Two Voices of Diplomacy: A Comparative Analysis of Ottoman and French Correspondence during the Franco–Ottoman Alliance (1553–1560)
Kasra Mohebbi Moghadam Somesaraee
Abstract. This article compares representations of the Franco–Ottoman alliance, in correspondence from 1553 to 1560. The two collections of correspondence studied here are the historical narrative of the Franco–Ottoman alliance from the Ottoman point of view, Münşeʾâtü's-Selâtîn by Feridun Ahmed Bey, and from the French point of view, Négociations de la France dans le Levant by Ernest Charrière. This article does not intend to study the two historical documents as two ‘national’ views on a period in history. Instead, the two documents will be studied in parallel. They can be read as two parts of one single historical narrative of the diplomacy of a period under review, or as two historical narratives of equal value, together presenting a full and accurate view of the relations between the Ottoman Empire and France in the sixteenth century. The article in particular focuses on how both collections of correspondence represent four topics: friendship, military co-operation, intelligence collected and intelligence transmitted. The article also studies the language of negotiation and the language of alliance as presented in both collections of correspondence. Above all the study establishes the unique historical value of the Münşeʾâtü's-Selâtîn as the only existing collection of Ottoman correspondence that is complemented by a virtually complete collection of correspondence written in the language of the other side.
Keywords: Franco–Ottoman Alliance, Münşeʾâtü's-Selâtîn, Ottoman diplomacy, French diplomacy, diplomatic correspondence, sixteenth century