"After being so long Prisoners, they will not return to Slavery in Russia": An Aegean Network of Violence between Empires and Identities

Bu makalede, 1787-1792 Osmanlı-Rus Harbi'nde iki devlet arasında kalan Rum menşeyli bir grup korsanın hikâyesi, kestirme bir cevap vermenin oldukça güç olduğu "Osmanlı kimdir?" sorusu çerçevesinde ele alınmaktadır. Çalışmada birbiriyle örtüşen Osmanlı, Rus ve İngiliz arşiv kaynaklarından hareketle, bahsedilen vaka birkaç farklı yönden ele alınmaktadır. Öncelikle hikâyenin kahramanları olan Rum korsanların zuhur etmelerinin başlıca nedeni olan Ege Denizi'ndeki şiddet sarmalının tarihsel arkaplanı çizilmektedir. Daha sonra Rum denizcilerin Rus hizmetine girmeleri ve Osmanlı güçleri tarafından ele geçirilişleri anlatılmaktadır. Tutsak edilen sıradan denizcilerin, yeni "işverenleri" olan Ruslar ve hükümranları olan Osmanlılar arasında kaldıkları zaman, kendi çıkarlarını korumak için hangi stratejilerle hareket ettikleri açıklanmaktadır. Tutsaklar ve devletler, canla başla tutsakların hukuki kimliklerini ve tabiiyetlerini tanımlamaya çalışırken, harbin bitmesiyle birlikte denizcilerin salıverilmesine sıra geldiğinde hikâye en ilgi çekici safhasına ulaşacaktır.

"O kadar esaretten sonra köle olmak için Rusya'ya dönecek halleri yok": İmparatorluklar ve Kimlikler Arasında Ege'de Bir Şiddet Ağı

This article tells the story of one group of Greek-speaking privateers caught between the Ottoman and Russian empires during a protracted war between those two states in the late eighteenth century (1787-1792). The work uses the incident to explore the complex question of "who was an Ottoman," and the vital effects the answer could have on the lives and livelihoods of those who negotiated their way between these two Black Sea imperial rivals. Drawing on a convenient overlap in Ottoman, Russian, and British archival sources, the article approaches this story from multiple viewpoints, first explaining the context of Aegean maritime violence from which this particular group of corsairs emerged. It then discusses their enlistment in Russian service, their capture by Ottoman forces, and the subsequent attempts of rank-and-file sailors to maneuver between the demands of their Russian employers and their Ottoman captors and rulers, all the while trying to assert their own interests. As captives and governments alike wrestled with the complex question of defining legal identity and imperial loyalty, the story became most interesting when it came time to release the captives at the close of the war in 1792.

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Archival Documents

Arkhiv Vneshnei Politikii Rossiiskoi Imperii (AVPRI), Konstantinopol'skaya Missiya (KM), 90-1-1055.

Başbakanlık Osmanlı Arşivi (BOA), Cevdet Bahriye (CBH), 6275, 10802

BOA, Cevdet Hariciye (CHR), 611, 7582, 9101.

BOA, Cevdet Maliye (CML), 720.

BOA, Divan-ı Hümayun Düvel-i Ecnebiye Kalemi Defterleri (DVEd), 86/4.

BOA, Divan-ı Hümayun Düvel-i Ecnebiye Kalemi Dosyaları (DVE), 65/36.

BOA, Hatt-ı Hümayun (HAT), 209/11182, 210/11316, 211/11478, 1386/55004, 1387/55087, 1387/55144, 1389/55311, 1397/56083, 1400/56389, 1402/56578, 1402/56614, 1402/56639, 1402/56641.

BOA, Maliyeden Müdevver, 10418.

The National Archives [of Great Britain] (TNA), Foreign Office papers (FO), 78/8 #11, 78/8 #15, 78/8 #22, 78/11 #33, 78/13 #10, 78/13 #12, 78/13 #13, 78/13 #15.

TNA, State Papers (SP), 97/51 #5. Published Works

Ahmed Câvid Bey: Osmanlı Rus İlişkileri Tarihi: Ahmet Câvid Bey'in Müntehabâtı, haz. Adnan Baycar, Istanbul: Yeditepe Yayınevi 2004.

Ahmed Câvid Bey: Hadîka-i Vekayî, haz. Adnan Baycar, Ankara: Türk Tarih Kurumu 1998.

Avant, Deborah: "From Mercenary to Citizen Armies: Explaining Change in the Practice of War", International Organization, 54 (2000), p. 41-72.

Bartlett, Roger P.: Human Capital: ?e Settlement of Foreigners in Russia, 1762-1804, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press 1979.

Benton, Lauren: "Legal Spaces of Empire: Piracy and the Origins of Ocean Regionalism", Comparative Studies in Society and History, 47 (2005), p. 700-724.

Duffy, Christopher: ?e Military Experience in the Age of Reason, London: Routledge 1987.

Earle, Peter: Corsairs of Malta and Barbary, London: Sidgwick & Jackson 1970.

Esmer, Tolga Uğur: "A Culture of Rebellion: Networks of Violence and Competing Dis- courses of Justice in the Ottoman Empire, 1790-1808," PhD diss.: University of Chicago 2009.

Greene, Molly: Catholic Pirates and Greek Merchants, Princeton, N.J.: Princeton Univer- sity Press 2010.

Grenet, Mathieu: "Entangled Allegiances: Ottoman Greeks in Marseille and the Shifting Ethos of Greekness (c. 1790 - c. 1820)", Byzantine and Modern Greek Studies 36 (2012), p. 56-71.

Jelavich, Barbara: Russia's Balkan Entanglements, 1806-1914, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press 1991.

Kardases, Vasiles A.: Diaspora Merchants in the Black Sea: ?e Greeks in Southern Russia, 1775-1861, Lanham, MD: Lexington Press 2001.

Krebs, Daniel. "Approaching the Enemy: German Captives in the American War of In- dependence, 1776-1783." PhD diss., Emory, 2007.

Pappas, Nicholas C.J.: Greeks in Russian Military Service in the Late Eighteenth and Early Nineteenth Centuries, ?essaloniki: Institute for Balkan Studies 1991.

Philliou, Christine: "Communities on the Verge: Unraveling the Phanariot Ascendancy in Ottoman Governance", Comparative Studies in Society and History, 51 (2009), p. 151-181.

Şakul, Kahraman: "An Ottoman Global Moment: War of Second Coalition in the Le- vant", PhD diss.: Georgetown University 2009.

Smiley, Will: "?e Meanings of Conversion: Treaty Law, State Knowledge, and Religious Identity among Russian Captives in the Eighteenth-Century Ottoman Empire", International History Review, 34 (2012), p. 559-580.

Smiley, Will: "'When Peace Comes, You Will Again Be Free': Islamic and Treaty Law, Black Sea Conflict, and the Emergence of 'Prisoners of War' in the Ottoman Em- pire, 1739-1830", PhD diss.: University of Cambridge 2012.

Smiley, Will: "?e Rules of War on the Ottoman Frontiers: an Overview of Military Captivity, 1699-1829", Plamen Mitev, Ivan Parvev, Maria Baramova, and Vania Racheva (eds.), Empires and Peninsulas: Southeastern Europe between Karlowitz and the Peace of Adrianople, Berlin: Lit Verlag 2010, p. 63-72.

Thomson, Janice: Mercenaries, Pirates, and Sovereigns, Princeton, N.J.: Princeton Univer- sity Press 1994.

Vasdravellis, John K.: Klephts, Armatoles and Pirates in Macedonia during the Rule of the Turks, ?essaloniki: Hetaireia Makedonikon Spoudon 1975.