Crime and Punishment in Istanbul: 1700-1800

This Vivid revisionist history chronicles crime and punishment in Istanbul over more than a century. Taking us through the city's streets, workshops, and houses, Fariba Zarinebaf gives voice to ordinary people---the man accused of stealing, the woman accused of prostitution, and the vagabond expelled from the city. Linking the history of crime and punishment to the dramatic political, economic, and social transformations that occurred in the eighteenth century, she finds that Istanbul in this period remains mischaracterized---in part by the sensational and exotic accounts of European travelers who portrayed it as the embodiment of Ottoman decline, rife with decadence, sin, and disease. In fact, eighteenth-century Istanbul had much in common with other merging modern cities in Europe, and even in America.

"While similar books have been written for other early modern cities, mostly in Western Europe, this book's data on crimes and trials in Istanbul is new and unlike anything written on this period in Ottoman history to date. Work on the legal system is often presented in isolation, while this book seeks to bring legal history and social history together." Linda T. Darling, author of Revenue-Raising and Legitimacy: Tax Collection and Finance Administration in the Ottoman Empire, 1560-1660.

"This book is a thorough and well-researched study that exposes the underworld of the city, and through it the entire fabric of a complex society in a crucial period. Zarinebaf helps us break away from the `Islamic city' paradigm and shows convincingly that Istanbul has more in common with Paris and London than with smaller Islamic cities." Dror Ze'evi, author of Producing Desire: Changing Sexual Discourse in the Ottoman Middle East, 1500-1900 More

Fariba Zarinebaf is Associate Professor of History at the University of California at Riverside and author, with John Bennet and Jack L. Davis, of A Historical and Economic Geography of Ottoman Greece: The Southwestern Morea in the 18th Century.