The Turk in French History, Thought and Literature 1520-1660

A glance at the table of contents of this study will reveal the fact that I have attempted to do two things : first, to show the multiple points of contact during a century and a half between Ottoman and French civilizations; second, to trace the result of this contact in the ideas and literature of France during this period. If the first, factual portion of the book seems to bulk over-large, it is because the historians have not yet provided us with a general treatment of this subject.

Books and articles on various individual features there are, of course, and they hare been gratefully used. But the drawing of the composite picture has had to be largely my own accumulation and synthesis. I hare made no. attempt to employ contemporary Turkish, Latin, German, or Italian sources, or the resources of the Archive Nationales and the Archives du Ministere des Aft aires Etrangeres in.Paris. Such a limitation, forced by ignorance in respect to the Turkish language and by considerations of time and space in the other cases, is quite legitimate, I feel, since my predominant aim is to see the Turk through the eyes of a sixteenth or seoenteenth century Frenchman. It would, be interesting, but it is not essential, to check the accuracy of the impressions of the Turk gained by contemporary French travelers or readers. Many of these undoubtedly came to well-educated Frenchmen through Latin, but the very fact that almost no Latin word, of any consequence to this subject failed to be translated into French within a few years of its appearance tends to support the contention that the great bull, of public opinion was molded by French books, and I have chosen the easier course, perhaps for the reader as well as for myself, of using the French translations almost exclusively. Reference is always made to the Latin editions.

A number of manuscript sources which have been made readily availaofble by modern editions have been employed as