Tanzimat döneminde Türkçenin imlası meselesini ciddi olarak ilk defa Ahmet Mithat Efendi gündeme getirmiştir. Yazar bu konuda 1890 yılının Ekim-Kasım aylarında yayımlanan Tercüman-ı Hakikat gazetesinin 3699. sayıdan itibaren "Üss-i İmla" adlı makaleler yazmıştır. Bu yazıların ilkinde yer alan "Mukaddime"de sık sık Osmanlı imlasının olmamasından şikâyet edildiğini, herkesin başka türlü imla kaideleriyle yazdığını, "İmla-yı Osmanîmiz için kavaid-i esasiye konulsun" denildiğini dile getirir. Ahmet Mithat Efendi bu yazılarda bazı imla sorunları hakkında görüş belirtir. Fatma Aliye Hanım, bu makaleler yayımlanınca kimi konulara itiraz ettiği bir yazı kaleme almış ve bunu Tercüman-ı Hakikat gazetesine göndermiştir. Ahmet Mithat Efendi, bu itiraz yazısını bir makale olarak yayımlamak yerine farklı bir yöntem seçmiş, Fatma Aliye Hanım'ın yazısına verdiği cevaplarla birlikte bir muhavere (karşılıklı konuşma) olarak yayımlamıştır. 1890 yılının Aralık ayında Tercüman-ı Hakikat gazetesinin 3728-3731. sayılarında yayımlanan "Üss-i İmla Hakkında" başlıklı makalelerde, Fatma Aliye Hanım'ın itirazları "Varakadan" alt başlığıyla parça parça verilmiş, Ahmet Mithat Efendi bu parçalara "Mülahazamız" alt başlığıyla anında cevap vermiştir. Aynı gazetenin Ocak 1891'de yayımlanan 3743 ve 3744. sayılarında "Mebhası İmla" başlığı altında tekrar imla bahsine dönülmüş, bu sefer de gazetenin 3728-3731. sayılarında çıkan muhaveredeki konulardan bahisle yeni görüşler ortaya atılarak tartışılmıştır. Bu yazılarda, Fatma Aliye Hanım Ahmet Mithat Efendi'nin Osmanlı Türkçesinin imlasıyla ilgili yazılarında geçen bazı konuları eleştirmekte, imla konusunda dikkat çeken bazı sorunlar hakkında kendi görüşlerini açıklamaktadır. Ahmet Mithat Efendi ise, Fatma Aliye Hanım'ın görüşlerini ya kabul etmekte ya da katılmadığı yerleri örnekler getirerek izah etmektedir. Burada Osmanlıcanın yazımından kaynaklanan birçok sorun tartışılmıştır. Bu tartışmaların dili oldukça akademiktir. Her iki tartışmacı konuyu daha iyi açıklamak için Arapça, Farsça ve Fransızcadan örnekler vermişlerdir. Bu çalışmada, Ahmet Mithat Efendi tarafından yazılan makalelerdeki imla bahisleri, Fatma Aliye Hanım'ın bunlara itirazları ve Ahmet Mithat Efendi'nin itirazlara cevapları değerlendirilmiştir

Ahmet Mithat Efendi was the first person to bring up the problem of spelling during the Tanzimat Reform Era. He wrote essays under the title of “Üss-i İmla” on the problem from the 3699th issue onwards in the newspaper Tercüman- Hakikat published in September-November of 1890. In the first one of these essays, under the title of “Mukaddime (Preface)” he mentions that there is a frequent complaint about the lack of a Ottoman spelling, everybody writes with different spelling principles, and the “fundamental regulations principles should be introduced for the spelling of our Ottoman language.” Ahmet Mithat Efendi reflects on some of the spelling problems in these essays. Fatma Aliye Hanım wrote an essay including her objections to some of the issues and sent it to the Tercüman-ı Hakikat newspaper after the publication of Ahmet Mithat’s essays. Ahmet Mithat, instead of publishing Fatma Aliye’s objections as an essay, chose a different method and published it as a conversation with his answers to Fatma Aliye Hanım’s comments. In the December of 1890 in the issues 3728-3731 of Tercüman-ı Hakikat, in the essays titled “Üss-i İmla Hakkında (On the Issue of Üss-I İmla), objections of Fatma Aliye Hanım were given in fragments under the subtitle “Varakadan”, and Ahmet Mithat Efendi responded to these objections immediately under the subtitle “Mülahazamız”. The problem of spelling was revisited in the 3743rd and 3744th issues of the same newspaper, published in the January of 1891, under the title of “Mebhas-ı İmla, this time putting forth new suggestions with the mention of the matters discussed in the 3728thand 3731st issues. In these essays, Fatma Aliye Hanım criticizes some of the topics mentioned in the writings of Ahmet Mithat on the spelling of Ottoman Turkish and explains her own thoughts on some of the conspicuous problems of spelling. On the other hand Ahmet Mithat Efendi either accepts Fatma Aliye Hanım’s remarks or explains the points he does not agree with by bringing some examples. Many problems generating from spelling the of Ottoman Turkish language have been discussed: the language of these discussions is highly academic. Both debaters have brought examples from Arabic, Persian and French to explain the subject better. In this study the matters of spelling, which are mentioned in the essays written by Ahmet Mithat Efendi, Fatma Aliye Hanım’s objections to them and Ahmet Mithat Efendi’s responses to these objections are evaluated. STRUCTURED ABSTRACT Ahmet Mithat Efendi was the first person to bring up the problem of spelling during the Tanzimat Reform Era. He wrote essays under the title of “Üss-i İmla” on the problem from the 3699th issue onwards in the newspaper Tercüman- Hakikat published in September-November of 1890. In the first one of these essays, under the title of “Mukaddime (Preface)” he mentions that there is a frequent complaint about the lack of a Ottoman spelling, everybody writes with different spelling principles, and the “fundamental regulations principles should be introduced for the spelling of our Ottoman language.” Ahmet Mithat Efendi reflects on some of the spelling problems in these essays. Fatma Aliye Hanım wrote an essay including