Visions of the Ottoman World in Renaissance Europe by Andrei Pippidi (review)

Book Reviews 393 that understands the body not simply as body, but as the laboring and reproGXFWLYH ERG\PLJKWVHHVRPHWKLQJRWKHUWKDQPHUHO\OLIHDI¿UPLQJLQSURMHFWV for labor and social justice. This question does not take away from Bargu’s argument, but hopefully works as an invitation to situate the concepts with which we work more explicitly within our intellectual genealogies, even when they are as abstract, elusive, and mundane as “life.” (YUHQ6DYFÕ San Francisco State University doi:10.2979/jottturstuass.3.2.15 Andrei Pippidi. Visions of the Ottoman World in Renaissance Europe. London: Hurst & Company, 2012. ix + 283 pp. Cloth, £45.00. ISBN: 978-1849041997. Andrei Pippidi’s book entitled Visions of the Ottoman World in Renaissance Europe is based on extensive research carried out in well-known eastern and western European universities, libraries, and research centers. The period covering the late Middle Ages and Renaissance, starting from 1300 and extending to 1600, which marks the emergence of the Turks in southeastern T T Europe and their expansion towards the West, is considered the most important phase of the history of the image of the Turk in T T Europe. The author aims to reveal the visions of the European opinion makers, e.g., historians, philosophers, scholars , priests, and statesmen, of the Ottomans/Turks who were considered “the T T Other” in Europe and to show the perceptions and stereotypes of them as they DSSHDUHGLQKLVWRULFDOGRFXPHQWVRIWKDWSHULRG7KHDXWKRU¿QGVLWDQHFHVVLW\ in our present day to know the historical visions of the Europeans about the Turks when T T Turkey’s attempt to join the T T European Union has become a political issue. He furthermore believes that objective research on that topic done in a historical, geographical, and sociocultural context is almost non-existent. Being a history scholar in a Romanian university and being of Greek origin, WKHDXWKRULQWHQGVWR¿OOWKLVJDSE\ORRNLQJDWWKHLVVXHIURPWKHSHUVSHFWLYH of southeastern Europe. 3LSSLGL LGHQWL¿HV WKUHH VWDJHV ZLWKLQ WKH VFRSH RI KLV VXUYH\7KH ¿UVW stage, starting with the fall of Constantinople in 1453, evoked pessimism and weariness in Europeans. That was a period when Turks were conquering sev T T eral lands in the Balkans, including the capital city of the East Roman Empire. The second stage was marked with the mobilization on both sides, the Turks T T and the Europeans, that started with the almost simultaneous occurrence of the Reformation in Europe (1517) and the conquest of Hungary by the Turks T T (1526). That stage ended with the victory of the European forces over the Turks T T 394 Journal of the Ottoman and Turkish Studies Association, Vol. 3.2 at the battle of Lepanto in 1571. That meant relief for Europeans from their continuous fear of the Turks. T T The third stage that coincided with the Thirteen Years’ War against the Turks was supposed to end with the recovery of south T T eastern Europe from the Turks but ended in a balance of power. T T The two halves of Europe stabilized and remained so until the end of the seventeenth century. The battles of Nicopolis (1396), Varna (1444), and Kosovo (1448), which marked the expansion of the Turks in southeastern T T Europe during the late fourWHHQWK DQGHDUO\¿IWHHQWKFHQWXULHVFUHDWHGDKRUURULQWKH%DONDQVWKDWVRRQ spread all over Europe. The Turks became not only a menace for T T Europeans but also for Christianity. They were considered to undermine the integrity of Christianity. With the fall of Constantinople, that fear reached its peak. That situation was conceived differently in Europe. Pippidi discerns three main lines of thought that were represented by three European opinion shapers of the sixteenth century. These were the Florentine thinker, strategist, and historian, Machiavelli (1469–1527), the German Protestant reformer, Martin Luther (1483–1546), and the Dutch philosopher and humanist, Erasmus (1465–1536). 0DUWLQ/XWKHU¿UVWEHOLHYHGWKDWWKH7XUNVZHUH³WKHLQVWUXPHQWVRIWKH wrath of God.” They were sent to punish the Christians who had sinned. In that respect he accused the pope—for him the...