On the shores of empire

Abstract

Much has been written on whether the Ottoman Empire was a terrestrial or a maritime one. Lost in this binary is what lies in between, namely the terraqueous dimensions of imperial rule. Enquiring into the interaction between land and water, the chapter transcends this divide and explores the ecological and economic continuum of the seas, continents, coastlines, islands, rivers, and lakes that compose the Ottoman world. Neither completely terrestrial nor simply aquatic, they are best conceived as hybrid spaces where land and water interact. We posit three Ottoman terraqueous zones defined by four rivers and four seas: the Danube, the Black Sea, the Aegean Sea, and the Adriatic Sea in the north domains of the empire; the Nile, the Eastern Mediterranean, and the Red Sea in the south; and Mesopotamia, from eastern Anatolia to the Persian Gulf in the east.