A Greco-Turkish Alexander the Great from 1843

In June 2023, on the very day my previous fellowship in Istanbul came to an end and my Harvard one started, I took a flight to Singapore on the occasion of a conference I was to attend. I was thinking grudgingly that this conference—fascinating though it turned out to be—would keep me away from my Harvard project on the Karamanli Alexander the Great for something close to a week. I was wrong! On one of the last days of the conference, the organizers offered us a guided tour in downtown Singapore. As we left the conference venue, we soon found ourselves climbing a small hill, known as Fort Canning Hill, which is covered in lush vegetation. In its heart, among exotic trees and bushes in bloom, there lies a keramat, a shrine, to Iskandar Shah. Iskandar Shah is a historical figure we know little about, possibly a ruler of late 14th century Singapura, the old name for Singapore. [1] Thanks to our guide, we learned that Iskandar was a name he chose himself with one thing in mind, that is, to portray himself on a succession line of impressively successful leaders like Alexander the Great, known in the Orient as either Iskender or Iskandar.

This was an unconventional yet eye-opening first-hand experience of how extensive a reception Alexander the Great enjoys. This was also an extraordinary introduction to my Harvard project, which investigated Alexander’s reception by the Turkish-speaking Greek Orthodox in the Ottoman Empire around the mid nineteenth century. More specifically, my research was based on a book in Karamanlidika, that is, Turkish written with the use of the Greek alphabet, that was printed in Ottoman Constantinople in 1843. This book was nothing else than the Alexander Romance in translation. As much has been written on the latter, [2] my research could have ended there. However, the book reveals much more: in its prologue and lists of subscribers, for example. More than the core text, it was these additions that attracted my interest the most for what they tell us about the purpose of this publication and its audience.

As mentioned, Karamanlidika (in Greek) or Karamanlıca (in Turkish) is the word more often used to denote the works (books, newspapers, pamphlets, handwritten community registers, etc.) written in Turkish with the use of the Greek alphabet. Although not unique to the Karaman region of central Anatolia, from where they took their name, such works were indeed produced in the Ottoman Empire and, on occasion, beyond.

The first Karamanlidika publication dates to 1584 and since then a total of 752 Karamanlidika books saw the prints, most of them in the 19th century. At first, Karamanlidika publications focused on religious topics, a reflection of concerted publication activity by Western missionaries and, to some extent, the Oecumenical Patriarchate. Karamanlidika publications also tended to be not so much original works as translations; this can be noticed in both religious and secular books alike. The period from 1841 to 1850—that is, the decade in which the Karamanli Alexander the Great was also published—saw secular books outnumber religious ones for the first time (by 12 to nine). [3] Athens and Constantinople, the two “national centres” for the Turkish-speaking Greek Orthodox had an impact on what was published in Karamanlidika, especially after 1830. However, a regular interest is noted among the Turkish-speaking Greek Orthodox in popular works of Turkish literature, for example Köroğlu, Aşık Garip, Shah İsmail, and the stories of Nasruddin Hoca. [4]

The Karamanli Alexander Romance falls within the category of translations from Greek, with its translator being a certain Agapios Papazoglou. [5] Who was he? Agapios Papazoglou was a resident of Constantinople, originally from Ankara. He had a book binding workshop at the Sümbüllü Han, close to the Grand Bazaar, where he also sold notebooks and books. [6] In 1843-1844, Papazoglou sold in his workshop various books and brochures in Karamanlidika, most of which had a religious content, [7] and, of course, the Karamanlidika Alexander Romance.

I agree with Sfoini who argues that the Karamanli Alexander was a relatively faithful translation. [8] Some simplification of the text is noticed as well as attempts to expand certain passages. Other differences between the Greek and Karamanli texts include changes to titles of chapters, where chapters are merged or broken down into more than one. If these are differences and similarities with the Greek text, the comparative study of the Karamanli edition with the Ottoman Turkish İskendername [9] and the Persian Iskandarnama [10] shows that these do not really share much of interest.

