian Serb's tale of the birth and death of Ottoman Bosnia. Translation of Serbo-Croatian Na Drini Cuprija.

Chamberlin, Ann, Sofia, Forge, New York, 1996

———, The Sultan's Daughter, Forge, New York, 1997
On-going saga of Sofia Baffo and Giorgio Veniero, two Venetians who become, respectively, Safiye, Murad III's favorite, and a eunuch in chaste love with his charge, Ismihan Sultan, Selim II's daughter (the second book's eponym). A slightly breathless, occasionally feminist saga of life in the age of the haseki. Enjoyable and well written, especially for fans of romance novels. The only problems I had with it were the transliterations (which are awful) and that the author has appropriated the name and life story of Selim's haseki Nurbanu Sultan (née Cecelia Venier-Baffo) and given it to Safiye Sultan, who was from the Ducagini mountain village of Rezi in Albania. As a writer, this doesn't bother me—and for dramatic purposes, it may improve the story—but the historian in me gets a little twitchy. For the real story, which is certainly interesting enough, check out Leslie Peirce's book above.

Morris, Roderick Conway, Jem: Memoirs of an Ottoman Secret Agent, St. Martin's Press, New York, 1988
"When I set out in search of Jem I had no intention of killing him..." In 1486, Barak, an Ottoman naval captain is pressed into service as a secret agent and sent to pursue and possibly assassinate Prince Cem, loser of the struggle to succeed Mehmet the Conqueror, then fugitive, then hostage "guest" of Western powers. A very good adventure novel; the piece of popular fiction on the Ottomans I've most enjoyed.

Pamuk, Orhan, The White Castle, George Braziller, New York, 1990
Intriguing, magical story of Italian and Ottoman doppelgängers in the seventeenth century, from the most important Turkish novelist of this century. Translation of Turkish Beyaz Kale.

Savage, Alan, Ottoman, Warner Books, London, 1990
A trashy but entertaining potboiler that leavens its history with lots of sex and violence. Also attributes most of the Ottomans' good decisions to a bunch of renegade Englishmen. Oh well...

Schoonover, Lawrence, The Gentle Infidel, Ballantine, New York, 1966
I smell potboiler. "Epic and bold—a masterful novel of the siege and rape of Constantinople!" Haven't read this one yet. I'm saving it for a special occasion. Thanks to Rob for digging this out of the discard box at a used bookstore. (Cover price: 95¢!)

Waltari, Mika, The Wanderer, Putnam, New York, 1951
Translation of Mikael Hakim by the great Finnish historical novelist Mika Waltari. Swashbuckling adventures of the hapless Mikael Karvajalka, cum Mika el-Hakîm. If you like swashbuckling adventure, you'll love it. If not, you'll probably still enjoy it but find it a bit hokey and dated in parts. Out of print, so it's hard to find and pricey.