Christianity and Islam Under the Sultans - Vol I

CHRISTIANITY AND ISLAM UNDER THE SULTANS by THE LATE F. W. HASLUCK,Originally published in 1929. EDITOR’S NOTE: MY husband spent most of his life from 1899 to 1916 in Greece and Turkey. During the first fourteen years of this period, working as an archaeologist rather than as an orientalist, he studied at various times the classical archaeology of Greece, the medieval and modern* history of Smyrna, the rise and development of the Orthodox monasteries of Mount Athos, the records of medieval geography and travel in the Near East, and the Genoese and Venetian coins and heraldry found in that area. The fruits of these studies were several books and some fifty articles. In the spring of 1913 he visited Konia, the ancient Iconium. There he became interested in the interplay of Christianity and Islam within the Turkish empire, and from that time this subject and its derivatives occupied most of his attention. The result of his researches is this work, the first comprehensive study of Turkish folk-lore and its relations with Christianity. The inequalities of the work, however, are so obvious that they call for an explanation of the circumstances in which it has been written and published. After his visit to Konia the author read and wrote steadily until the outbreak of the war. His delicate health made active military service impossible, and he continued his researches, amid ever-increasing diffi culties, until the summer of 1915. Then he joined the Intelligence Department of the British Legation at Athens, where use was found for his exceptional know ledge of the languages and general conditions of the Near East. He found the work uncongenial, but he devoted himself entirely to it and had only his weekly holiday for writing. Late in 1916 the lung trouble that had long sapped his strength was diagnosed and he was sent to Switzerland. There was considerable danger from German submarines at that time on the sea journey from Greece to Italy, and to avoid risk of loss he left behind him in Athens such of his manuscripts as did not exist in duplicate. In Switzerland he con tinued to read and to write, so far as his gradually de clining health and strength allowed. He died there on February 22, 1920, a few days after his forty-second birthday. It then fell to me to publish as much of his work as possible. On the present subject he had intended to publish two books, the first entitled ’ Transferences from Christianity to Islam and Vice Versa ’ and the second ’ Studies in Turkish Popular History and Religion Since, however, their contents were cognate and ’ Studies ’ was left very unfinished, my friends advised their fusion. This has been carried out, ’ Transferences ’ being represented in the present edition by Part I and Chapters XXV-XXXVIII of Part III, and ’ Studies ’ by Part II and Chapters XXXIX-LX of Part III. The title of the present edition was given by me. Very few of the manuscripts had passed the author as ready for publication. One-third of the total number were nearly ready. Four-fifths of the others, including those in Athens, were in a provisional form, and one fifth existed only in notes. In my editorial work I have preserved the original text as scrupulously as possible. Certain repetitions were deleted after the two books were combined, and defective chapters have been writ ten up and completed to the best of my ability, but these are the only parts of the text which are not as my husband wrote them.