Fighting the “Levantinization” of Ottoman Turkey’s Italian community: Italian government’s strategies and plans (1880-1911), LIVING TRANSCULTURAL SPACES CO.AS.IT., Diaspore Italiane - Italy in Movement, MELBOURNE: 4-8 APRIL 2018. (original) (raw)
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During the Nineteenth century, the Italian peninsula was shaken by significant evolutions and revolutions in its political, economic and social structure: the Risorgimento movement, the foundation of the Kingdom of Italy in 1861 and the agrarian problem in the South of the peninsula. These factors were among the main causes of the migratory flow that made so many Italians leave the country in that century. One of the main arrival destination was the Ottoman Levant: a territory that had already hosted, for centuries, a small Italian-speaking community and where reforms within the Sublime Porte were offering new scenarios and opportunities to foreign workers. This paper aims to examine the process of insertion of this heterogeneous community, in sectarian and social terms, in the ottoman context, and specifically in the cities of Istanbul and Izmir. The relationship between the Italian community, the authorities, and the other communities in the urban space, the language used in the public and working sphere and their institutions will be analyzed in relation to the Mediterranean policy undertaken by the Kingdom of Italy.
Since the Middle Age, Italian merchants had established their colonies in the Levant in order to develop the trade between the West and East. As a result of their presence, Italians were able to enlarge their networks during the Ottoman period which enabled them to have a main role in the circulation of goods, ideas and culture in the Levantine cities. Through out of the 19th century, thanks to the foundation of the Kingdom of Italy in 1861, the Italians of the Levant took advantage of the new institutions created by the Italian state. Consequently, this gave them a stronger link to their motherland. In this regard, the establishment of an Italian Chamber of Commerce in the Ottoman capital in 1885, was the first step towards the development of an Italian-Ottoman economical relationship. This body, the Italian Chamber of Commerce, was behind the publication of a commercial bulletin, the Rassegna Italiana - Organo degl’Interessi Italiani in Oriente, which supported and informed people about the Levantine trade. The aim of this paper is to investigate the Italian trade network in Turkey after the establishment of the Turkish Republic. This study will deeply examine the Italian presence in the new Turkish market thorough a research on the Italian institutions, Consular Agencies and other entities that functioned during the interwar period. The main questions of this work will be focused on how Italy kept her predominant position in Turkish regions during the past Ottoman period and how her Levantine appendix reacted in the face of the changed political environment. The sources of this paper will be the records of the Italian Chamber of Commerce in Istanbul, the material published by the Rassegna Italiana, the archival documents coming from the Ministry of Foreign Affairs in Rome and other information available in several private institutions. A bibliography on this subject in Italian, English, French and Turkish will further buttress and strengthen this research.
The study of the Italian communities abroad has seen unprecedented developments in the recent years following the establishment of a large number of study centers, associations, museums and university departments dedicated to the study and preservation of the Italian migration heritage. While it is common to hear about Little Italy, Petite Italie and Barrio Italiano, unfortunately, the Italian migration heritage still remains unknow in the Eastern Mediterranean regions. Yet, in this very same geographical area, resides one of the most ancient Italian communities abroad: the Italian-Levantines. This paper aims at analyzing the most recent studies on the Italian heritage in Turkey and the ongoing projects which are addressed to create an Italian-Levantine memory.
The paper analyses the use of Italian as a literary language in the literature of European travel to the Ottoman Empire during the late Ranaissance. The choice of Italian will be explained as the link between its diffusion in Europe as a language of culture and its practical uses in the Mediterranean as a diplomatic and commercial code or as a tool of religious propaganda. During the late Renaissance, travels to the Ottoman Empire were the continuation of the peregrinatio academica and the Grand Tour to Italy of high-educated European scholars. In light of this premises, I will present different versions , both manuscripts and in print, of the multilingual relatione by the Pole Wojciech Bobowski (1610-1675), musician and dragoman in the Ottoman Empire, who wrote a description of the Topkapi Palace for European readers in Italian.
Turkish Literature in Italian: 1923-2012
Istanbul Üniversitesi Çeviribilim Dergisi, sayı 5, 89-120, 2013
This paper presents a brief survey on translated Turkish literature in Italian. Italy and Turkey, two Mediterranean countries that are geographically not too distant, have had long historical, commercial, and cultural ties. However, despite the considerably high number of translations from Italian into Turkish since the 1870s, the flow of translations from Turkish literature into Italian, which started only in 1923, has been slow until the 2000s. This paper examines the position of Turkish literature in Italian based on a bibliography of translated works; discussing at the same time several issues that arise while compiling a bibliography of translated works.