What purposes did the Karamanli Alexander serve? Generally, the Alexander Romance in Greek is considered an expression of the Ottoman Greeks’ national aspirations. [11] Karamanli literature is not devoid of such references to the Greek national cause. For example, the Karamanli translation of Aristotle’s Physiognomics (1819) contain clear references to that in its prologue by the translator, Anastasios Ch. Gr. Karakioulafes for Kayseri/Caesarea in Cappadocia: “because it is the essential duty of every Greek who loves his nation and the arts … whether small or great, whatever he can contribute to the common good, thus too do I, so as not to appear ungrateful to Hellas, my beloved homeland, offer her this small gift for her two sons who speak a foreign tongue, thus, receiving her blessing … I shall be of greater benefit to her.” [12] In other words, two years before the outbreak of the Greek War of Independence, Karakioulafes sees Hellas as his homeland and his Turkish mother tongue as a foreign one. His alienation from an Anatolian or Ottoman identity is easily discernible.

Such declarations of national aspirations are nowhere to be found in the Karamanli Alexander. The image of Alexander the Great as published by Rigas Feraios or Velestinles adorns the edition of the book studied by Sfoini. [13] This might be an allusion to an emancipatory programme, one however that referred—in Velestinles’ fashion—to all the nations of the Ottoman Empire and their peaceful coexistence. It is known that Rigas Velestinles did not aspire to distinct, let alone competing, national revolutions but to a republican political programme that concerned all the nations in the Empire. [14] Interestingly, in the edition that I had access to, instead of the Alexander’s portrait, the reader comes across a maritime scene in which a man, perhaps a king, drives his chariot drawn by two horses over the waves. A sailing boat and what resembles an island complete the picture as background (see Figure 1 below). [15] Whatever political connotation Alexander’s illustration brought, this seems completely lost in this nautical scene.

In reality, the Karamanli Alexander is nothing else than an Enlightenment-style publication based on the concept of magistra vitae topos. Agapios Papazoglou clarifies his intentions in the prologue. [16] He aims for Alexander to serve as a model to anyone who might read or listen to the story of the life and deeds of this legendary Macedonian ruler: kings, ministers, aristocrats, military officers, religious dignitaries, the uneducated, merchants and artisans, irrespective of whether they are rich or poor—in a nutshell, everyone, no matter what their rank in society. [17] For Papazoglou, Alexander’s story is didactic and offers life lessons to everyone. [18] Alexander’s character, Papazoglou adds, has some qualities that are important for all: fear of God, sense of justice, compassion, insightfulness, zeal and steadfastness. [19] Moreover, Papazoglou considers life to be in vain. [20] This Judaeo-Christian understanding of life and death is confirmed at the end of the book. Following its Greek original, the book concludes with the famous saying by Solomon: “Vanity of vanities! All is vanity.” [21] Significantly, Papazoglou, in order to further impress this point, includes in his book a two-page long poem on the same subject. [22] In all these ways, Papazoglou attempts to edify his audience and instill in them one of the cardinal concepts of the Enlightenment: Humanism (İnsaniyetlik). [23]

Was there an audience for such a book? A list of subscribers—individuals who purchased the book in advance in order to finance its publication—that can be found at the back of the book [24] confirms that the Karamanli Alexander enjoyed a large audience. These subscribers pre-ordered no less than 1.176 copies in total. By means of comparison, an Alexander Romance in Greek, published only two years after the Karamanli Alexander, in 1845, was published in 2.000 copies. [25] One reads in the Karamanli edition that its subscribers were merchants and artisans. They came mostly from towns and villages in Cappadocia but there were also those few who lived in Constantinople and the kaza of Felibe/Philippoupolis (modern-day Plovdiv) in Ottoman Bulgaria. [26]

The Karamanli Alexander is but one variation of the Alexander Romance. It shows the vitality of a minority that bridged two worlds, that of Turkish-speaking populations with that of the Greek Orthodox. It showcases how a community could borrow from Greek-language traditions shared by its coreligionists to enrich its own Turkish-language literary tradition. In this process, Alexander, one of the first profane books in Karamanlidika, aimed at edifying its readers and auditors according to an Enlightenment understanding of the world.