The majzubs and majnuns in the ottoman state: A glance into the ottoman hospitals and madness in the early modern period

Abstract

The Book of Travels of Evliya Çelebi is a polyphonic narrative in which different genres such as biography, fiction and history intertwine with each other. Evliya’s Seyahatnâme, which encompasses a large spectrum of subject matter and world-wide geography, is a significant source for researchers coming from different academic disciplines. In this article it was dwelled on how hospitals were depicted and the issue of madness was reflected in Seyahatnâme. The article mainly centered on chapters depicting the hospitals in Edirne and Egypt. In the first part of the article the lexical meanings of bîmârhâne, bîmâristân and tîmârhâne have been discussed and it has been briefly touched on the architectural structure of the Ottoman hospital and the method of its management. It is aimed to discover the differences between the Ottoman hospitals and modern hospitals and demonstrate that the differences between these medical institutions actually depend on the difference of mentality. Indeed the pre-modern Ottoman mentality, which bears the traces of the medieval worldview, didn’t define madness with a marginalised point of view unlike the Western modernity. The early modern hospitals were built at the center of the city, which was another sign of the symbiotic lifestyle of the Ottoman society. In the last two parts of the article it is analysed how madness was depicted and defined in the Seyahatnâme. Therefore, the works of Michael Dols and Eyüp Öztürk and the biographical anthology of Enfî Hasan Hulûs Halvetî was benefited as theoretical and informative sources. Furthermore, some of the mystics introduced in the anthology of Enfî Hasan Ağa have been found in Seyahatnâme, as well. Finally, it is revealed that Evliya divided madmen into two groups as melancholic people (majnun) and mystic majzubs in his Book of Travels. In other words, it is understood that both lyric and sufistic meanings have been attributed to madness in Seyahatnâme.