Since the project began in 2009, research has concentrated on documents held in the Ottoman archives in Istanbul. Most of these are in Ottoman Turkish, but a significant number are in Arabic, the principal language used for diplomatic communications between the Ottoman Empire and South East Asia. French, the major language of diplomacy in the nineteenth century, is also represented, while smaller amounts of material in Dutch, English, Malay, Tausug and Burmese have also come to light. The bulk of the documents date to the nineteenth and early twentieth centuries, but smaller quantities of material in Ottoman and Arabic survive from the sixteenth century. A preliminary survey of our results is available here. We have also given support to smaller individual research projects. Topics covered to date include: - Seventeenth and eighteenth century Ottoman influences on South East Asian Islam according to Arabic manuscripts from Indonesia. - Ottoman subjects from Syria in South East Asia, 1850s-1918. - South East Asian material culture in Istanbul. - Ottoman paper in Malay manuscripts. Click here for more details. These projects are still in progress and further information about them will be published on this website on their completion. Opposite: Ottoman translation of a plea for help from Aceh, dated 1268 AH. BOA. İ.MLV. 226/7706 |
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