Narration Beyond Genres: The Military Memoirs of Kabudlu Mustafa Vasfi

Yıl 2024, Cilt: 64 Sayı: 64, 353 - 376, 29.11.2024

Ömer Koçyiğit

https://doi.org/10.18589/oa.1597891

Öz

One of the manuscripts in the rich collection at Leiden University Library
was written by a cavalry soldier named Kabudlu Mustafa Vasfi. He was a deli (irregu-
lar horseman) in the Ottoman army in the first quarter of the nineteenth century
and travelled to many places in the eastern Anatolian and Balkan regions. In 1834
Kabudlu wrote a work called Tevārīḫ, in which he discusses his travels and memories.
In the manuscript, he states that he composed the tevārīḫ (chronicle) as an account
of the cities he visited and the wars he witnessed. In this article, I discuss the reasons
why a deli soldier would pen his memoirs by considering the context of Ottoman
book culture in the nineteenth century. The place that chronicles, autobiographies
and travelogues occupied in that period is worthy of greater attention, and they shed
light on how the narratives of an Ottoman soldier were influenced during the trans-
formation from manuscript culture to the era of the printing press. In that regard, by
analysing the manuscript, which was written on the eve of print capitalism in Otto-
man territories, I try to answer the question of why Kabudlu Mustafa Vasfi referred to
his extraordinary travel notes as a chronicle (tevārīḫ). Besides examining two journeys,
namely the travels of the author as well as the travels of the manuscript itself, I also
discuss other travelogues, chronicles, memoirs and diaries from that period to dem-
onstrate the importance of this ego-document written by an irregular soldier within
the context of Ottoman literary traditions.

Anahtar Kelimeler

Ottoman Empire, Military, Manuscript, Travelogue, Autobiography, Ego- Document.

Kaynakça

• BOA, HAT, 1227/47927. BOA, HAT, 510/25048, 7 Muharrem 1240 (1 September 1824). BOA, HAT, 762/36026, 9 Rebiülahir 1230 (21 March 1815). BOA, HAT, 867/38584-M, 20 Zilhicce 1236 (18 September 1821). Kabudlu Mustafa Vasfi: Tevārīḫ, Leiden University Library, Special Collection, Cod.Or.1551