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Introduction
- Johns Hopkins University Press
- Chapter
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Introduction In early June 1614, fleeing a failed love a√air, one of the early modern era’s most intrepid travelers, Pietro della Valle, set out from the Venetian port of Malamocco . A poet, an orator, and a soldier, the twenty-eight-year-old scion of a noble Roman family sailed on the Gran Delfino, a Venetian war galleon armed with forty-five artillery pieces that all but guaranteed a safe passage amid the corsairs that infested the Mediterranean. His objective was one of the most popular and intriguing destinations of early modern travelers, the seat of the sultan of the Ottoman Empire, Constantinople.∞ This departure marked the beginning of an eleven-year ‘‘pilgrimage of curiosity’’ that would take the Roman through Ottoman and Persian lands, and eventually as far as India. During his travels, della Valle actively engaged the cultures he encountered: he ‘‘copied ancient inscriptions , collected oriental manuscripts, dug up Egyptian mummies, researched Arabic science, translated or even composed Persian literature,’’ and even mastered several of the region’s languages. Because of the breadth and depth of his travels and experiences, he has been recognized as a particularly astute and thoughtful early modern cultural reporter.≤ Della Valle’s voyage into the east lasted just over two months, and he landed in Galata,≥ Constantinople’s cosmopolitan suburb across the Golden Horn on August 15, 1614. During the course of his voyage, della Valle composed a detailed and suggestive description of the ‘‘men and women, soldiers, sailors, merchants and passengers ,’’ some five hundred in total, who accompanied him. He paid particular attention to his fellow travelers, who were a decidedly diverse lot: ‘‘There were Catholic Christians, heretics of various sects, Greeks, Armenians, Turks, Per- 2 v e n e t i a n s i n c o n s t a n t i n o p l e sians, Jews, Italians from almost all cities, French, Spanish, Portuguese, English, Germans, Flemings, and to conclude in a few words, [people] of almost all religions , and nations of the world.’’∂ Della Valle’s taxonomy represents his attempt to both order and describe the people he encountered. It illustrates the complexity of the world in which he traveled, as well as two of the primary markers of early modern identity, religion and nation. The image of the ‘‘medley of this company,’’ as della Valle describes it, sharing the limited space of the Gran Delfino—eating, drinking, conversing, passing the long days together for more than two months—also hints at unexpected possibilities of cultural exchange in the Mediterranean of the seventeenth century . Della Valle saw nothing unusual or troubling in the diverse mix of his fellow travelers; indeed he described his experience with them as ‘‘truly delightful,’’ which suggests the potential for seemingly antagonistic cultures to interact and even coexist.∑ It is this nexus between identity and coexistence, specifically in the context of the relationship between the two great early modern Mediterranean sea powers—the Venetian and the Ottoman empires—that is the focus of this study. coexistence The intersection of cultures has attracted much scholarly attention since at least the anthropological turn that produced the ‘‘new cultural history.’’∏ The most important initial studies were usually within the context of European expansion and encounters with the societies of Asia, Africa, and the Americas.π More recently the cultural pluralism of the Mediterranean has been rediscovered: as della Valle’s experience suggests, it represents an excellent laboratory in which to pose questions regarding identity, cultures, and the ways in which individuals and groups interacted in times of peace and of conflict.∫ Because of their long and unique shared history, their abundant archival resources for the early modern period, and the richness of their modern historiographical traditions, the relationship between the Venetian and the Ottoman empires represents an ideal case study for examining the nature of cultural contacts in the Mediterranean.Ω In the case of Venice, scholars in recent years have been drawn to the multicultural character of the city and the possibility of analyzing diverse groups interacting in ‘‘relative harmony,’’ both in the city itself and in its expansive eastern empire, the stato da mar.∞≠ In the early modern era, the Venetian Empire was uniquely situated to function as both boundary and cultural middle ground, ‘‘a place of transition’’ in which people from throughout the Mediterranean and [44.197.114.92] Project MUSE (2024-03-28 19:27 GMT) i n t r o d u c t i...