Hostname: page-component-586b7cd67f-r5fsc Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2024-11-22T20:23:39.030Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false
  • English
  • Français

The fight over nobody's children: Religion, nationality and citizenship of foundlings in the late Ottoman Empire

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  21 July 2015

Nazan Maksudyan
Nazan Maksudyan*
Affiliation:
Wissenschaftskolleg zu Berlin, [email protected].
Get access Rights & Permissions [Opens in a new window]

Abstract

In the late nineteenth century, the religion, nationality, and citizenship of abandoned children became a contested terrain over which much effort was spent by local authorities, foreign missionaries, religious and civil leaders of the communities, municipalities, the police force, and the central state. Relying on Ottoman and French archival sources, together with periodicals and contemporary literature, this paper discerns the elevated political significance of abandoned children within such realms as demographic politics, politics of conversion, and national identities. The state's new preoccupation of properly registering new-born infants, in line with the new Regulation on Population Registration created controversy over the nationality and citizenship of abandoned children. As new administrative reforms challenged the customary jurisdiction and the autonomy of the communal authorities and as the power of the governmental bureaus, police departments, the municipality, and the foundling unit of the Dârü'l-aceze increased, non-Muslim leadership resisted these practices: they both submitted official appeals to the government and opened or strengthened their own foundling facilities. Furthermore, the child gathering efforts of Catholic missionaries created an atmosphere of self-defense on the part of the communities, as they felt threatened with losing prospective members of their newly conceived and idealized imagined communities. In this context, abandoned children attracted interest hardly due to pity, or disinterested charity. Institutional solutions, policies, and strategies of diverse and competing actors were closely related to the emergence of a modernized governmental structure and attempts to strengthen communities as its mirror image.

Keywords

child welfarefoundlingscitizenshipreligionmodern state
Type
Articles
Information
New Perspectives on Turkey , Volume 41 , Fall 2009 , pp. 151 - 179
Copyright
Copyright © New Perspectives on Turkey 2009

