BETWEEN TWO WORLDS

Turkey: A Short History By Norman Stone, Thames & Hudson, 9.95

The major city of Turkey, Istanbul before 1453 it was called Constantinople is the only city in the world that physically straddles two continents. It has a European side and across the Bosphorus, an Asian side. Istanbul, on its European side, is also divided between the modern city that lies across the Golden Horn (an inlet of the Bosphorus) and the historical Istanbul, built on a promontory on the Sea of Marmara and the Bosphorus. These geographical and historical divisions of Turkeys first city (Ankara is the capital but it doesnt command the importance of Istanbul) in significant ways reflect the history of Turkey. Norman Stone, formerly of Oxbridge and then was so seduced by the irresistible charms of Turkey that he became (and still is) the director of the Turkish-Russian Centre of Bilkent University, Ankara, explores the history of Turkey in one grand, exhilarating sweep. The early Turks, Stone points out, came from the Altai region of Central Asia. They moved in waves towards the west and south west: the direction of the great civilizations that lay on the periphery of Central Asia. The early history is difficult to reconstruct but by the 14th century it was possible to talk of the Ottoman state as an entity. The highpoint of the Ottoman state was the conquest of Constantinople in 1453 by Mehmet II. A significant component of Mehmets conquering force were the Janisseries (yeni ceri in Turkish, meaning new troops) young boys who were conscripted, trained, converted to Islam and given privileges in the palace. They formed an elite and compact core; in the 19th century the Janisseries were disbanded because they defied the authority of the Sultan. The transformation of Constantinople to Istanbul was the beginning of the making of

modern Turkey. Norman Stone sees the making of Turkey as being influenced by six factors: (i) the ancient native Turkish tradition; (ii) Persia; (iii)Byzantium; (iv) Islam; (v) what sort of Islam; and (vi) conscious westernization. The Ottoman Empire was at its zenith under Suleyman I, who ruled for nearly 50 years (1520-66). During his reign, Ottoman gunnery specialists were in Indonesia, its fleet wintering in Toulon, its armies fighting in Hungary, on the Volga and on the lower Tigris. The west could not ignore Suleyman: Titian painted a portrait of him (picture). Istanbul became a rich city with a population of 7,50,000 which was three times the size of Paris. It was a period of cultural efflorescence in jurisprudence, in poetry and in architecture. Soon after shadows began to lengthen, though the sun would take four hundred years to set on the Ottoman grandeur. The longest shadow was that of bankruptcy. The other was the growing tension between the forces of westernization and the forces of Islam. Before either of these could be resolved, Turkey was engulfed in the First World War. In the aftermath of great war, the Ottoman Empire disintegrated and a republic under the leadership of the redoubtable Kemal Ataturk emerged. Stone brings the story right up to 2010. His telling of the story displays a rare balance between factual details and generalizations. The writing is consistently lucid and occasionally brilliant. He avoids stereotypes and the tone is never patronizing. Stone obviously loves Turkey, its present, past and future. Its difficult to think of a better introduction to a country that is imbued with history. RUDRANGSHU MUKHERJEE