her objections to some of the issues and sent it to the Tercüman-ı Hakikat newspaper after the publication of Ahmet Mithat’s essays. Ahmet Mithat, instead of publishing Fatma Aliye’s objections as an essay, chose a different method and published it as a conversation with his answers to Fatma Aliye Hanım’s comments. In the December of 1890 in the issues 3728-3731 of Tercüman-ı Hakikat, in the essays titled “Üss-i İmla Hakkında (On the Issue of Üss-I İmla), objections of Fatma Aliye Hanım were given in fragments under the subtitle “Varakadan”, and Ahmet Mithat Efendi responded to these objections immediately under the subtitle “Mülahazamız”. The problem of spelling was revisited in the 3743rd and 3744th issues of the same newspaper, published in the January of 1891, under the title of “Mebhas-ı İmla, this time putting forth new suggestions with the mention of the matters discussed in the 3728thand 3731st issues. In these essays, Fatma Aliye Hanım criticizes some of the topics mentioned in the writings of Ahmet Mithat on the spelling of Ottoman Turkish and explains her own thoughts on some of the conspicuous problems of spelling. On the other hand Ahmet Mithat Efendi either accepts Fatma Aliye Hanım’s remarks or explains the points he does not agree with by bringing some examples. Many problems generating from spelling the of Ottoman Turkish language have been discussed: the language of these discussions is highly academic. Both debaters have brought examples from Arabic, Persian and French to explain the subject better. In this study the matters of spelling, which are mentioned in the essays written by Ahmet Mithat Efendi, Fatma Aliye Hanım’s objections to them and Ahmet Mithat Efendi’s responses to these objections are evaluated. Some of the subjects discussed: 1. The first subject brought into question by Fatma Aliye Hanım in the essay titled “Üss-i Lisan”, whether the vowels in the first syllable in the words with Turkish origin should be written or not. She puts forth that this causes in reading by giving the "kuyucu/kapucu". 2. She puts emphasis on the inessentiality of spelling the word “dağ” as “tag” and the verb ”dur-“ as “ṭur-“ in Ottoman Turkish and says that these words should be written in accordance with their pronunciations in the dialect of Istanbul and shown with /d/. However, Ahmet Mithat Efendi wrote a lengthy answer stating that spelling does not conform to the pronunciation of the capital cities in many countries, that the English language does not have a spelling and is not pronounced as it is written, and as for French that they do not rely on the Paris pronunciation. Author expresses his opinions in favor /tı/ in the spelling of these words. 3. One of the spelling problems of Ottoman Turkish is about the emergence of several forms of reading. For example “i” in the last syllable of the word “efendim” is frequently not written (ﻡﺩﻨﻓ ﺍ). In fact there is a letter /ye/ at the end of this word. Such autography results in the spread of spelling mistakes. Ahmet Mithat Efendi responds to this issue briefly suggesting the public to not take these into account and write a letter /ye/ letter before the mim as the suggestion of Fatma Aliye Hanım. 4. A new discussion is about the pronunciation of g-breve on the velarized line. For example the people some provinces say “baga” while others say “baya”. The Istanbulite pronounces with a sound between /g/ and /y/. Again some countrymen say “ekmeği kestim”, whereas others say “ekmeyi kestim”. Ahmet Mithat Efendi suggests that local usages should not be taken into account the sound /ğ/ should be pronounced expressly. 5. The next discussion is about the conjunction da/de. In the issue 3704 of Tercüman-ı Hakikat n., Fatma Aliye Hanım thanks Ahmet Mithat Efendi saying that affixation of the postpositional adverb /da/ while writing the referential particle /d/ separately from the previous word is a newly invented rule in order to tell apart between the two. She states that by doing so the text will be understood easily. It is understood that Ahmet Mithat Efendi is the first one to bring up the issue of writing the da/de particle different than the locative suffix, he wrote and established it gradually and he had shown this as an indicator of our improvement in language. 6. Fatma Aliye Hanım had objects to the random location of the interrogative particle to the middle or the end of the word in Tercüman-ı Hakikat'. 7. Fatma Aliye Hanım revisited the issue of ‘nasal kef’, which they had previously discussed with Ahmet Mithat Efendi and brought up a very important topic. Although she had put forth that ‘nasal kef’s were then pronounced as nuns, they are started to be written with nun as occasionally spelling conformed to pronunciation and it was a necessity to regulate spelling in accordance with pronunciation as it changes, however Ahmet Mithat Efendi opposed this idea. Uniformity in spelling still could not be implemented in spite of the long period since 1928, when we adopted the Latin alphabet, increased schooling, communication and universities. This is because the issue of the spelling of Turkish language is not that of our time only. If Ottoman scholars had started discuss this issue in previously as Ahmet Mithat Efendi and Fatma Aliye Hanım did, perhaps it would had been solved by now. Ahmet Mithat Efendi had shown how foresighted Turkish language lover he was by pondering on these issues and applying them in his newspaper