An Ottoman Traveller: Selections from the Book of Travels of Evliya Celebi Paperback – December 31, 2011

Yes I know abour Marco Polo. I also know about Gore Vidal's "Creation". There are other stories, travelogues, novels, myths i vaguely remember reading. But Evliya Celebi's Travels are above and beyond all that.The complete ten volumes includes history, travel information valid even today, cultural anthropology, psychology, myths, stories, both conservative religious views and the most liberal sexual descriptions. It is an incredible treasure.Evliya's travels took him through the Balkans, Eastern and Central Europe to Russia, the Crimea, Georgia, Azerbaijan, Persia, Armenia, All of the Middle East and Anatolia. He was born in Istanbul in 1611 and died in about 1685 in Cairo. His first book starts describing Istanbul. he was also the first embedded reporter that I know, traveling with the Ottoman army and describing some major battles including one near Vienna.Unfortunately the "Travels" is written in Ottoman Turkish and we have this book as the largest English language compendium of various chapters and sections from the ten volumes. Ottoman Turkish, having incorporated a large number of Persian and Arabic words of the time and using the Arabic script but with the addition of some additional letters (like 'p') is difficult to read because of the limited usage of vowels. Unless you are familiar with a word, it is very difficult to read that word.There are a number of modern Turkish translations, but, so far, no one has either gone to the trouble of translating one of those to English, or trusted one to be complete and unbiased.The present volume, selects what the translator, the editor and the publishers consider to be significant sections from the travelogue. Thus we are at their mercy. What they have picked is mostly very interesting. Yet, one wonders how much one misses because these worthy people decided that we need not read those other sections.It is a book to whet the appetite. There are sections over which a seasoned traveler would go crazy, hoping to visit areas he has not been to and revisit others that he has already visited. A scholar of social anthropology could be aghast at the limitations of his knowledge on the customs and mores and attitudes of the different peoples of the time. A post modern or alternate history novelist would find a treasure here worthy of many short and tall tales. A behavioral psychologist could easily come up with new theories of cognition and perception on the basis of the observations, descriptions and narratives.Finally, Evliya Celebi is my namesake. My name is Celebi pluralized. My late uncle, Asaf Halet Celebi, was an important poet of the first half of the twentieth century. I call myself "Otherchelebi" in preparation of the publication of my travels, to continue the tradition. Unfortunately, i cannot trace my roots to Evliya.As an interesting afterthought, the word "Celebi" pronounced 'chaelaebee,' meant a 'gentleman, an intellectual, a man of learning, a wit' and was used by Ottomans and included many Armenians in the Ottoman Empire. According to Evliya, Turks were not regarded highly by the Ottomans who basically were christians converted to islam at an early age, educated at palace schools and who were not allowed to establish any roots in any regions or lands.

It is an interesting and useful resource to understand how an Ottoman intellectual saw other countries and cultures, which were so different than Istanbul life of the day.

Select this book if you are curious about a fascinating time and place - the world of the Ottomans! It is not a fast read and it is rather long. However it is well written with colorful language painting a tapestry of the exotic in a voice from the distant past.Drink this book while sipping Turkish tea while reclining on pillows in front of the fire or bring it to a cafe and sip coffee. You will be worlds away in no time!

This is a large work that is a translation of an early travelers account and it is very well done.

it was not worth the cost

Fascinating!

Fascinating

This is a beautiful description of the Ottoman Empire 500 years ago through the eyes and pen of a traveling scholar. Fill of wonderful adventure and detailed descriptions, it's worth a read.