Ottoman Rule of Law and the Modern Political Trial: The Yildiz Case (Hardcover) (ISBN-13: 9780815635970)

In 1876, a recently dethroned sultan, Abd?aziz, was found dead in his cham- bers, the veins in his arm slashed. Five years later, a group of Ottoman senior officials stood a criminal trial and were found guilty for complicity in his murder. Among the defendants was the world-famous statesman former Grand Vizier and reformer Ahmed Midhat Pasa, a political foe of the autocratic sultan Abd?hamit II, who succeeded Abd?aziz and ruled the empire for thirty-three years.

The alleged murder of the former sultan and the trial that ensued were political dramas that captivated audiences both domestically and internationally. The high-profile personalities involved, the international politics at stake, and the intense newspaper coverage all rendered the trial an historic event, but the question of whether the sultan was murdered or committed suicide remains a mystery that continues to be relevant in Turkey today. Drawing upon a wide range of narrative and archival sources, Rubin explores the famous yet understudied trial and its representations in contemporary public discourse and subsequent historiography. Through the reconstruction and analysis of various aspects of the trial, Rubin identifies the emergence of a new culture of legalism that sustained the first modern political trial in the history of the Middle East.

Author: Avi Rubin
ISBN-10: 0815635974
ISBN-13: 9780815635970
Publisher: Syracuse University Press
Language: English
Published: 11/08/2018
Pages: 264
Format: Hardcover
Weight: 1.24lbs
Size: 9.00h x 6.00w x 0.75d

Review Citation(s):
Choice 04/01/2019