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

References

References

Primary sources

Archives du Ministère des Affaires Étrangères (AMAE) Quai d'Orsay, Correspondance Politique et Commerciale, Nouvelle Série, 1897-1918, Turquie, no. 459.Google Scholar
Prime Ministry Ottoman Archives [Başbakanlık Osmanlı Arşivleri] (BOA): DH.EUM.MTK.: 79/43Google Scholar
DH.MKT: 549/2, 783/6, 919/29, 1007/53, 2051/40, 2060/93Google Scholar
DH.UMVM.: 114/44Google Scholar
MV.: 113/119Google Scholar
ZB.: 372/171, 372/172, 373/33, 373/34, 373/84, 374/95, 374/96, 374/102Google Scholar
MAD.d.: 1/13894, 1/13578Google Scholar
H.R.TO.: 458/1Google Scholar
İstanbul Mahkemesi 121 Numaralı Şer'iyye Sicili, İstanbul: Sabancı üniversitesi, 2006.Google Scholar
Anastassiadou, Méropi. “La Protection de L'enfance Abandonnée Dans L'empire Ottoman Au XIXe Siècle. Le Cas de La Communauté Grecque Orthodoxe de Beyoğlu (İstanbul).” Südost-Forschungen no. 59-60 (2000-2001): 272–322.Google Scholar
Bargach, Jamila. Orphans of Islam: Family, Abandonment, and Secret Adoption in Morocco. Lanham: Rowman and Littlefield, 2002.Google Scholar
Baron, Beth. “Nile Mother: Lillian Trasher and Egypt's Orphans.” In Competing Kingdoms: Women, Mission, Nation, and American Empire, 1776-1960, edited by Ellington, Barbara Reeveset al. Durham, N.C.: Duke University Press, forthcoming.Google Scholar
Baron, Beth. “Orphans and Abandoned Children in Modern Egypt.” In Interpreting Welfare and Relief in the Middle East, edited by Neguib, Nefissa and Okkenhaug, Inger Marie, 12–34. Leiden: Brill, 2008.Google Scholar
Boswell, John. The Kindness of Strangers: The Abandonment of Children in Western Europe from Late Antiquity to the Renaissance. Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1998.Google Scholar
Congrégation de la Mission: répertoire historique… et table générale des annales de la congrégation de la Mission depuis leur origine jusqu'à la fın de l'année 1899. Paris: à la procure de la congrégation de la mission, 1900.Google Scholar
“Dârülaceze Nizâmnâme-i Dahilisi, 13/Ş/1313 (29 January 1896),” Düstûr, ser. 1, vol. 7 (1895-1904), Ankara: Başvekalet Devlet Matbaası, 1941, 43–47.Google Scholar
d'Ohsson, Mouradgea. Tableau Général de l'Empire Othoman: Divisé en Deux Parties, dont l'une Comprend la Législation Mahométane; l'Autre, l'Histoire de l'Empire Othoman. Vol. 5. İstanbul: Les Éditions ISIS, 2001.Google Scholar
Ransel, David L.. Mothers of Misery: Child Abandonment in Russia. Princeton, N.J.: Princeton University Press, 1988.Google Scholar
Deringil, Selim. The Well-Protected Domains: Ideology and the Legitimation of Power in the Ottoman Empire, 1876-1909. London and New York: I.B. Tauris, 1998.Google Scholar
Elshakry, Marwa. “The Gospel of Science and American Evangelism in Late Ottoman Beirut.” Post and Present 196, no. 1 (2007): 173–214.Google Scholar
Ener, Mine. “Charity of the Khedive.” In Poverty and Charity in the Middle Eastern Contexts, edited by Ener, Mine, Singer, Amy and Bonner, Michael, 185-201. Albany: State University of New York Press, 2003.Google Scholar
Ener, Mine. Managing Egypt's Poor and the Politics of Benevolence, 1800-1952. Princeton, N.J.: Princeton University Press, 2003.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
“Extrait d'une lettre de la Sæur Caroline, fille de la Charité à Constantinople, à Ses Parents (Constantinople, 14 Décembre 1845).” Annales de la Congrégation de la Mission 11, (1846):184-92.Google Scholar
“Extraits des rapports des Missions de Notre Province de Constantinople.” Annales de la Congrégation de la Mission 39, (1874): 134-45.Google Scholar
Fahmy, Khaled. All the Pasha's Men: Mehmed Ali, His Army and the Making of Modern Egypt. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1997.Google Scholar
“ModernizingCairo: A Revisionist Narrative.” In MakingCairo Medieval, edited by Rabbat, Nasser O., Bierman, Irene A. and Alsayyad, Nezar, 173-200. Lanham: Lexington Books, 2005.Google Scholar
Flueh-Lobban, , Carolyn, . Islamic Society in Practice. Gainesville: University Press of Florida, 1994.Google Scholar
Fuchs, Rachel. Abandoned Children: Foundlings and Child Welfare in Nineteenth Century France. Albany: State University of New York Press, 1984.Google Scholar
Gallant, Thomas W.“Agency, Structure, and Explanation in Social History: The Case of the Foundling Home on Kephallenia, Greece, During the 1830s.” Social Science History 15, no. 4 (1991): 479–508.Google Scholar
Georgelin, Hervé. La Fin de Smyrne: Du Cosmopolitisme aux Nationalismes. Paris: CNRS, 2005.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Giladi, Avner. Infants, Parents, and Wet Nurses: Medieval Islamic Views on Breast-Feeding and Their Social Implications. Leiden: Brill, 1999.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Ginio, Eyal. “Living on the Margins of Charity.” In Poverty and Charity in the Middle Eastern Contexts, edited by Ener, Mine, Singer, Amy and Bonner, Michael, 165-184. Albany: State University of New York Press, 2003.Google Scholar
Hyamson, Albert M.The Sephardim of England: A History of the Spanish and Portuguese Jewish Community 1492-1951. London: Menthuen & Co., 1951.Google Scholar
Kechriotis, Vangelis. “Greeks of Izmir at the End of the Empire: A Non-Muslim Community between Autonomy and Patriotism.” Ph.D. diss., Leiden Universtiy, 2005.Google Scholar
Kieser, Hans Lukas. Iskalanmış Barış: Doğu Vilayetlerinde Misyonerlik, Etnik Kimlik ve Devlet 1839-1938. İstanbul: İletişim Yayınları, 2005.Google Scholar
Laslett, Peter, Oosterveen, Karla, and Smith, Richard M., eds. Bastardy and Its Comparative History: Studies in the History of Illegitimacy and Marital Nonconformism in Britain, France, Germany, Sweden, North America, Jamaica, and Japan. Cambridge, Mass.: Harvard University Press, 1980.Google Scholar
“Les Sæurs de la Charité à Constantinople.” Oeuvres des écoles d'orient no. 153 (1886): 244-48.Google Scholar
“Lettre de M. Cartel, prêtre de La Mission, à Sæur N…, Fille de la Charité, à maison-mère à Paris (Smyrne, Maison Du Sacrè-Coeur, 15 Janvier 1884).” Annales de la Congrégation de la Mission 49, (1884): 449-56.Google Scholar
“Lettre de M. Descamps, Missionnaire apostolique, à M. Etienne, Supérieur-Général, à Paris, (Constantinople, Le 15 Janvier 1851).” Annales de la Congrégation de la Mission 16, (1851): 89–95.Google Scholar
“Lettre de ma Sæur Sauvage, à M. N. à Paris (Smyrne, Maison de Marie, 14 Mars 1873).” Annales de la Congrégation de la Mission 38, (1873): 404-6.Google Scholar
“Lettre de Sæur Gignoux à M. Etienne, Supérieur Général, (Smyrne, 21 Janvier 1873).” Annales de la Congrégation de la Mission 38, (1873): 177–219.Google Scholar
Maksudyan, Nazan.“Foster-Daughter or Servant, Charity or Abuse: Beslemes in the Late Ottoman Empire.” Journal of Historical Sociology 21, no. 4 (2008): 488–512.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Maksudyan, Nazan.“Guardians of Abandoned Children: Provisions for the Foundlings in the Nineteenth-Century Ottoman Empire.” Journal of History of Childhood and Youth 2, no. 3 (2009): 361–392.Google Scholar
Marcus, Abraham.“Privacy in Eighteenth-Century Aleppo: The Limits of Cultural Ideals.” IJMES 18, no. 2 (1986): 165–183.Google Scholar
Masters, Bruce. Christians and Jews in the Ottoman Arab World: The Roots of Sectarianism. New York: Cambridge University Press, 2001.Google Scholar
Moutassem-Mimouni, Badra. Naissances Et Abandons En Algérie. Paris: Éd. Karthala, 2001.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Nomer, Engin. Vatandaşlık Hukuku. İstanbul: Filiz Kitabevi, 1989.Google Scholar
Özbek, Nadir. Osmanlı İmparatorluğu'nda Sosyal Devlet: Siyaset, İktidar ve Meşruiyet 1876-1914. İstanbul: İletişim Yayınları, 2002.Google Scholar
Özbek, Nadir. “The Politics of Welfare: Philanthropy, Voluntarism and Legitimacy in the Ottoman Empire, 1876-1914.” Ph.D. diss., State University of New York at Binghamton, 2001.Google Scholar
Peirce, Leslie. Morality Tales: Law and Gender in the Ottoman Court of Aintab. Berkeley: University of California Press, 2003.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Piolet, Père J. B.La France Au Dehors Les Missions Catholiques Françaises Au XIXe Siècle, Tome Premier, Missions D'orient. Paris: Librairie Armand Colin, 1900.Google Scholar
“Rapport de M. Lepavec, Supérieur de la maison de Monastir, à M. Soubiranne, Directeur de l'Oeuvre des Ecoles d'Orient, (9 Janvier 1867).” Annales de la Congrégation de la Mission 33, (1868): 29–65.Google Scholar
“Rapport sur les établissements de Filles de la Charité à Smyrne et aux environs.” Annales de la Congrégation de la Mission 41, (1876): 532-43.Google Scholar
“Rapport sur les Missions.” Annales de la Congrégation de la Mission 59, (1894): 162-68.Google Scholar
“Rapport sur les Oeuvres des Missions de Constantinople, envoyé à M. Etiene, Supérieur Général, par M. Boré, Préfet apostolique (Constantinople, 25 Mars, 1854).” Annales de la Congrégation de la Mission 19, (1854): 133-78.Google Scholar
Règlement de l'orphelinat grec à Smyrne, fondé en février 1870. Smyrne, 1874.Google Scholar
Rugh, Andrea B.“Orphanages in Egypt: Contradiction or Affirmation in a Family-Oriented Society.” In Children in the Muslim Middle East, edited by Fernea, Elizabeth Warnock, 24-41. Austin: University of Texas Press, 1995.Google Scholar
Simon, Rachel. Change within Tradition among Jewish Women in Libya. Seattle: University of Washington Press, 1992.Google Scholar
Sonbol, Amira al-Azhary. “Adoption in Islamic Society: A Historical Survey.” In Children in the Muslim Middle East, edited by Fernea, Elizabeth Warnock, 45-67. Austin: University of Texas Press, 1995.Google Scholar
Spagnolo, John P.“The Definition of a Style of Imperialism: The Internal Politics of the French Educational Investment in Ottoman Beirut.” French Historical Studies 8, no. 4 (1974): 563–584.Google Scholar
Sujimon, M. S.“The Treatment of the Foundling (Al-Laqit) According to the Hanafis.” Islamic Law and Society 9, no. 3 (2002): 358–385.Google Scholar
Terpstra, Nicholas. Abandoned Children of the Italian Renaissance: Orphan Care in Florence and Bologna. Baltimore: JHU Press, 2005.Google Scholar
van de Walle, Etienne. “Illegitimacy in France During the Nineteenth Century.” In Bastardy and Its Comparative History: Studies in the History of Illegitimacy and Marital Nonconform ism in Britain, France, Germany, Sweden, North America, Jamaica, and Japan, edited by Laslett, Peter, Oosterveen, Karla and Smith, Richard M., 264-77. Cambridge, Mass.: Harvard University Press, 1980.Google Scholar
Yıldırim, Mustafa. ıslam Hukuku Açısından Evlat Edinme, ızmir: İzmir İlahiyat Vakfı, 2005.Google Scholar
Yıldırım, Nuran. İstanbul Darülaceze Müessesesi Tarihi, İstanbul: Darülaceze Vakfı, 1997.Google Scholar
Zohrab, Krikor. “Rahmetli.” İn Öyküler, 46-57. İstanbul: Aras Yayıncılık, 2001.Google Scholar